Under the Data Protection Legislation, we can only use your personal data if we have a proper reason for doing so, e.g.:
- to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations;
- for the performance of our contract with you or to take steps at your request before entering into a contract;
- for our legitimate interests or those of a third party; or
- because you have given consent.
A legitimate interest is when we have a business or commercial reason to use your information, so long as this is not overridden by your own rights and interests.
The table below explains what we use (process) your personal data for and our reasons for doing so:
| What we use your personal data for | Our reasons |
| To provide legal services to you | For the performance of our contract with you or to take steps at your request before entering into a contract |
| To provide legal services to a legal person (e.g. a company) represented by you | For our legitimate interests or those of our client |
| Conducting checks to identify our clients and verify their identity
Screening for financial and other sanctions or embargoes Other processing necessary to comply with professional, legal and regulatory obligations that apply to our business, e.g. under health and safety regulation or rules issued by our professional regulator |
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Gathering and providing information required by or relating to audits, enquiries or investigations by regulatory bodies | To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Ensuring business policies are adhered to, e.g. policies covering security and internet use | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party |
| Operational reasons, such as improving efficiency, training and quality control | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party |
| Ensuring the confidentiality of commercially sensitive information | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Statistical analysis to help us manage our practice, e.g. in relation to our financial performance, client base, work type or other efficiency measures | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party |
| Preventing unauthorised access and modifications to systems | For our legitimate interests or those of a third party
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Updating and enhancing client records | For the performance of our contract with you or to take steps at your request before entering into a contract
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations For our legitimate interests or those of a third party |
| Statutory returns | To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
| Ensuring safe working practices, staff administration and assessments | To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
For our legitimate interests or those of a third party |
| Marketing our services to existing and former clients; third parties who have previously expressed an interest in our services; and other third parties. | For our legitimate interests |
| Credit reference checks via external credit reference agencies | For our legitimate interests or a those of a third party |
| External audits and quality checks, e.g. for Lexcel accreditation of The Law Society and the audit of our accounts | For our legitimate interests or a those of a third party
To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations |
Usually, we rely on other reasons than consent to process personal data. Where your consent is required, we will ask you for such consent separately and clearly. For example, in our Engagement Letter we ask for your consent to make your file available for inspection by The Law Society for the purpose or Lexcel quality accreditation checks on us. We may also use your personal data with your permission in our or third party press releases (e.g. to publicise a deal we have advised you on). If you give us your permission to use your data for certain purpose and change your mind, you can ask us to stop using your data for that purpose at any time.
We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If you wish to get an explanation as to how the processing for the new purpose is compatible with the original purpose, please contact us using the contact details provided in paragraph 13 of this notice.
If we need to use your personal data for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so.