NEXUS SOLICITORS LIMITED PRIVACY POLICY MAY 2024 EDITION

INTRODUCTION AND PURPOSE

Nexus Solicitors Limited (referred to herein as ‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’, ‘the Firm’) is committed to protecting the privacy and security of personal information. This policy describes how we collect and use personal information about you.

All personal information we collect or is provided to us will be held and stored in accordance with this policy and the UK General Data Protection Regulation (“UK GDPR”), the Data Protection Act 2018 and any other legislation relating to the protection of personal information (data protection laws). We are the “data controller”, unless stated otherwise.

When we act as the controller of your personal information, we are responsible for your personal information, including deciding how we hold and use it.  We are required under data protection laws to notify you of the information contained in this policy. 

For the purposes of this policy:

‘Clients’ includes natural persons who have engaged us to provide legal advice to them in their personal capacity;

‘Instructing Officers’ includes natural persons who have instructed us on behalf of a company, partnership, trust, estate, agency, department, corporate body of any description or any other group or organisation;

‘Subscribers’ includes natural persons that have signed up to any newsletters or bulletins which we issue, have attended or registered to attend one of our events or who follow us on social media; and

‘Interested parties’ includes visitors accompanying clients or Instructing Officers to our premises, beneficiaries to a will or trust about which we are advising a client and dependants relevant to family law matters.

This policy applies to the personal information of past and present clients, Instructing Officers, subscribers and interested parties.  Please note that you may fall in to more than one of these categories so we may hold your personal information in a number of capacities.

If you are a past or present employee, member or consultant of the Firm, we will hold further personal information about you.  For further details please contact pb@nexussolicitors.co.uk or speak to your supervisor.  This policy does not form part of any contract that you may have with the Firm. It is provided for information purposes only.

Data protection contact

We have appointed a Data Protection Officer (DPO) to oversee compliance with this policy. If you have any questions about this policy or how we handle personal information, please contact the DPO in writing using the details below.

Email address: pb@nexussolicitors.co.uk

Postal address: Data Protection Officer

Nexus Solicitors Limited

Carlton House

16-18 Albert Square

Manchester

M2 5PE

Registrations

Our Company Registration Number is: 03997942.  We are also registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO).  Our ICO registration number is: Z5073979

Changes to this policy

We reserve the right to update this policy at any time. Any changes we make to our privacy policy will be posted on our website.  This policy was last updated on 1 May 2024.

1. THE DATA PROTECTION PRINCIPLES

We will comply with all applicable data protection law.  The data protection principles say that the personal information that we hold must be:

• Used in a lawful, fair and transparent way;

• Collected only for valid purposes that we have clearly explained and not used in any way that is incompatible with those purposes;

• Relevant to the purposes for which it was collected and limited only to those purposes;

• Accurate and kept up to date;

• Kept only as long as necessary for the purposes for which it was collected;

• Kept securely;

• Used with appropriate measures in place to evidence compliance with the data protection law.

2. INFORMATION WE HOLD ABOUT OUR CLIENTS AND INSTRUCTING OFFICERS 

Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified.  It does not include data where the identity has been removed (such as anonymous data).  There are some “special categories” of more sensitive personal information which require a higher level of protection.

We collect, store and use some or all of the following categories of personal information about clients and Instructing Officers:

(A) Client engagement information: name, title, job title, address, telephone number, email address, photographic identification, date of birth, credit check.

(B) Client file information: name, title, job title, address, telephone number, email address, bank account details.

(C) Matter file information: The categories of personal information that we hold about you for the purposes of specific matters that we are providing advice on will vary according to the type of matter.  Where we have collected this information other than from you, we will always ask you to confirm its accuracy.  By way of example this category may include, amongst other things: tax details, marriage details, employment details, directorships, shareholding details or personal correspondence.

(D) Relationship information: name, title, job title, address, telephone number, email address, client relationship details (length of relationship, Firm contacts engaged with, meetings, calls and other engagement with the Firm), services details (departments used, number of engagements, references, reviews and testimonials) and dietary preferences.

(E) Marketing information: name, title, job title, address, telephone number, email address, company, engagement details (click-throughs, open rates, bounce rates, return to sender notifications) event attendance history, payment details and marketing preferences.

(F) Social media information: username, company details and engagement details (likes, retweets, shares, reactions, comments).

(G) Monitoring: PC login details, use of our IT and communications systems.

(H) Technical data: on-line browsing activities on our website, IP address, browser type and version, device type, operating systems and platform.

(I) Business information: company details, other information provided or necessary for the purposes of providing advice.

(J) Financial and Payment data: bank account and other data necessary for processing payments and fraud prevention, including credit/debit card numbers, security code numbers and other related billing information.

3. SENSITIVE PERSONAL INFORMATION WE HOLD ABOUT OUR CLIENTS AND INSTRUCTING OFFICERS

In some circumstances we may need we may also collect, store and use the following “special categories” of more sensitive personal information about clients and Instructing Officers:

(K) Relationship information (sensitive): special access requirements, allergies.

(L) Matter information (sensitive): The categories of personal information that we hold about you for the purposes of specific matters that we are providing advice on will vary according to the type of matter.  Where we have collected this information other than from you, we will always ask you to confirm its accuracy.  By way of example this category may include, amongst other things: race or ethnicity, political opinions, philosophical or religious beliefs, trade union membership, biometric data, medical conditions, prescriptions, surgeries, therapies, medical history, disabilities and sexual orientation.

(M) Criminal records: criminal convictions and offences, allegations of the same, including unproven allegations, spent or previous convictions or involvement in any offence as a victim or witness.

(N) Children’s personal information: our website and services are not aimed at children.  Where there are matters involving children they will be represented by parents or legal guardians. Where we are acting in matters involving children, we will explain why their personal information is needed and how it will be used.

This list is not exhaustive, and, in specific instances, we may need to collect additional data for the purposes set out in this Policy.

4. HOW WE COLLECT CLIENTS’ AND INSTRUCTING OFFICERS’ INFORMATION 

We collect personal information in categories A, B and J above directly from clients and Instructing Officers as part of our file opening and client engagement process.

We collect personal information in categories C, I, L and M above directly from clients and Instructing Officers as we take instructions in relation to specific matters.  We may also obtain further information about specific matters from other sources including publicly available registers, court transcripts, credit searches and private investigators.

We collect personal information in categories D and E abo0ve directly from clients and Instructing Officers over the course of our relationship.  We may also collect further information from other sources such as Companies House or market information providers.

We collect personal information in category F above either from clients and Instructing Officers directly or from social media platforms when those individuals engage with our social media accounts on Twitter and LinkedIn.

We collect personal information falling within category F, G, and H above when clients or Instructing Officers visit our premises or use our IT or communications systems.

5. INFORMATION ABOUT OTHER INDIVIDUALS

In some circumstances we process personal information provided to us by a third party, for example because you are the subject of, or the information is included for the purposes of specific matters that we are providing advice on.

6. HOW WE USE PERSONAL INFORMATION 

We will only use personal information when the law allows us to.  The law says that we must identify a lawful basis for each use of personal information.  We rely on a number of lawful bases, including:

• Where we have obtained freely given, specific, informed and unambiguous consent from you to use your personal information in certain ways;

• Where we need to perform a contract that we have entered into;

• Where we need to comply with a legal obligation;

• Where it is necessary for us to use personal information to conduct our business and pursue our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and we believe that using personal information in that way is not overridden by the interests or fundamental rights of the person to whom the information relates.

Below, we have set out the purposes for which we use each category of personal information and the lawful bases which are relevant to those purposes.

We use your client engagement information to conduct certain compliance checks that we are required to carry out by law.  These include conflict of interest, “know your client” and anti-money laundering searches.  Our lawful basis for this is that we have a legal obligation to conduct these checks.

We use your client file information for communicating with you in the course of our engagement.  This includes taking your instructions, providing legal advice and invoicing our fees and disbursements.  For clients, our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to perform the contract for legal services that we have with you.  For Instructing Officers, our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to pursue the legitimate interest of the entity you represent in seeking legal advice.

We use your matter file information to provide legal advice to you.  For clients, our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to perform the contract for legal services that we have with you.  For Instructing Officers, our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to pursue the legitimate interest of the entity you represent in seeking legal advice.

We use your relationship information to manage our relationship with you.  This includes linking the work that we do across different practice areas and offices to ensure that you receive relevant communications.  Our lawful basis for this is necessary in order to pursue our legitimate interests in creating deep and lasting relationships with our clients and with Instructing Officers.

We use your marketing information for marketing purposes.  This includes contacting you with relevant newsletters, bulletins and other information about our services, inviting you to events and measuring engagement with our communications to ensure that the content that we create is relevant and useful.  Our lawful basis for sending marketing information is your consent or we may be relying on our legitimate interest in promoting services we believe are of interest to you or your organisation. 

You have the right to object to marketing or amend your marketing preferences at any time by contacting pb@nexussolicitors.co.uk, or going to amend your preferences.  You could also click on the unsubscribe link at the bottom of any marketing emails.

We hold your social media information in the course of operating our social media accounts on Twitter or LinkedIn.  Our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to pursue our legitimate interest in maintaining a visible, engaging and relevant social media presence and / or to respond to you if you contact us via social media.

We use monitoring to manage access to our premises and for security purposes and also to ensure network and information security, including preventing unauthorised access to our systems and preventing malware distribution and to ensure compliance with our IT and communications policies. Our lawful basis for this is our legitimate interests in securing our information and systems.

We use technical data to remember your preferences and to monitor how people use our website, to help us improve our site’s performance as well as the content we provide.  Please see our Cookie Policy for further information.

We use business information in the course of providing legal advice to you.

We use Financial and Payment information for processing payments, to undertake credit checks and the prevention of fraud.  Our lawful basis for this is to comply with our legal or regulatory duty, to pursue our legitimate interest and where we need to perform a contract we are about to enter or have entered with you.

7. HOW WE USE SENSITIVE PERSONAL INFORMATION 

“Special categories” of particularly sensitive personal information require higher levels of protection.  We need to have further justification for collecting, storing and using this type of personal information. Below we have identified the further justification on which we are relying to process clients’, Instructing Officers’ and other third party’s special category personal information.  We also have in place an appropriate policy and safeguards which we are required by law to maintain when processing such data.

We use relationship information (sensitive) to ensure that our offices and events are inclusive and accessible to all our clients.  Our lawful basis for this is our legitimate interest in ensuring that clients and Instructing Officers can access and make use of our offices and events.  Our further justification is that any information that we use to ensure accessibility is information that you have manifestly made public.

We use matter information (sensitive) to provide legal advice to you.  For clients, our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to perform the contract for legal services that we have with you.  For Instructing Officers, our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to pursue the legitimate interest of the entity you represent in seeking legal advice.  Our further justification is that it is necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims.

We use criminal records to provide legal advice to you.  For clients, our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to perform the contract for legal services that we have with you.  For Instructing Officers, our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to pursue the legitimate interest of the entity you represent in seeking legal advice.  Our further justification is that it is necessary for the purpose of obtaining legal advice.

8. THE KIND OF INFORMAITON WE HOLD ABOUT SUBSCRIBERS AND INTERESTED PARTIES

We collect, store and use some or all of the following categories of personal information about subscribers and interested parties:

(O) Relationship information: name, title, job title, address, telephone number, email address, client relationship details (Firm contacts engaged with, meetings, calls and other engagement with the Firm), services details (departments used, references, reviews and testimonials) and dietary preferences.

(P) Marketing information: name, title, job title, address, telephone number, email address, company, engagement details (click-throughs, open rates, bounce rates, return to sender notifications), event attendance history, payment details, reviews, case studies, testimonials and marketing preferences.

(Q) Social media information: username, company or organisation details and engagement details (likes, retweets, shares, reactions, comments).

(R) Monitoring: use of our IT and communications systems.

9. HOW WE USE SUBSCRIBERS’ AND INTERESTED PARTIES’ PERSONAL INFORMATION 

We may also collect, store and use the following “special categories” of more sensitive personal information about subscribers and interested parties:

(S) Relationship information (sensitive): special access requirements.

(T) Matter information (sensitive): The categories of personal information that we hold about interested parties (but not subscribers) for the purposes of specific matters that we are providing advice on will vary according to the type of matter.  Where we have collected this information other than from you, we may ask you to confirm its accuracy, or we will take other steps to verify the data. By way of example this category may include, amongst other things: race or ethnicity, political opinions, philosophical or religious beliefs, trade union membership, biometric data, medical conditions, prescriptions, surgeries, therapies, medical history, disabilities and sexual orientation.

(U) Criminal records: criminal convictions and offences, allegations of the same or involvement in any offence as a victim or witness, in each case relating to interested parties (but not subscribers).

10. HOW WE COLLECT SUBSCRIBERS AND INTERESTED PARTIES’ PERSONAL INFORMATION 

We may collect personal information in categories O, P, and Q above directly from you over the course of our relationship.  This may be when you sign up to a newsletter, when you engage with us as a witness, when you attend one of our events, or some other time when you engage with us directly.  We may also source some of this information from other sources such as Companies House or market information providers.

We collect personal information in category Q above either from you directly or from social media platforms when you engage with our social media accounts on Twitter and LinkedIn.

We collect personal information falling within category R above when you visit our premises or use our IT or communications systems.

11. HOW WE USE SUBSCRIBERS’ AND INTERESTED PARTIES’ PERSONAL INFORMATION 

We will only use personal information when the law allows us to.  The law says that we must identify a lawful basis for each use of personal information.  We rely on a number of lawful bases, including:

• Where we have obtained freely given, specific, informed and unambiguous consent from you to use your personal information in certain ways;

• Where we need to perform a contract that we have entered into with you;

• Where we need to comply with a legal obligation;

• Where it is necessary for us to use personal information to pursue our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and we believe that using personal information in that way is not overridden by the interests or fundamental rights of the person to whom the information relates;

• Where you provide information to us relating to an employee, your advisers or your suppliers, you are responsible for bringing this privacy policy to their attention at the time of sharing the data with us.  If you provide information relating to anyone aged under 18, you must either be parent or guardian to that person or have the explicit consent of their parent or guardian.

Below, we have set out the purposes for which we use each category of personal information and the lawful bases which are relevant to those purposes.

We use your relationship information to manage and strengthen our relationship with you.  This includes linking the work that we do across different practice areas and offices to ensure that you receive relevant communications at all times.  Our lawful basis for this is necessary in order to pursue our legitimate interests in creating and maintaining deep and lasting relationships with our contacts.

We use your marketing information for marketing purposes, this includes contacting you with relevant newsletters, bulletins and other information about our services, inviting you to events and measuring engagement with our communications to ensure that the content that we create is relevant and useful. 

Our lawful basis for sending marketing information is your consent or our legitimate interest in promoting services we believe to be of interest to you or your organisation. You have the right to object to marketing or amend your marketing preferences at any time by contacting pb@nexussolicitors.co.uk or going to amend your preferences.  You could also click on the unsubscribe link at the bottom of our marketing emails.

We hold your social media information in the course of operating our social media accounts on Twitter and LinkedIn.  Our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to pursue our legitimate interest in maintaining a visible, engaging and relevant social media presence and / or to respond to you if you contact us via social media.

We use monitoring to manage access to our premises and for security purposes and also to ensure network and information security, including preventing unauthorised access to our systems and preventing malware distribution and to ensure compliance with our IT and communications policies. 

Our lawful basis for this is our legitimate interests in securing our information and systems.  We use technical data to remember your preferences and to monitor how people use our website, to help us improve our site’s performance as well as the content we provide.

Please see our Cookie Policy for further information.

12. USE OF SUBSCRIBERS’ AND INTERESTED PARTIES’ SENSITIVE INFORMATION 

“Special categories” of particularly sensitive personal information require higher levels of protection.  We need to have further justification for collecting, storing and using this type of personal information. Below we have identified the further justification on which we are relying to process subscribers’ and interested parties’ special category personal information. We have in place an appropriate policy and safeguards which we are required by law to maintain when processing such data.

We use relationship information (sensitive) to ensure that our offices and events are inclusive and accessible to all visitors.  Our lawful basis for this may be our legitimate interest in ensuring that subscribers and interested parties can access and make use of our offices and events and enjoy appropriate catering.  Our further justification is that any information that we use to ensure accessibility is information that you have manifestly made public.

We use matter information (sensitive) to provide legal advice to our clients.  Our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to pursue the legitimate interest of our client in seeking legal advice, where an interested party’s information, input or involvement is relevant to the client’s matter.  Our further justification may be that the information is necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims, you have consented to sharing the information or that you have manifestly made public the information.

We use criminal records to provide legal advice to our clients.  Our lawful basis for this is that it is necessary in order to pursue the legitimate interest of our client in seeking legal advice, where an interested party’s information, input or involvement is relevant to the client’s matter.  Our further justification is that it is necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims.

13. IF YOU FAIL TO PROVIDE PERSONAL INFORMATION 

Where we need to collect personal information by law, legitimate interest or under the terms of a contract we have with you, and you fail to provide that data when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have or are trying to enter into with you (for example, to provide you with legal advice or services) or we may be prevented from achieving our legitimate interests (such as engaging with you on social media).  In this case, we may have to cancel a service you have with us, but we will notify you if this is the case at the time.

We also have a statutory obligation to maintain records, and to undertake compliance checks or screening and recording (e.g., anti-money laundering, financial and credit checks, fraud and crime prevention and detection, trade sanctions and embargo laws) that we conduct during  the on-boarding of clients and Instructing Officers.  If you choose not to provide that information, we will not be able to engage you or the organisation you represent as a client of the Firm.

14. CHANGE OF PURPOSE

We will only use your personal information for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another purpose and that purpose is compatible with the original purpose. If we need to use your personal information for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the lawful basis which allows us to do so.

15. DATA SHARING 

We only ever share your personal information with trusted third parties.

We share your information with third parties, including third-party service providers, courts, regulators and other lawyers.  We require all third parties to respect the security of your information and to treat it in accordance with the law.

We only provide third parties with the information they need to know to perform their specific services. Third-party service providers require access to your personal information in the course of providing their services to us.  We engage third parties to provide the following services: the instruction of barristers, mediation, public relations and marketing, IT support, dictation services, practice management systems, document management systems, case management systems, printing and reprographics support and event hosting services.

We also receive personal information from third party companies providing services for credit risk checks, money laundering and other financial checks.  

All third parties are required to take appropriate security measures to protect your personal information in line with our policies.  We do not allow third parties to use your personal information for their own purposes.  We only permit them to access your personal information for specific purposes and in accordance with our instructions.

We may also disclose your personal information to comply with a regulatory or legal duty, or if it is necessary to disclose personal information in connection with an investigation of suspected or actual fraudulent activity or is based on a lawful disclosure request.

We may also disclose personal information where such disclosure is necessary to protect the safety or security of any persons, and/or otherwise as permitted under applicable law.

We may share your personal information with other third parties, for example with a potential purchaser in the context of a potential sale or restructuring of the business.

We may also need to share your personal information with a regulator to comply with the law.

16. THIRD PARTY LINKS

This website may include links to third-party websites, plug-ins and applications.  Clicking on those links or enabling those connections may allow third parties to collect or share data about you.  We do not control these third-party websites and are not responsible for their privacy statements or policies. 

17. WHERE PERSONAL INFORMATION MAY BE PROCESSED 

Your personal information will be stored on systems with appropriate technical and organisational security measures and controls located within the UK.  Sometimes we will need to share your personal information with third parties and suppliers outside the UK such as Europe and the USA. Where we transfer your personal information outside the UK you can expect a similar degree of protection in respect of your personal information.

We will only transfer personal information outside the UK when it is necessary for the services we provide you. Transfers will always be subject to adequate safeguards.  These safeguards may take the form of an adequacy decision.  Adequacy decisions are made by the UK’s Secretary of State in respect of certain countries.  An adequacy decision means that the countries to which we transfer your data are deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for your personal information.  To ensure that your personal information does receive an adequate level of protection in the absence of an adequacy decision, we will put in place relevant contractual clauses including international contractual clauses (IDTAs) or standard contractual clauses with the UK addendum to ensure that your personal information is treated by those third parties in a way that is consistent with and respects UK laws on data protection (or applicable EU laws, if you are resident in the EU).

If you require further information about these protective measures, please contact our DPO by emailing pb@nexussolicitors.co.uk

18. DATA SECURITY

We have put in place appropriate security measures to protect your personal information from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed.  In addition, we limit access to your personal information to those people who have a business need to know.  They will only process your personal information on our instructions, and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.  We have put procedures in place to deal with any suspected data security breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected breach where we are legally required to do so.

19. DATA RETENTION

We will only retain your personal information for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal accounting, or reporting requirements.  We have provided an overview of our general retention periods below, however if you want to learn more about our retention periods, please contact the DPO on pb@nexussolicitors.co.uk