Gardeners Farringdon Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how Gardeners Farringdon collects, uses, stores and protects the personal data of its customers and prospective customers. It applies to all Gardeners Farringdon customers and individuals who enquire about or use our gardening services within our service area.

We are committed to handling your personal information in compliance with the UK General Data Protection Regulation and the Data Protection Act, and to being transparent about what we do with your data and why.

Personal data we collect

We collect and process different types of personal data depending on how you interact with us. This may include the following categories of information.

Identification and contact details, such as your name, postal address, service address if different, and general location information so we can confirm that you are within our service area.

Communication details, such as any information you provide when you contact us to request a quote, ask a question, or give feedback about our services.

Service and contract information, such as records of services requested or provided, visit dates and times, garden access instructions provided by you, and any relevant notes needed to deliver our services safely and effectively.

Billing and transaction details, such as records of payments, invoices, and the amount and date of transactions. We do not store full card details where card payments are processed through third party payment providers.

Technical and usage information, such as basic information about how you use any online forms or website pages provided by Gardeners Farringdon, including date and time of visits and pages viewed, where this is necessary to operate or improve our services.

How we collect your data

We usually collect personal data directly from you when you contact us, request a quote, book a service, or otherwise communicate with Gardeners Farringdon. This may be in person, by written correspondence, or using online contact forms.

We may also receive personal data indirectly where an existing customer provides your details for the purpose of referring you to us or arranging services at a property you occupy, provided that they have your permission to share these details.

Lawful basis for processing

Gardeners Farringdon relies on several lawful bases under the GDPR to process your personal data.

Contractual necessity. We process your personal data where it is necessary to enter into a contract with you or to perform a contract for gardening or related services. For example, we need your contact and service address details to provide the gardening services you request.

Legitimate interests. We rely on our legitimate business interests to process personal data for certain purposes, such as managing our relationship with you, planning our schedules, maintaining records of work completed, improving our services, and handling general business operations. When we use this basis, we carefully balance our interests against your rights and expectations.

Legal obligations. We may process and retain personal data where we are required to do so in order to comply with legal and regulatory requirements, such as maintaining certain tax and accounting records.

Consent. In limited cases we may rely on your consent, for example where you choose to receive optional marketing communications. Where we rely on consent, you can withdraw it at any time, and we will then stop processing your data for that purpose.

How we use your personal data

We use your personal data to provide and manage our gardening services in the area we cover, which includes:

Responding to your enquiries and providing quotes for services.

Arranging and delivering gardening services at your property.

Managing bookings, rescheduling visits, and communicating with you about service updates.

Issuing invoices, processing payments, and managing any refunds or adjustments.

Keeping records of the services we provide to you for administrative and legal purposes.

Improving the efficiency and quality of our services, including analysing basic information about demand and service patterns.

Where permitted, sending you updates about service changes or important information related to your ongoing services.

Data processors and third parties

In some cases we use trusted third party service providers to help us run our business and deliver our services. These organisations act as data processors on our behalf and may process your personal data only on our instructions and only for the purposes we specify.

Examples of such processors may include accounting or bookkeeping providers for invoicing and financial record keeping, payment processing companies to handle card or online payments, and IT or cloud storage providers that host our records and assist with secure data backup.

We require all such processors to implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your personal data and to comply with applicable data protection laws. They are not allowed to use your data for their own purposes.

We may also share your personal data with professional advisers such as accountants or legal advisers where necessary for the legitimate interests of operating our business and meeting our regulatory obligations.

International transfers

Where any of our processors or service providers store or access data from locations outside the United Kingdom, we will ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place. This may include relying on adequacy regulations or using standard contractual clauses or equivalent protections recognised under data protection law.

Data retention

We retain your personal data only for as long as is necessary for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy or as required by law.

Customer and service records are generally kept for the duration of our relationship with you and for a reasonable period afterwards, to enable us to respond to queries or disputes and to maintain accurate business records. Financial and accounting records are retained for the period required by tax and accounting regulations.

When personal data is no longer needed for these purposes, we will securely delete or anonymise it so that you can no longer be identified.

How we protect your data

We take appropriate technical and organisational measures to safeguard personal data against accidental loss, misuse, unauthorised access, alteration or disclosure. These measures may include access controls, secure storage, and procedures to limit access to personal data to those who need it for business purposes.

While no method of transmission or storage is completely secure, we regularly review our measures to help ensure your information remains protected.

Your data protection rights

Under data protection law, you have a number of rights in relation to your personal data held by Gardeners Farringdon.

You have the right to request access to the personal data we hold about you and to receive a copy of that data.

You have the right to request that we correct any inaccurate or incomplete personal data about you.

You have the right to request that we erase your personal data in certain circumstances, for example where it is no longer needed for the purposes for which it was collected and we have no legal obligation to retain it.

You may have the right to request that we restrict the processing of your personal data in certain situations, such as while we are considering a request for rectification or objection.

You have the right to object to processing that is based on our legitimate interests, including any direct marketing activities. We will stop processing your data unless we can demonstrate compelling legitimate grounds that override your interests, rights and freedoms or unless processing is required for legal claims.

You have the right to request the transfer of certain personal data to you or to another service provider in a commonly used, machine readable format, where the processing is based on consent or contract and carried out by automated means.

Where we rely on your consent to process personal data, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time. This will not affect the lawfulness of processing prior to the withdrawal of consent.

Exercising your rights and complaints

If you wish to exercise any of your data protection rights in relation to Gardeners Farringdon or have questions about this Privacy Policy, you can contact us using the usual contact methods you use to arrange services with us. We will respond to your request in line with applicable data protection laws.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the relevant data protection authority if you are concerned about how we handle your personal data. We would, however, welcome the opportunity to address your concerns directly in the first instance.

Changes to this Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our services, business practices, or legal obligations. Any revised version will apply from the date it is made available. We encourage you to review this Policy periodically to remain informed about how we protect your personal data as a customer of Gardeners Farringdon within our service area.