1. Bira Membership Privacy Policy
The information provided will be used to administer your membership of Bira and any divisions, subsidiary companies and all third parties (henceforth referred to as “the Group”), manage your access to membership benefits, including those provided by subsidiary companies and all third parties, and provide you with information (by post, fax, email, telephone or SMS) which we believe may be of interest or benefit. Your business name, trading location and contact details may also be included in any listing of members produced by the Group on its websites, in the members’ handbook or summary of members issued to Members or Associate Members of the Group.
2. Our Data Handling Policy
The British Independent Retailers Association (Bira) is a Trade Association and is committed to protecting the data it collects and using it fairly to contact existing members, potential members and customers with relevant information and applies the current laws, which are known as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
Bira will be what’s known as the ‘controller’ of the personal data you provide to us. Our registered address is 225 Bristol Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B5 7UB. Our Data Compliance Officer is David Wilson and can be contacted via email at gdpr@bira.co.uk.
Wholly owned subsidiaries of Bira, as well as its divisions, subsidiary companies, service partners and other third parties (hereby known as The Group), will be adhering to this privacy notice, including Bira Direct Ltd. Data obtained through the above entities of the Trade Association can share data with each other as per the “How we process your data” section of this notice.
How the law protects you
Your privacy is protected by law. This section explains how this works. Data Protection law says that we are allowed to use personal information only if we have a proper reason to do so. This includes sometimes sharing it outside Bira. The law says we must have one or more of these reasons:
- To fulfil a contract we have with you, or
- When it is our legal duty, or
- When it is in our legitimate interest (business or commercial reason), or
- When you consent to it
Information we collect about you
We may collect personal data about you, including, for example, your name, address, telephone/mobile number(s) and email address. If we are running an event or training course that you are personally attending, then we may collect more sensitive data such as dietary requirements or access needs if applicable. If you are using any of our financial or personal services, then we will collect more data of a financial or personal nature to ascertain the level of service we can offer you. This data could come from internal or third-party services that we may utilise in determining your credit worthiness. Examples of the sources of data we collect about you or your company:
- Membership application form
- Other application forms e.g. events or training courses
- When you talk to us on the telephone, personally or communicate with us via social media or website
- In emails and letters
- When you use our website
- Cookies
- When you interact on social media
- Email tracking facilities
- In surveys
- In financial reviews where a form of credit is offered
- Payment and transactional data
- The internet
- Publicly available information
- Bought in accredited third party marketing lists for recruitment purposes (B2B)
How we process your data
GDPR law says that we can only use your personal information if we have a proper reason to do so. This includes sharing your data with third parties. We may process your personal data for the following purposes, if relevant;
- Administer your membership with Bira
- Responding to your enquiries
- Process applications for banking services
- Extend credit to you or your company
- Credit checking
- Allow you to use service providers and preferred suppliers
- Provide you with information about other goods and services we are offering as a Trade Association
- Permit selected third parties within The Group to contact your business with service offerings that may be of interest to you.
- Notify you about changes to our terms and conditions
- For research and statistical analysis
- Communicate with you about industry news and events, updates to your membership and other activities we are involved in as a Trade Association and believe you would be interested in
- Provide advice or guidance about using our services
- Carry out marketing activities
- Collect and recover money that is owed to us
- Tailor your experience on our website
- Communicate with you via social media
- Respond to complaints and seek to resolve them
- Share information about your use of products with third-party business partners.
We process this data on the basis of our legitimate interest to run Bira in an efficient and proper way for the benefit of our members. This includes managing our financial position, planning, audit, communications, business capability and to exercise our rights set out in agreements and contracts. We also process your personal data where required to comply with laws and regulations that apply to us.
How we will use the information about you
Data is stored securely within Bira’s systems to prevent unauthorised access. No data held by Bira will be supplied outside the European Economic Area (EEA) other than to companies that are signed up to the Privacy Shield (https://www.privacyshield.gov). Bira has various data and security policies that it complies with to ensure the safe keeping of the data that we collect. Staff are trained and regularly updated to ensure they are treating your data within the guidelines of this notice. The Government requires us to screen banking service applications that are made to ensure we are complying with the international fight against terrorism and other criminal activities. As a result of this we may need to disclose your information to Government bodies.
Retention period
There are various lengths of time that data is kept for depending on need and other laws that we adhere to. You have the right to be forgotten within our database as long as there isn’t an over-riding legitimate business need. If you wish to know more, contact gdpr@bira.co.uk.
When we may share your information
We will treat your personal information as private and confidential, but may share it with each other and disclose it outside of the The Group of companies if:
- Allowed by any agreement entered into by you
- You consent
- Needed by our agents, advisers or others involved in running accounts and services for you or collecting what you owe to other companies
- Needed by third parties to help manage your records (such as our IT suppliers who run our computer systems) – please note we will have appropriate separate service contracts in place with these firms
- HM Revenue and Customs or other statutory authorities who require it
- The Law, Regulatory Bodies, or the public interest permits and requires it
- Required by us or others to investigate or prevent crime
- Required as part of our duty to protect your accounts
What are your rights?
You have the right to ask us to provide you with access to and rectification or erasure of your personal data. Providing you with this information is free of charge, but charges may apply for excessive requests. You have the right to ask us to provide you or a third party with the personal data you have provided to us in an electronic format. You have the right to object to certain purposes for processing, in particular direct marketing. If you wish to raise a complaint on how we have handled your personal data, you can contact our Data Compliance Officer, who will investigate the matter further. If you wish to stop us from providing you with marketing materials, then you can opt out at any time by ticking the appropriate boxes on data forms, clicking the appropriate links within an email or contacting our membership department directly (membership@bira.co.uk). For further information on which companies have been supplied with your details or how your information is used, how we maintain the security of your information and your rights to access/alter and change information we hold on you, please write to us at: 225 Bristol Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B5 7UB Should you be unhappy with our processing of your personal data, you have a right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office, which is the regulator for data protection.
Breaches
In the event that we believe there is a serious breach to our systems or data, we will inform the Information Commissioner’s Office within 72 hours and will inform the affected members/customers as soon as practically possible there afterwards.
Changes to this policy
Any changes we make to this policy in the future will be communicated to you via email. The full notice (as it currently stands) will be available on our website here as well as available on request by contacting the Membership Department or Data Compliance Officer. This policy was last updated on 18th August 2023.
3. Our Website Privacy Policy
This website and its owners take a proactive approach to user privacy and ensure the necessary steps are taken to protect the privacy of its users throughout their visiting experience. This website complies to all UK national laws and requirements for user privacy.
What is this Privacy Policy for?
This privacy policy is for this website www.bira.co.uk and served by the British Independent Retailers Association and governs the privacy of its users who choose to use it.
The policy sets out the different areas where user privacy is concerned and outlines the obligations & requirements of the users, the website and website owners. Furthermore, the way this website processes, stores and protects user data and information will also be detailed within this policy.
Contact & Communication
Users contacting this website and/or its owners do so at their own discretion and provide any such personal details requested at their own risk. Your personal information is kept private and stored securely until a time it is no longer required or has no use, as detailed in the Data Protection Act 1998. Every effort has been made to ensure a safe and secure form to email submission process but advise users using such form to email processes that they do so at their own risk.
This website and its owners use any information submitted to provide you with further information about the products / services they offer or to assist you in answering any questions or queries you may have submitted. This includes using your details to subscribe you to any email newsletter program the website operates but only if this was made clear to you and your express permission was granted when submitting any form to email process. Or whereby you the consumer have previously purchased from or enquired about purchasing from the company a product or service that the email newsletter relates to. This is by no means an entire list of your user rights in regard to receiving email marketing material. Your details are not passed on to any third parties.
External Links
Although this website only looks to include quality, safe and relevant external links, users are advised adopt a policy of caution before clicking any external web links mentioned throughout this website. (External links are clickable text / banner / image links to other websites, similar to; Folded Book Art or Used Model Trains For Sale.)
The owners of this website cannot guarantee or verify the contents of any externally linked website despite their best efforts. Users should therefore note they click on external links at their own risk and this website and its owners cannot be held liable for any damages or implications caused by visiting any external links mentioned.
Adverts and Sponsored Links
This website may contain sponsored links and adverts. These will typically be served through our advertising partners, to whom may have detailed privacy policies relating directly to the adverts they serve.
Clicking on any such adverts will send you to the advertisers website through a referral program which may use cookies and will track the number of referrals sent from this website. This may include the use of cookies which may in turn be saved on your computers hard drive. Users should therefore note they click on sponsored external links at their own risk and this website and its owners cannot be held liable for any damages or implications caused by visiting any external links mentioned.
Cookie Policy
This website uses cookies to better the users' experience while visiting the website. Where applicable this website uses a cookie control system allowing the user on their first visit to the website to allow or disallow the use of cookies on their computer / device.
This complies with recent legislation requirements for websites to obtain explicit consent from users before leaving behind or reading files such as cookies on a user’s computer / device.
Cookies are small files saved to the user’s computers hard drive that track, save and store information about the user’s interactions and usage of the website. This allows the website, through its server to provide the users with a tailored experience within this website. Users are advised that if they wish to deny the use and saving of cookies from this website on to their computers hard drive they should take necessary steps within their web browsers security settings to block all cookies from this website and its external serving vendors.
This website uses tracking software to monitor its visitors to better understand how they use it. This software is provided by Google Analytics, which uses cookies to track visitor usage. The software will save a cookie to your computer hard drive in order to track and monitor your engagement and usage of the website, but will not store, save or collect personal information.
You can read Google’s privacy policy here for further information.
Other cookies may be stored to your computers hard drive by external vendors when this website uses referral programs, sponsored links or adverts. Such cookies are used for conversion and referral tracking and typically expire after 30 days, though some may take longer. No personal information is stored, saved or collected. Functionality cookies may be used to recognise you when you return to the website. This will enable us to personalise content for you, greet you by name and remember your online preferences (for example, your favourite services, website interests, language or region).
v.1.1 April 2020 Edited & customised by: The British Independent Retailers Association 225 Bristol Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B5 7UB info@bira.co.uk
4. Our Social Media Privacy Policy
Social Media Platforms Communication, engagement and actions taken through external social media platforms that this website and its owners participate on are custom to the terms and conditions as well as the privacy policies held with each social media platform respectively. Users are advised to use social media platforms wisely and communicate / engage upon them with due care and caution in regard to their own privacy and personal details.
This website nor its owners will ever ask for personal or sensitive information through social media platforms and encourage users wishing to discuss sensitive details to contact them through primary communication channels such as by telephone or email.
This website may use social sharing buttons which help share web content directly from web pages to the social media platform in question. Users are advised before using such social sharing buttons that they do so at their own discretion and note that the social media platform may track and save your request to share a web page respectively through your social media platform account.
Shortened Links in Social Media
This website and its owners through their social media platform accounts may share web links to relevant web pages. By default some social media platforms shorten lengthy urls [web addresses] (this is an example: http://bit.ly/zyVUBo). Users are advised to take caution and good judgement before clicking any shortened urls published on social media platforms by this website and its owners.
Despite the best efforts to ensure only genuine urls are published many social media platforms are prone to spam and hacking and therefore this website and its owners cannot be held liable for any damages or implications caused by visiting any shortened links.
Resources and further information:
v.1.1 April 2018 Edited & customised by: The British Independent Retailers Association 225 Bristol Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B5 7UB info@bira.co.uk
Bira recognises the negative effects that businesses can have on the environment. Find out more about how we work toward sustainability. View our Sustainability Policy.