Storage Richmond upon Thames Privacy Policy
This Privacy Policy explains how Storage Richmond upon Thames collects, uses and protects personal information about its customers in the Richmond upon Thames area. It is intended to meet the requirements of the UK General Data Protection Regulation and related data protection laws. By using our storage services, visiting our premises or interacting with us, you acknowledge that you have read and understood this policy.
Scope and Data Controller
This Privacy Policy applies to all Storage Richmond upon Thames customers, prospective customers, and other individuals whose personal data we process in connection with our services in the Richmond upon Thames area. Storage Richmond upon Thames is the data controller in relation to your personal data, which means we decide how and why your information is processed.
Personal Data We Collect
We collect and process different types of personal data depending on how you interact with us. This may include:
Identification details such as full name, title, date of birth and a copy of an identification document where required for security or verification.
Contact details such as home address, billing address, previous address where necessary, and contact details for authorised persons associated with your agreement.
Communication records including emails, written correspondence, and notes from telephone conversations relating to enquiries, bookings, payments, complaints or support requests.
Contract and account information such as storage unit number, contract start and end dates, payment history, outstanding balances, deposit information and records of contract changes.
Payment and billing information such as payment method, partial payment card details where necessary for recurring payments, and transaction records. We do not store full card numbers where this is not required.
Security and access information such as CCTV footage captured at our premises, access control logs, entry and exit records, and details of authorised persons allowed to access your unit.
Website and online enquiry information such as information you submit through enquiry forms, quote requests, or online booking tools, as well as basic technical data such as IP address and information about your device and browser where this is necessary for security or service delivery.
Lawful Basis for Processing
We only process your personal data where we have a lawful basis to do so. The main lawful bases we rely on are:
Contract: We process personal data to enter into and perform our storage agreements with you, including setting up and administering your account, taking payments, and providing customer support.
Legal obligation: We process data to comply with legal and regulatory requirements, such as tax, accounting, fraud prevention, security obligations and other laws that apply to our business.
Legitimate interests: We process data where it is necessary for our legitimate business interests and where these are not overridden by your rights and interests. This includes ensuring the security of our premises, preventing non-payment or fraud, managing our business operations, and improving our services.
Consent: In limited cases, we may rely on your explicit consent, for example for certain types of marketing communications where consent is legally required. Where we rely on consent, you can withdraw it at any time.
How We Use Your Personal Data
We use the personal data we collect for the following purposes:
To provide storage services to you, including setting up your contract, managing your booking, granting and managing access to your unit, and administering your account.
To process payments, deposits, refunds and any other financial transactions related to your contract, and to keep proper financial and accounting records.
To maintain the safety and security of our customers, staff and premises, including through the use of CCTV, access control systems and monitoring of access logs.
To communicate with you about your contract, bookings, service updates, changes to our terms, reminders about payments, and other essential service messages.
To respond to your enquiries, feedback, complaints or requests and to provide customer service and support.
To manage debt recovery and resolve disputes, including taking steps to recover unpaid charges or enforce contractual rights where necessary.
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations, and to cooperate with law enforcement or regulatory authorities where we are legally required to do so.
To carry out internal business analysis, management reporting and service improvement activities, using aggregated or anonymised data wherever possible.
Data Retention
We retain your personal data only for as long as necessary for the purposes for which it was collected and to meet legal, accounting or reporting requirements. The exact retention period will depend on the type of data and the purpose of processing.
Typically, we keep customer contract records, billing information and related correspondence for a number of years after the end of the contract to comply with legal obligations and to be able to respond to queries or disputes. CCTV footage and access logs are kept for shorter periods, unless they are required for the investigation of an incident or to comply with legal requirements, in which case they may be retained for longer.
When personal data is no longer required, we will securely delete or anonymise it so that it can no longer be linked back to you.
Data Processors and Sharing of Information
We may share your personal data with carefully selected third parties that act as data processors on our behalf. These processors only process your data in accordance with our instructions and are required to implement appropriate security measures.
Examples of data processors we may use include:
Payment service providers who process card payments or direct debits on our behalf.
IT and system support providers who host or maintain our software, customer management systems and security systems.
External professionals such as accountants, auditors, or legal advisers where this is necessary for the management of our business.
We may also share personal data with other third parties in the following circumstances:
With debt recovery agencies or legal representatives when this is necessary to recover outstanding amounts or enforce our legal rights.
With law enforcement agencies, courts, regulators or other public authorities where we are required or permitted by law to do so.
With another organisation in the event of a business sale, merger or restructuring, in which case we will ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place.
We do not sell your personal data to third parties.
International Transfers
Where any of our service providers or systems are located outside the United Kingdom, we will ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect your personal data in accordance with data protection law. This may include using standard contractual clauses or ensuring that the destination country has an adequate level of protection.
Security of Your Personal Data
We take the security of your personal data seriously. We implement technical and organisational measures designed to protect your information from loss, misuse, unauthorised access, alteration or disclosure. These measures include access controls, physical security at our premises, staff training and regular review of our procedures and systems.
Your Data Protection Rights
Under data protection law, you have a number of rights in relation to your personal data. These include:
The right of access: You can request a copy of the personal data we hold about you and information about how we process it.
The right to rectification: You can ask us to correct or complete any inaccurate or incomplete personal data we hold about you.
The right to erasure: In certain circumstances, you can request that we delete your personal data, for example where it is no longer needed for the purposes for which it was collected and we have no legal basis to continue processing it.
The right to restrict processing: You can ask us to restrict the processing of your personal data in certain situations, such as while we are dealing with a request to rectify inaccurate data.
The right to object: You can object to our processing of your personal data where we rely on legitimate interests as our lawful basis and you feel that your rights and interests outweigh our reasons for processing.
The right to data portability: In some cases, you can request that we provide your personal data in a structured, commonly used and machine readable format, or that we transmit it to another controller where technically feasible.
Where we rely on consent as a lawful basis, you have the right to withdraw your consent at any time. This will not affect the lawfulness of processing carried out before consent was withdrawn.
Exercising Your Rights and Complaints
If you wish to exercise any of your data protection rights, or if you have questions about how we handle your personal data, you can contact us using the usual contact details you use to communicate with Storage Richmond upon Thames. We may need to verify your identity before responding to your request. We aim to respond within the time limits set by data protection law.
If you are not satisfied with our response or how we have handled your personal data, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the relevant data protection supervisory authority in the United Kingdom.
Changes to This Privacy Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices, legal requirements or the services we provide. Any changes will take effect when the updated policy is made available. We encourage you to review this policy periodically to stay informed about how we protect your personal data.
