Privacy policy

The privacy policy has been updated to reflect the incoming changes in data protection laws, brought about by a new European piece of legislation which has been transposed into UK laws, and which will become legally binding on 25th of May 2018. This policy may be further updated before the 25th May 2018.

 

Privacy Policy

Guy Sterne Limited is committed to ensuring the privacy and confidentiality of your personal information, and to protect it from unauthorised access and disclosure.

The purpose of this Privacy Policy is to clearly communicate to you how Guy Sterne handles your personal information to provide you with services, and to comply with legal obligations. This Privacy Policy applies to all websites owned or operated by Guy Sterne, including the websites of Guy Sterne within the UK, as amended from time to time (the “Websites”). This Privacy Policy will give you a better and more complete understanding of the type of personal information that Guy Sterne holds about you and the way Guy Sterne handles that information.

Guy Sterne complies with the Data Protection Act 1998, and the General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (“GDPR”) and any local or European laws on data protection, as amended from time to time. Guy Sterne and is registered as a data controller as defined in the GDPR with the data protection regulator in the UK, the Information Commissioner’s Office “ICO”), www.ico.org.uk.

 

How we use your information

This privacy policy tells you what to expect when Guy Sterne collects personal information. It applies to information we collect about:

  • visitors to our Websites;
  • visitors who submit a general enquiry via our contact page or who correspond with our phone, email or otherwise;
  • those who use our services, e.g. who subscribe to our newsletter or request a publication from us;
  • job applicants and our current and former employees;
  • those who send a written complaint or enquiry to our Data Protection Officer;

 

Visitors to our Websites

Guy Sterne collects data on visitors to its Web sites including usage and behaviour patterns via a third party service, Google Analytics (Google LLC). This is to review the number of visits to each part of the Website and how the user accessed the Website only. Information collected, which may contain Personal Information, includes:

  • date and time of visit;
  • pages accessed;
  • browser or mobile platform used to access the Website;
  • the source used to find and access the Website (i.e. Google Search Engine);
  • location of the visitor (town level only);
  • search queries from external and internal search engines;
  • page interaction information including aggregated contact form completions; and
  • technical information, including browser type and version, operating system and platform.

When you use our Website, we do not attempt to identify you as an individual user and we will not collect personal information about you unless you specifically provide this to us.

We may collect your personal information if you choose to provide this to us via an online form or by email. Examples are where you:

  • Submit a general enquiry via our contact forms;
  • Register to receive email Newsletters;
  • Register for an Open Event place via our event registration form;
  • Make an enquiry via a telephone number displayed on the Website; or
  • Send a written complaint or enquiry to our Data Protection Officer

 

Use of Cookies

We use cookies on our site to distinguish between users. You can read more about how we use cookies on our Cookies page.

 

Use and disclosure

We will use personal information collected via our Website:

  • for the purposes for which we have been given it, and
  • if we have a legal ground to justify it.

We have set out below a non-exhaustive list of instances where you have shared your personal information with us voluntarily in the first place via email or telephone enquiries, giving us, as a result, your consent for us to use that information to reply to you:

  • to confirm treatment/specialist availability or
  • to confirm a treatment price quotation,
  • to book an initial consultation
  • to confirm an event registration

If we receive your email address because you sent us an email message, the email will be used or disclosed for the purpose for which you have provided it only and we will not add your email address to an emailing list or disclose this to anyone else without your consent.

Your personal information will also be used in delivering electronic Newsletters to you if you have consented by opting-in to our E-Newsletter via our Website.

We may share your personal information with any member of the Guy Sterne’s Group including any of its subsidiaries, Guy Sterne’s holding company and its subsidiaries for administrative purposes, and/or compliance with a legal obligation (such as employment law).

Personal information submitted via a Website or telephone calls may be shared with healthcare consultants working for Guy Sterne who provide the treatment for which you may be inquiring about under strict confidentiality agreements.

Guy Sterne may also share anonymised information with analytics and search engine providers to assist us in improving and optimising our site.

We will not disclose your personal information to other any third parties in the UK unless we have a legal basis for it, and we have the appropriate measures and safeguard in place to ensure its protection. We will not send your personal information to any third parties outside of the European Economic Area unless we have got a legal basis for it, and the recipient country benefits from an “adequacy decision” from the European Commission. For the remaining non-EEA countries, information may only be if there is a legal basis for it, and with a contractual arrangement in place with the third party as prescribed by the European Commission.

 

Data quality

If we collect your personal information from our Website, we will process it in a way that is adequate, relevant and limited to what is necessary for relation to the purposes for why it is processed. We will maintain and update your information as necessary to keep it accurate or when you advise us that your personal information has changed. We will keep your information in a form which permits your identification for no longer than is necessary. We will hold personal information collected from web enquiry forms for a period of 12 months from when the enquiry is closed.

 

Data Security

Guy Sterne is committed to protecting the security of your personal information within its control. We use technologies and processes such as access control procedures, network firewalls, encryption and physical security to protect the privacy of information. Although the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure, we will use our best endeavours to protect your information from loss, misuse or alteration when it is within our control.

If you choose to complete our online forms or make enquiries via telephone numbers displayed on our Website, we will ensure that your contact details are stored on password-protected databases. All information is encrypted between your computer and the Guy Sterne web server using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) ensuring that communications are secure. We also conduct regular penetration tests to ensure that the server is tested for its security and no patient information is stored directly on the website servers.

Staff members associated with Website maintenance only may access to our Website’s administration system. When they do, they are subject to confidentiality obligations.

 

Access and correction of personal information

Guy Sterne is committed to facilitating the exercise of your rights as data subjects. You can find out if we hold any of your personal information by making a ‘Subject Access Request’ (“SAR”). If any information is held about you, Guy Sterne will:

  • give you a description of your personal information it holds about you;
  • the purposes for which it is being held;
  • the recipients or classes of recipients to whom it is or may be disclosed;
  • let you have a copy of your personal information in an intelligible form;
  • inform you as your right as a data subject, including the right to contact the ICO

If we do hold your personal information and you believe it is incorrect you may submit a request to Guy Sterne to correct any alleged mistakes through the contact details above.

Requests are free of charge, unless manifestly unfounded or excessive in which case Guy Sterne will charge a reasonable fee. A request will be processed within one month of receipt, but this might be extended to two months in case of a complex request or if the identity of the requestor cannot be verified.

Guy Sterne, as a health care provider, is subject to legal and regulatory obligations which may limit or restrict the enforcement of your rights on some occasions.

 

Links to other websites

We may create links to third-party websites. We are not responsible for the content or privacy practices employed by those responsible for any third party websites we are linked to.

 

Telephone Calls

In the interests of training and continually improving our services, enquiry calls to Guy Sterne may be monitored. Enquiry calls will also be tracked for analytical purposes to monitor the marketing source of the call such as Search Engine, Pay Per Click Advertising or Print Advertisements.

 

Email enquiries

Any email sent to us, including any attachments, may be monitored and blocked if the email you send to us is potentially a threat to our Websites and/or information systems or is deemed illegal in our reasonable opinion.

 

Marketing information

We will only send you marketing information where you have agreed to opt-in to receive it. We will only use your preferred communication channels to contact you and you will be given the option to select this when opting in. You can stop us from contacting you for marketing purposes by clicking on the ‘unsubscribe’ link embedded within the email that has been sent to you. Doing so will remove your personal data from our contacts list automatically.

 

Market Research

We also like to improve our services by asking for your views. We may contact you for market research but it will be your choice if you wish to take part in this.

 

Social Media

Any personal information shared and/or collected on social media pages is not collected by Guy Sterne but by the social media platform. Any personal information shared and/or collected on Guy Sterne’s social media pages shall be subject to the privacy notices and other policies of the relevant social media platform. The content of Guy Sterne’s social page is not owned by Guy Sterne but by the social media platform.

 

Changes to this privacy notice

We keep our privacy notice under regular review. Any changes we may make to our privacy policy in the future will be posted on this page. Guy Sterne reserves the right to make changes to its Privacy Policy at any time.

This privacy policy was last updated 24 May 2018.

You have the right to be told what personal information I hold about you on my database. Should you require this you should write to me at Mr Guy Sterne, c/o The West Midlands Private Hospital, Colman Hill, Halesowen, West Midlands, B63 2AH.