Privacy Policy
The Horticultural Trades Association (hereinafter referred to as ‘We’, "Our" and "Us") is committed to protecting and respecting your privacy.Details of our registered office address and other relevant information is set out below.
This policy sets out the basis on which any personal data that we collect from you, or that you provide to us, will be processed by us. Please read the following carefully to understand our views and practices regarding your personal data and how we will treat it.
For the purpose of the Data Protection Act 1998 ("the Act"), we are the data controller.
1 Information we may collect from you
1.1 We may collect and process the following data about you:
· Information that you provide on our site www.the-hta.org.uk ("our site"). This includes information provided at the time of registering to use our site or requesting further services. We may also ask you for information if you report a problem to us.
· If you contact us (including but not limited to contact by telephone, letter or email) we may keep a record of that correspondence.
· We may also ask you to complete surveys that we use for research purposes, although you do not have to respond to them.
· Details of your visits to our site and the resources that you access.
1.2 Information on visitors using our site
1.2.1 During the course of any visit to our site the pages you see, along with something called a session ID or cookie ("Cookies"), are downloaded to your computer (see paragraph 1.2.2 for more on this). Most, if not all, websites do this, because Cookies allow the website publisher to do useful things like find out whether the computer (and probably its user) has visited the site before. This is done on a repeat visit by checking to see, and finding, the Cookie left there on the last visit.
1.2.2 What is a Cookie?
When you enter a site your computer will automatically be issued with a Cookie. Cookies are text files that identify your computer to our server. Cookies in themselves do not identify the individual user, just the computer used. Many websites do this whenever a user visits their website in order to track traffic flows.
Cookies themselves only record those areas of the site that have been visited by the computer in question, and for how long. Users have the opportunity to set their computers to accept all Cookies, to notify them when a Cookie is issued, or not to receive Cookies at any time. The last of these, of course, means that certain personalised services cannot then be provided to that user.
2 Where we store your personal data
2.1 All information you provide to us is stored on our secure servers. Where we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password which enables you to access certain parts of our site, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share your password with anyone.
2.2 Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure. Although we will do our best to protect your personal data, we cannot guarantee the security of your data transmitted to our site; any transmission is at your own risk. Once we have received your information, we will use strict procedures and security features to try to prevent unauthorised access.
3 Submitting personal information
When you supply any personal information to Horticultural Trades Association (eg for competitions, or registering for membership access) we have legal obligations towards you in the way we deal with that data. We must collect the information fairly (see the notices on particular webpages or other materials supplied that let you know why we are requesting the information); we must let you know how we will use it; and we must tell you in advance if we decide to pass the information on to anyone else. We will hold your personal information on our systems for as long as you use the service you have requested, and remove it in the event that the purpose has been met, or, in the case of membership access, you no longer wish to continue your registration as a member or registered user.
4 Uses made of the information
4.1 We use information held about you in the following ways:
· To ensure that content from our site is presented in the most effective manner for you and for your computer.
· To provide you with information, products or services that you request from us or which we feel may interest you, where you have consented to be contacted for such purposes.
· To allow you to participate in interactive features of our service, when you choose to do so.
· To notify you about changes to our service.
4.2 From time to time we may send you details of other services and products that may be of interest to you and offer you the opportunity to subscribe to them. We will keep a record of information provided by you. Please note that any information you provide to us will never be supplied to third parties without first obtaining your consent unless we are obliged to disclose such information by law.
4.3 If you do not want us to use your data in accordance with this clause, or to pass your details on to third parties for marketing purposes, please tick the relevant box situated on the page or form on which we collect your data. Please note that if you choose not to be contacted by us, we may not be able to provide you with any products or services which you have subscribed to.
5 Disclosure of your information
5.1 We may disclose your personal information to any member of our group.
5.2 We may disclose your personal information to third parties:
5.2.1 If we or substantially all of our assets are acquired by a third party, in which case personal data held by us about our members will be one of the transferred assets.
5.2.2 If we are under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order to comply with any legal obligation, or in order to enforce or apply our terms of business and other agreements; or to protect our rights, property, or safety of our personnel, members, or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organisations for the purposes of fraud protection and credit risk reduction.
6 Your rights
6.1 You have the right to ask us not to process your personal data for marketing purposes. We will usually inform you (before collecting your data) if we intend to use your data for such purposes or if we intend to disclose your information to any third party for such purposes. You can exercise your right to prevent such processing by checking certain boxes on the pages or forms we use to collect your data. You can also exercise the right at any time by contacting us at The Horticultural Trades Association 19 High Street Theale Reading Berkshire RG7 5AH.
6.2 Our site may, from time to time, contain links to and from the websites of our partner networks, advertisers and affiliates. If you follow a link to any of these websites, please note that these websites have their own privacy policies and that we do not accept any responsibility or liability for these policies. Please check these policies before you submit any personal data to these websites.
7 Access to information
The Act gives you the right to access information held about you. Your right of access can be exercised in accordance with the Act. Any access request may be subject to a fee of £10 to meet our costs in providing you with details of the information we hold about you.
8 Changes to our privacy policy
Any changes we may make to our privacy policy in the future will be posted on this page and, where appropriate, notified to you by e-mail.
The Horticultural Trades Association
A company limited by guarantee – Established 1899
Registered Office: 19 High Street, Theale, Reading, Berkshire, RG7 5AH
Registered in London with Company Registration Number: 00169606
Last updated: 15/12/2010 14:27