The Parochial Church Council (PCC ) of St Mark’s, Bourne End - Data Privacy Notice
1. Your personal data – what is it?
Personal data relates to a living individual who can be identified from that data. Identification can be by the information alone or in conjunction with any other information in the data controller's possession or likely to come into such possession. The processing of personal data is governed by the General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (the 'GDPR') and the Data Protection Act 2018, (the "DPA 2018").
2. Who are we?
The Parochial Church Council (PCC ) of St Mark’s, Bourne End is the data controller. This means it decides how your personal data is processed and used. Personal data relates to a living individual who can be identified from that data. Identification can be by the information alone or in conjunction with any other information in the data controller’s possession or likely to come into such possession. The processing of personal data is governed by the General Data Protection Regulation (the GDPR).
In the rest of this Privacy Notice we use the word “we” to refer to refer to the data controllers, as appropriate.
3. How do we process your Personal Data?
We comply with our obligations under the ‘GDPR’ by keeping personal data up to date; by storing and destroying it securely; by not collecting or retaining excessive amounts of data; by protecting personal data from loss, misuse, unauthorised access and disclosure and by ensuring that appropriate technical measures are in place to protect personal data.
We use your personal data for the following purposes: –
• To administer membership records
• To comply with Diocesan requirements regarding attendance figures and statistics
• For health and safety and safeguarding purposes in accordance with our legal obligations and Diocesan best practice guidelines
• To inform you of news, events, activities and services running at St Mark’s Church
• To fundraise and promote the interests of St Mark’s Church, charities and causes it supports and the wider church
• To maintain our own accounts and records (including the processing of gift aid applications and standing orders)
• To operate the St Mark’s website in order to provide you with the information you require
• To manage our Clergy, employees and volunteers
• To enable our teams to operate and team members to liaise with each other
• To enable us to carry out our ministry activities including weddings, funerals and baptisms/thanksgivings
• To enable us to provide pastoral care and keep records of pastoral meetings
Members should notify the church as soon as any of their contact details change so that records can be kept up to date
4. What is the legal basis for processing your personal data?
The legal basis for processing varies depending on the purpose:
• Most of our data is processed because it is necessary for our legitimate interests, or the legitimate interests of a third party (such as the Oxford Diocesan Board of Finance). An example of this would be holding office-holder's personal data to support the day-to-day communications needed to run our churches (this applies to roles such as churchwarden and PCC secretary). We will always take into account your interests, rights and freedoms.
• Some of our processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation. For example, we are required by the Church Representation Rules to administer and publish the electoral roll, and under Canon Law to announce forthcoming weddings by means of the publication of banns.
• We may also process data if it is necessary for the performance of a contract with you, or to take steps to enter into a contract. An example of this would be processing your data in connection with a contract for maintenance of our buildings or equipment, or hire of the church hall.
• For other purposes we will process your data with your explicit consent. An example of this would be regular email newsletters providing information about our services and activities in the parish/benefice.
5. How long do we keep your Personal Data?
We keep data in accordance with the guidance set out in the guide “Keep or Bin: Care of Your Parish Records”, The Oxford Diocese Safeguarding Handbook and in Safeguarding Records: Practice Guidance which are available from the Church of England website. Specifically, we retain electoral roll data while it is still current; Gift Aid declarations and associated paperwork for up to 6 years after the calendar year to which they relate; Safeguarding Records for fifty years; and Parish Registers (baptisms, marriages, funerals) permanently.
We use the Church Suite platform to store and manage personal data. Church Suite requires users to explicitly grant consent and gives users control over how their data is used – allowing them to change their preferences at any time. Church Suite is secure, and administrative access is restricted to staff and office-holders only.
We will keep some records permanently if we required to do so. In general, we will endeavour to keep data only for as long as we need it. This means that we may delete or destroy it when it is no longer needed.
6. Your Rights & Your Personal Data
Unless subject to an exemption under the GDPR, you have the following rights with respect to your personal data: -
• The right to request a copy of your personal data which the PCC of St Mark's holds about you;
• The right to request that the PCC of St Mark's corrects any personal data if it is found to be inaccurate or out of date;
• The right to request your personal data is erased where it is no longer necessary for the PCC of St Mark's to retain such data;
• The right to withdraw your consent to the processing at any time
• The right to request that the data controllers provide you with your personal data and where possible, to transmit that data directly to another data controller, (known as the right to data portability), where applicable.
• The right, where there is a dispute in relation to the accuracy or processing of your personal data, to request a restriction is placed on further processing;
• The right to object to the processing of personal data, where applicable.
• The right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office.
• The right to change the way they are contacted at any time or the nature of the material they receive, simply by contacting the parish administrator.
When exercising any of the rights listed above, in order to process your request, we may need to verify your identity for your security. In such cases we will need you to respond with proof of your identity before you can exercise these rights.
7. Further processing
If we wish to use your personal data for a new purpose, not covered by this Data
Protection Notice, then we will provide you with a new notice explaining this new use prior to commencing the processing and setting out the relevant purposes and processing conditions. Where and whenever necessary, we will seek your prior consent to the new processing.
8. Contact Details
Queries or complaints in the first instance should be sent to the PCC Secretary at the following email address stmarkschurchbe@gmail.com
You can contact the Information Commissioners Office on 0303 123 1113 or via email https://ico.org.uk/global/contact-us/email/ or at the Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire. SK9 5AF.
[2] Details about retention periods can currently be found in the Record Management Guides located on the Church of England website at: - https://www.churchofengland.org/more/libraries-and-archives/records-management-guides
This draft Privacy Policy was created on 20.6.24 and will be reviewed by the PCC at their meeting in September 2024