Privacy Policy
How will we use information about our service users?
We collect information about our service users in order to provide psychological / neuropsychological assessment and intervention.
We may use information from a third party (e.g., a service user’s solicitor, medical legal representative or case manager) to coordinate or provide appointments. Only information which is clinically necessary will be passed on. Due to the nature of psychological / neuropsychological assessment and therapy, personal data is required to be held and shared by Bury Psychology Associates and we would not be able to provide our services without doing so.
We may pass on results of your assessment or appointment to your solicitor, insurer, case manager or legal representative if you are undergoing a personal injury or clinical negligence claim, to facilitate the progress of such claims. Where we have been instructed to carry out an assessment for court, a report will be produced for the court. All reports are encrypted and password protected.
Why we process service users’ personal data?
At Bury Psychology Associates we wouldn’t be able to provide our services without the processing of personal data, including some information which is classified as special categories of personal data (such as information concerning an individual’s health) and as a result of us doing so, our service users benefit. We process personal data in ways we believe our service users would expect. We will not use service users’ information for any type of sales or marketing. Therefore, we believe we are acting with a legitimate interest. However, if you would like to know more or object to us doing so, please contact us at the earliest opportunity.
Where do we keep the information?
We keep your information in the stores described below.
On work-related computers:
We use personal computers which are password protected and the hard drives are encrypted. Passwords are changed every 90 days and passwords are not shared. We use One Drive (an encrypted cloud service) to store your data.
Your report:
We may create a report that contains all the information that we gather and our findings and conclusions.
A paper copy of your assessment / therapy notes:
We may take hand written notes when we meet you. These notes are used to create the report that we provide to you.
We may keep a paper copy of your invoice. We send this copy to our accountant.
How we might contact you?
As part of providing our service to you we might send a report to you via email. The report will be encrypted, and password protected. Also, as part of this service, we need to send details of your appointments to you. To protect your information, we prefer to use an end-to- end encrypted messaging service (e.g., Whats App). If you are not able to use such a service we may use SMS (text messages); however, this does increase the risk of someone intercepting the message.
How long do we keep your data?
The British Psychological Society recommend retaining information for up to 7 years after intervention (assessment and/or therapy) ends, in which Bury Psychology Associates will conform to, if no objection is raised. Where a service user is under the age of 18 years old, data will be retained for 7 years from the date the individual turns 18 years old.
We will keep the paper copy invoices for 13 months. The accountant keeps the paper for a maximum of 11 months. Once the accountant has finished with the invoice they shred the paper using a secure shredding service.
We keep the electronic invoice for 7 years as this is the required length to comply with the HMRC requirements. After seven years we delete the invoices.
Marketing
We will not use service users’ information for marketing purposes. We will only try to contact service users or individuals if your details have been referred to us in order for us to coordinate an appointment, or you have contacted Bury Psychology Associates directly.
You have a right at any time to request that we stop contacting you or giving your information to other parties. If you no longer wish to be contacted, please contact your therapist or email us on info@burypsychology.com.
Access to your information and correction
You have the right to request a copy of the information that we hold about you. If you would like a copy of some or all of your personal information, please email your therapist directly, or email us at info@burypsychology.com or write to us at the following address; Bury Psychology Associates, Carne House, 16 Parsons Lane, Bury, Lancashire, BL9 0JT.
We want to make sure that your personal information is accurate and up to date. You may ask us to correct or remove information you think is inaccurate, please email your therapist directly, or email us at info@burypsychology.com or write to us at the following address; Bury Psychology Associates, Carne House, 16 Parsons Lane, Bury, Lancashire, BL9 0JT.
You have the right to raise concerns with the Information Commissioners Office if you feel there is a problem in the way we are handling your data, you can find more information on their webpage www.ico.org.uk/concerns/
Right to Object
You have the right to object to how Bury Psychology Associates use your personal data. Please notify Bury Psychology Associates at the earliest opportunity if you object to us processing your data, you may be asked to put this in writing. Bury Psychology Associates will then consider your objection in a timely manner and respond at the earliest opportunity.
Data Breaches
Bury Psychology Associates are committed to complying with its legislative responsibilities. All data breaches will be recorded and in the unlikely event that a breach occurs and may impact upon our service users’ rights or freedoms, we will notify the Information Commissioners Office within 72 hours of becoming aware.
Cookies
Cookies are text files placed on your computer to collect standard internet log information and visitor behaviour information. This information is used to track visitor use of the website and to compile statistical reports on website activity.
For further information visit www.aboutcookies.org or www.allaboutcookies.org. You can set your browser not to accept cookies and the above websites tell you how to remove cookies from your browser. However in a few cases some of our website features may not function as a result.
Changes to our privacy policy
We keep our privacy policy under regular review and we will place any updates on this web page. This privacy policy was last updated on 26th April 2018.
How to contact us
Please contact us if you have any questions about our privacy policy or information we hold about you:
By Email: info@burypsychology.com
By Post: Bury Psychology Associates, Carne House, Parsons Lane, Bury, Lancs, BL9 0JT.
