At Citizens Advice Bracknell & District we collect and use your personal information to help solve your problems, improve our services and tackle wider issues in society that affect people’s lives.   We only ask for the information we need. We always let you decide what you’re comfortable telling us, explain why we need it and treat it as confidential.

When we record and use your personal information we:

• only access it when we have a good reason
• only share what is necessary and relevant
• don’t sell it to commercial organisations

At times we might use or share your information without your permission. If we do, we’ll always make sure there’s a legal basis for it. This could include situations where we have to use or share your information:

• to comply with the law – for example, if a court orders us to share information. This is called ‘legal obligation’
• to protect someone’s life – for example, sharing information with a paramedic if a client was unwell at our office. This is called ‘vital interests’
• to carry out our legitimate aims and goals as a charity – for example, to create statistics for our national research. This is called ‘legitimate interests’
• for us to carry out a task where we’re meeting the aims of a public body in the public interest – for example, delivering a government or local authority service. This is called ‘public task’
• to carry out a contract we have with you – for example, if you’re an employee we might need to store your bank details so we can pay you. This is called ‘contract’
• to defend our legal rights – for example, sharing information with our legal advisors if there was a complaint that we gave the wrong advice

We handle and store your personal information in line with the law – including the General Data Protection Regulation.  You can check our national Citizens Advice privacy policy for how we handle most of your personal information.  This page covers how we, as your local charity, handle your information locally in our offices.

Who’s responsible for looking after your personal information?

The national Citizens Advice charity and your local Citizens Advice operate a system called Casebook to keep your personal information safe. This means they’re a ‘joint data controller’ for your personal information that’s stored in our Casebook system.

Each local Citizens Advice is an independent charity, and a member of the national Citizens Advice charity. The Citizens Advice membership agreement also requires that the use of your information complies with data protection law.

You can find out more about your data rights on the Information Commissioner’s website.

How Citizens Advice Bracknell & District handles your information

To find out how we handle your information, see our national Citizens Advice privacy policy.  Please see below, further details about how we handle your personal information, depending on how you interact with us.

• When you get advice from an adviser
• When you apply for a job or to be a volunteer
• When you sign up to receive news from us
• When you make a donation to us or join our fundraising lottery club
• Information for funders, sponsors and third party referrers
• When you make a comment on our social media websites
• If you make a complaint about our service

Contact Citizens Advice Bracknell & District about your information

If you have any questions about how your information is collected or used, you can contact our office.

Telephone: 01344 428107 Monday to Thursdays 9am-4pm

Email: admin@bracknellcab.org.uk

Address: Citizens Advice Bracknell & District, Lower Ground Floor, The Columbia Centre, Market Street, Bracknell, RG12 1JG

You can contact us to:

• find out what personal information we hold about you
• correct your information if it’s wrong, out of date or incomplete
• request we delete your information
• ask us to limit what we do with your information – for example, ask us not to share it if you haven’t asked us already
• ask us to give you a copy of the information we hold in a format you can use to transfer it to another service
• ask us to stop using your information

If you want to make a complaint

If you’re not happy with how we’ve handled your data, you can make a complaint through the national Citizens Advice website.  Citizens Advice Bracknell & District also has a complaints leaflet, which details other ways that you can tell us about your complaint. Please ask for a copy of the leaflet.

You can also raise your concern with the Information Commissioner’s office