Privacy Notice

Introduction

In this Privacy Notice the terms, 'we', 'us' and 'our' are references to Carr & Jones Ltd (Carr & Jones), company number 15120687, company registered address of 23 Eliot Street, Weston Mill, Plymouth, PL5 1AX.

This Privacy Notice sets out the basis on which any personal data we collect from you through our website (www.carr-jones.co.uk) (Our Site), or that you provide to us through via other methods you may communicate with us, will be processed by us.

Please read the following carefully to understand our practices regarding your personal data and how we collect, use and store it. These processes include the following:

• The information that is being collected about you.
• When Special Data and Criminal Disclosures is collected.
• How we use the information we collect.
• The legal basis upon which we deal with your information.
• How long we keep your information on file. 
• Who we disclose your information to.
• Our process relating marketing activities.
• Third party websites
• How we keep your information secure?
• How we use cookies.
• Your rights and how to exercise them.
• How to contact Carr & Jones. 

Carr and Jones take your privacy very seriously, and we are committed to keeping your information secure and managing it in accordance with our legal responsibilities under applicable data protection laws.

By accessing, browsing or otherwise using our website you confirm that you have read and agree to this Privacy Notice. If you do not agree with any part of this Privacy Notice, you should not use Our site or use our services.

We reserve the right to change the contents of our site at any time, which includes this Privacy Notice. Any changes to our site including Privacy Notice, Cookie Policies and any other part or parts will be notified by informing site user of the changes on our site. It is the responsibility of the site user, to familiarise themselves with the Privacy Notice regularly. By continuing to use our site following being advised of any changes confirms that you accept the revised Privacy Notice.

This Privacy Notice was last updated on 26th October 2023. 

The information that is being collected about you

Category

Examples

When we collect

Personal contact information

Name

Address

Email

Phone numbers

LANDLORDS

Where you engage us to provide agency services on your behalf either in branch, at your property, by telephone or by email

APPLICANTS/TENANTS

Anytime you register or use an online form to arrange a viewing, register for property alerts, or submit an enquiry

Personal identifiers

Marital status

Date of birth

Nationality

Tax status

LANDLORDS, APPLICANTS & TENANTS 

When you apply to enter or enter into an agreement with us OR with a landlord via Carr & Jones. This includes but is not limited to pre-referencing, affordability, full referencing and contracts.

Property information

Address

Property description

Floor plans

Energy performance certificate ratings

Property photographs

LANDLORDS

When you ask us to market a property to sell or let on your behalf

Financial information

Bank account details

Tax URN number (Landlords only)

LANDLORDS, APPLICANTS & TENANTS 

Where we manage a financial transaction for you, set up a standing order, or take payment for the services which we provide to you

Identity verification details

Date of birth

Nationality

Identity documentation

Outcome of any checks

LANDLORDS, APPLICANTS & TENANTS 

Where we are required by law to carry out:

• know your client anti-money laundering checks; or 
• checks to verify that you have the right to rent a property

Landlord property details

Proof of ownership

Mortgage, insurance and licencing details

Details of service contracts

When you ask us to provide letting services for your property

Tenant application details

Marital status

Employment details

Nationality and residential status

Bank details and credit history

Outcome of checks

When you make an application to rent a property with ourselves and we carry our referencing and credit checks as part of this

Tenancy details

Move in and out date

Meter readings

Details of deposit paid

Photographs of property for inventory or inspection

As part of any tenancy between a landlord and a tenant

Browser data

The time, date and duration of your visit to our website

the sites from which you have come (the referral URL)

the pages visited

your IP address.

When you visit our website.

Special Category Information

Health information

Appropriate adjustments

When you volunteer this information to us

When Special Data and Criminal Disclosures is collected.

We may have collected personal information from you which is of a sensitive nature. Where we have done so we treat this information in accordance with the additional protection it is given under data protection laws.

How we use the information we collect.

Your information will be used by us in connection with the following purposes:

Data

Usage

Lettings services

• Valuing your property.
• Helping you let your property, or to find a property to rent
• To carry out tenant referencing and credit checks to assess if you are creditworthy before you move in to a property
• To protect a tenant’s deposit by registering it with a deposit protection scheme
• To process the receipt and payment of rent, maintenance and tax
• To arrange an energy performance certificate or home report inspection for you
• To arrange an inventory or to prepare a report on the condition of a property
• To ensure that utilities are in place and that utility companies and local authorities are able to contact you for billing purposes when you move in to a property
• To arrange and carry out essential maintenance and emergency repairs to a property via an approved contractor
• To manage ongoing renewals of tenancies

Marketing our services to you

• To provide you with general updates in relation to the property market
• To carry out targeted advertising to you on social media websites when you have already shown an interest in our services

Responding to your queries

• To help answer any questions which you have asked one of our agents or staff members
• To provide you with a quote for our services

Improving our services

• To analyse cookie and website usage data to improve our website;
• To allow us to customise the content which is presented to you based on your likely interests
• To keep client records up to date

Legal and Regulatory Obligations

• To comply with applicable laws where we are obliged to retain and/or disclose certain information
• To investigate or address claims or complaints relating to your use of our services
• For internal and external auditing purposes
• To carry out anti-money laundering checks
• To carry out right to rent checks

Other

• To take a payment for the services we provide
• to collect a debt which is owed to us
• for onward referencing where you are a tenant
• Retention of copyright in all advertising material (including photographs)

The legal basis upon which we deal with your information.

Wherever we collect or use your personal information, we will make sure we do this for a valid legal reason. This will be for at least one of the following purposes:

• because it is necessary to fulfil the terms of our contract with you - if you have entered into a contract with us for example to let your property or to become a tenant.
• because it is necessary to support the legitimate interests of our business in operating Our site and providing letting agency services.
• to meet responsibilities, we have to our regulators, tax officials, law enforcement, or otherwise meet our legal responsibilities
• where we have obtained a clear consent from you - we will always make it clear when we need your consent and how you can change your permissions at any time thereafter.

If you require further information about the reasons or interests about the way in which Carr & Jones Ltd use and store your data, please get contact the team and we will be happy to help.

How long we keep your information on file. 

All personal information that you provide to Carr & Jones, will be retained by us in accordance with applicable laws.  We will only hold your personal information on our systems for as long as is necessary for the relevant purpose for which it was collected. This could be for the life of a tenancy, or for a less defined amount of time if the information was provided for marketing purposes. For details on how to request deletion of your person information, please see later in this Privacy Policy or contact the team at Carr and Jones. 

Who we disclose your information to.

The information you provide to us will be recorded and stored on our computer systems and accessed by or given to our staff for purposes set out in this Privacy Notice or for other purposes approved by you. 

We will also disclose your information to the following third parties when required for the following purposes:

Who

Why

Landlord, tenant and guarantor

To comply with our legal obligations

To keep all parties fully informed where we manage a property on behalf of a landlord

To allow you to contact each other directly in circumstances where the landlord is managing the property.

Utility switch partner

Where the landlord of a property instructs us to arrange the supply of a property’s gas and/or electricity

For the purposes of notifying council tax, water and energy suppliers at the property and for the purposes of setting up accounts with them when you start a tenancy.

Deposit protection service

For the purpose of providing a tenancy deposit protection scheme

Local authorities

To notify exemption from council tax where you are a student living in a property occupied only by full time university or college students

The Property Ombudsman

Where they are providing an alternative dispute resolution service in connection with the letting services which we are providing

Propertymark

A professional body responsible for raising professional standards amongst letting agents, where information relating to you is requested by them in order to protect your interests

Approved contractors

To arrange and carry out essential maintenance and emergency repairs to your property

To carry out inventory checks and report on the condition of your property

To arrange gas or electric safety checks to your home

Our process relating marketing activities.

We use your information to provide you with information on our products and services which we believe you may be interested in. Full details on how to remove your details from marketing information can be found below or by contact the Carr & Jones team. 

When contacted through the 'contact us' page of our site, or make an enquiry in branch or on the phone to us, we will use the details you have supplied to us to provide you with our general property marketing by email unless you choose to 'opt-out' of these communications.

Third party websites

Our site may contain links to other websites. We accept no responsibility or liability for the content of other websites which are not under our strict control, in particular, we are not responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting other websites and such sites are not governed by our Privacy Notice.
 

How we keep your information secure?

We employ security measures which aim to protect the information provided by you from access by unauthorised persons and against unlawful processing, accidental loss, destruction or damage.

We also expect you to take reasonable steps to safeguard your own privacy when transferring information to us, such as not sending confidential information over unprotected email, ensuring email attachments are password protected or encrypted and only using secure methods of postage when original documentation is sent to us.

Third parties service providers who process your personal data on our behalf may be located in the UK or elsewhere in the world where different privacy laws may apply which may not offer the same level of protection as UK law. We only make these arrangements or transfers where we are satisfied that adequate levels of protection are in place to protect any information held in that country and that the service provider acts at all times in compliance with applicable privacy laws.

How we use cookies.

Our site use cookies (including cookies to obtain an overall view of visitor habits and visitor volumes to our Site). To view more information on what cookies we use and how we use them please review our separate Cookies Policy.

Your rights and how to exercise them.

Subject to certain exemptions, and in some cases dependent upon the processing activity we are undertaking, you have certain rights in relation to your personal information.

Right to access personal information

You have a right to request that we provide you with a copy of your personal information that we hold and you have the right to be informed of; (a) the source of your personal information; (b) the purposes, legal basis and methods of processing; (c) the data controller’s identity; and (d) the entities or categories of entities to whom your personal information may be transferred.

Right to rectify or erase personal information

You have a right to request that we rectify inaccurate personal information. We may seek to verify the accuracy of the personal information before rectifying it.

You can also request that we erase your personal information in the following limited circumstances:

• where it is no longer needed for the purposes for which it was collected; or
• where you have withdrawn your consent (where the data processing was based on consent); or
• following a successful right to object (see right to object); or
• where it has been processed unlawfully; or
• to comply with a legal obligation to which we are subject.

We are not required to comply with your request to erase personal information if the processing of your personal information is necessary:

• for compliance with a legal obligation; or
• for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims.

Right to restrict the processing of your personal information

You can ask us to restrict the processing of your personal information, but only where:

• its accuracy is contested, to allow us to verify its accuracy; or
• the processing is unlawful, but you do not want it erased; or
• it is no longer needed for the purposes for which it was collected, but you still need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or
• you have exercised the right to object, and verification of overriding grounds is pending.

We can continue to use your personal information following a request for restriction:

• where we have your consent; or
• to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or
• to protect the rights of another natural or legal person.

Right to transfer your personal information

You can ask us to provide your personal information to you in a structured, commonly used, machine readable format, or you can ask to have it transferred directly to another data controller, but in each case only where:

• the processing is based on your consent or on the performance of a contract with you; and
• the processing is carried out by automated means.

Right to object to the processing of your personal information

You can object to any processing of your personal information which has our legitimate interests as its legal basis, if you believe your fundamental rights and freedoms outweigh our legitimate interests.

If you raise an objection, we have an opportunity to demonstrate that we have compelling legitimate interests which override your rights and freedoms.

Right to object to how we use your personal information for direct marketing purposes

You can request that we change the manner in which we contact you for marketing purposes.

You can request that we do not transfer your personal information to unaffiliated third parties for the purposes of direct marketing or any other purposes.

Right to obtain a copy of personal information safeguards used for transfers outside your jurisdiction

You can ask to obtain a copy of, or reference to, the safeguards under which your personal information is transferred outside of the UK.

We may redact data transfer agreements to protect commercial terms.

Right to lodge a complaint with your local supervisory authority

You have a right to lodge a complaint with your local supervisory authority if you have concerns about how we are processing your personal information.

We ask that you please attempt to resolve any issues with us first, although you have a right to contact your supervisory authority at any time. 

If you wish to access any of the above rights, we may ask you for additional information to confirm your identity and for security purposes before disclosing personal information to you. We reserve the right to charge a fee where permitted by law, for instance if your request is manifestly unfounded or excessive.

You can exercise your rights by contacting us using the details in the “contact us” section of this Privacy Notice. Subject to legal and other permissible considerations, we will make every reasonable effort to honour your request promptly or inform you if we require further information in order to fulfil your request.

We may not always be able to fully address your request, for example if it would impact the duty of confidentiality we owe to others, or if we are legally entitled to deal with the request in a different way.

How to contact Carr & Jones. 

If you have questions or comments about our Privacy Notice or if you wish to exercise your rights mentioned above, please contact our Data Protection Officer by:

Email: charlie.carr@carr-jones.co.uk

Post: Data Protection Officer, 23 Eliot Street, Weston Mill, Plymouth, PL5 1AX

Telephone: +44(0)1392 71 55 38

If you have any concerns or complaints as to how we have handled your personal data you may lodge a complaint with the UK's data protection regulator, the ICO, who can be contacted through their website at https://ico.org.uk/global/contact-us/ or by writing to Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF.