Privacy Notice

This Privacy Policy (together with our terms and conditions and any other documents referred to in it) describes the type of information that we collect from you (‘you’/ ‘your') through the use of our will writing, Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) and Trust services (‘Services'), or the use of our website https://jmwills.co.uk/ (‘Website'), how that information may be used or disclosed by us and the safeguards we use to protect it.

Our Website may contain links to third party websites that are not covered by this Privacy Policy. We therefore ask you to review the privacy statements of other websites and applications to understand their information practices.

We have drafted this Privacy Policy to be as clear and concise as possible. Please read it carefully to understand our policies regarding your information and how we will treat it. By using or accessing our Website or the Services, you agree to the collection, use and disclosure of information in accordance with this Privacy Policy. This Privacy Policy may change from time to time and your continued use of the Website or the Services is deemed to be acceptance of such changes, so please check periodically for updates.

This Privacy Policy was last updated on 22nd December 2021 to add new provisions to the policy applicable regarding data protection. Please check back regularly to keep informed of updates to this Privacy Policy. Please read this Privacy Policy carefully and ensure that you understand it. Your acceptance of our Privacy Policy is deemed to occur upon your first use of our Website. If you do not accept and agree with this Privacy Policy, you must stop using our Website immediately.

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance. It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with us.

If you have any comments on this Privacy Policy, please email them to [email protected]

2.1 Here are the details that pursuant to applicable data protection and privacy legislation in force from time to time in the UK (including the UK GDPR which is the retained EU law version of the General Data Protection Regulation) says we have to give you as a "data controller":

• Our Website address is https://jmwills.co.uk/

• Our company name is James McKenzie (Wills) Ltd

• Our registered address is The Old Station House, London Road, East Grinstead, West Sussex RH19 1EP

• Our Data Protection Officer is Louise Fredericks and they can be contacted at [email protected]

2.2 We respect your right to privacy and will only process personal information about or provided by you in accordance with the Data Protection Legislation which for the purposes of this Privacy Policy shall mean:  the UK GDPR; the Data Protection Act 2018 (and regulations made under that Act) and the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (SI 2003/2426) as amended

3.1 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 (anonymous data).

3.2 We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:

• Identity Data includes first name, last name, username, date of birth or similar identifier; and .

• Contact Data includes billing address, invoicing address, email address and telephone numbers.

• We use Stripe to process your payments. We do not store your account information.

• Transaction Data includes details about payments and other details of our Services you have ordered or purchased from us using data collected by Stripe

• Technical Data includes internet protocol (IP) address, your login data, browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform and other technology on the devices you use to access this Website.

• Profile Data includes your username and password, bookings made by you, your interests, preferences, feedback and survey responses.

• Usage Data includes information about how you use our Website and Services.

• Marketing and Communications Data includes your preferences in receiving marketing from us and our third parties and your communication preferences.

• Interaction Data includes any information that you might provide to any discussion forums on the Website. When you complete our questionnaire, email, phone, meet with us or otherwise, we will also collect information which we require to carry out the services such as information related to your assets, beneficiaries, family members or relating to your involvement in the estate of someone who has died,.

• Cookies Data. Like many websites, we use "cookies" to enhance your experience and gather information about visitors and visits to our websites. Please refer to the "Do we use "cookies"?" section below for information about cookies and how we use them and what kind.

• Third Parties and Information we receive from other sources. We may receive information about you from your employer or through the Services we provide. In this case we will have informed you when we collected that data that it may be shared internally and combined with data collected on our Website. We are also working closely with third parties (including, for example, business partners, suppliers, sub-contractors, advertising networks, analytics providers, and search information providers) and may receive information about you from them.

• Analytics includes third-party analytics services (such as Google Analytics) to evaluate your use of the Website, compile reports on activity, collect demographic data, analyse performance metrics, and collect and evaluate other information relating to our Website and internet usage. These third parties use cookies and other technologies to help analyse and provide us the data. By accessing and using the Website, you consent to the processing of data about you by these analytics providers in the manner and for the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy.

3.3 We also collect, use and share Aggregated Data such as statistical or demographic data for any purpose. Aggregated Data may be derived from your personal data but is not considered personal data in law as this data does not directly or indirectly reveal your identity. For example, we may aggregate your Usage Data to calculate the percentage of users accessing a specific website feature. However, if we combine or connect Aggregated Data with your personal data so that it can directly or indirectly identify you, we treat the combined data as personal data which will be used in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

3.4  Where we collect Special Categories of Personal Data about you (this includes details about your race or ethnicity, religious or philosophical beliefs, information about your health and genetic and biometric data) and it is necessary to do so for our business, we will obtain your specific consent, unless we have another lawful basis to do so.

3.5 In accordance with Data Protection Legislation, we will ensure that your personal data is processed lawfully, fairly, and transparently, without adversely affecting your rights. We will only process your personal data if at least one of the following basis applies:

a) You have given consent to the processing of your personal data for one or more specific purposes;

b) processing is necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are a party or in order to take steps at the request of you prior to entering into a contract;

c) processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which we are subject;

d) processing is necessary to protect the vital interests of you or of another natural person;

e) processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller; and/or

f) processing is necessary for the purposes of the legitimate interests pursued by us or by a third party such as our financial payments, except where such interests are overridden by the fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject, in particular where the data subject is a child.

3.6 If we receive personal information in the course of providing our Services to you from another data subject, we expect you to have complete responsibility for ensuring that the contents of this Privacy Policy are brought to their attention and you have obtained their consent in the process.

3.7 In some instances, it may be appropriate for us to combine your information with other information that we may be holding about you, such as combining your name with your geographic location or your browsing or purchasing history.

3.8 Purposes for which we will use your personal data: We have set out below, in a table format, a description of all the ways we plan to use your personal data, and which of the legal bases we rely on to do so. We have also identified what our legitimate interests are where appropriate.

Note that we may process your personal data for more than one lawful ground depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your data. Please contact us if you need details about the specific legal ground we are relying on to process your personal data where more than one ground has been set out in the table below.

4.1 We (or third party data processors, agents and sub-contractors acting on our behalf) may collect, store and use your personal information by way of different methods to collect data from and about you including through:

Direct interactions. You may give us your information by filling in forms and questionnaires via our Website or by corresponding with us by post, phone, email or otherwise. This includes personal data you provide when you:

a) present Website content;

b) use any of our Services;

c) create an account on our Website;

d) subscribe to our Services or publications;

e) request marketing to be sent to you;

f) enter a competition, promotion or survey; or

g) give us some feedback.

4.2 In addition to the above, we may use the information in the following ways:

a) To personalise your Website experience and to allow us to deliver the type of content and product offerings in which you are most interested.

b) To administer a contest, promotion, survey or other site feature.

c) If you have opted-in to receive our e-mail newsletter, we may send you periodic e-mails. If you would no longer like to receive promotional e-mail from us, please refer to the "How can you opt-out, remove or modify information you have provided to us?" section below. If you have not opted-in to receive e-mail newsletters, you will not receive these e-mails. Visitors who register or participate in other site features such as marketing programs and "members-only" content will be given a choice whether they would like to be on our e-mail list and receive e-mail communications from us.

d) Present Website content effectively to you.

e) Provide information, and services that you request, or (with your consent) which we think may interest you.

f) Carry out our contracts with you.

g) Provide the relevant Services to you

h) Tell you our charges.

4.3 If you are already our customer, we will only contact you electronically about things similar to what was previously sold to you.

4.4 If you are a new customer, you will only be contacted if you agree to it.

4.5 We may keep a record of those links which are used the most to enable us to provide the most helpful information but we agree to keep such information confidential and you will not be identified from this information.

4.6 In addition, if you don't want us to use your personal data for any of the other reasons set out in this section in 5, you can let us know at any time by contacting us at [email protected], and we will delete your data from our systems. However, you acknowledge this will limit our ability to provide the best possible services to you.

4.7 In some cases, the collection of personal data may be a statutory or contractual requirement, and we will be limited in the [products and] services we can provide you if you don't provide your personal data in these cases.

4.8 We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances:

a) Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you.

b) Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests.

c) Where we need to comply with a legal or regulatory obligation

4.9 Generally we do not rely on consent as a legal basis for processing your personal data other than in relation to our marketing communications or sending third party direct marketing communications to you via email or text message. You have the right to withdraw consent to marketing at any time by contacting us at [email protected], and we will either delete your data from our systems or move your data to our ‘unsubscribe list'. However, you acknowledge this will limit our ability to provide the best possible services to you.

4.10 As already indicated above, with your permission and/or where permitted by law, we may also use your data for marketing purposes which may lead to us contacting you by email and/or telephone with information, news and offers on our Services. We agree that we will not do anything that we have not agreed to under this Privacy Policy, and we will not send you any unsolicited marketing or spam. We will take all reasonable steps to ensure that we fully protect your rights and comply with our obligations under Data Protection Legislation.

4.11 All calls received from and made from our head office are recorded and stored for 6 months. All video calls hosted on the Microsoft Teams service are recorded and stored for 3 months. Payment details are no longer taken by phone. 

Why we record calls and meetings

Calls made to and from our office, and recorded meetings, provide an exact record which can: 

·         Provide support with training new and existing employees 

·         Protect employees from nuisance or abusive calls 

·         Establish the facts in the event of a complaint 

Access and Availability 

Only employees with appropriate authority can access calls and meetings. Access to the calls/meetings may be for any of the stated reasons for why we record calls, the main reason for training and monitoring purposes. 

You have the right to listen to or obtain a copy of recordings made of your own calls/meetings. A request will only be processed if made by a Subject Access Request (SAR) to our Data Protection Officer [email protected]. You will have to provide a reason why you require a copy of the call and provide enough information about the originating telephone number (for calls), date, and time of the call/meeting to enable us to locate it. The lead time is 1 calendar month. If more than one client participated in the call/meeting, we require an SAR from both parties. See section 8 for details of your rights.

5.1 All Cookies used by and on our website are used in accordance with current English Cookie Law.

5.2 We use cookies to distinguish users and improve our Website. Please look at our Cookie Policy https://jmwills.co.uk/cookie-policy for more cookie information.

6.1 We do not generally transfer your personal data outside the UK).

6.2 If we were to transfer your personal data out of the UK, for example, if you are based outside the UK or we need to use certain service providers outside the UK, we will ensure a similar degree of protection is afforded to it by ensuring at least one of the following safeguards is implemented:

• We will only transfer your personal data to countries that have been deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data; or 

• Where we use certain service providers, we may use specific contracts approved for use in the UK which give personal data the same protection it has in the UK. 

Please contact us if you want further information on the specific mechanism used by us when transferring your personal data out of the UK.

6.3 Data security is of great importance to us, and to protect your data we have put in place suitable physical, electronic and managerial procedures to safeguard and secure data collected through our Website. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

6.4 We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a breach where we are legally required to do so.

6.5 By giving us your personal data, you agree to this arrangement. We will do what we reasonably can to keep your data secure.

6.6 Any payments made by you, will be encrypted. We do not store this information.

6.7 We have implemented security measures such as a firewall to protect any data and maintain a high level of security.

6.8 Notwithstanding the security measures that we take, it is important to remember that the transmission of data via the internet may not be completely secure and that you are advised to take suitable precautions when transmitting to us data via the internet and you take the risk that any sending of that data turns out to be not secure despite our efforts.

6.9 If we give you a password upon registration on our Website, you must keep it confidential. Please don’t share it.

6.10 Due to the nature of the services and pursuant to Article 17(3) GDPR, if you complete a will or other such document using our service we will securely store your data indefinitely. This is in order to protect against legal claims, as well as to provide supporting information if your will is ever contested. Otherwise, we will keep personal data for as long as is necessary which is usually the life of our relationship and up to a period of seven years after our relationship have ended. We may however be required to retain personal data for a longer period of time to ensure we comply with our legislative and regulatory requirements. We review our data retention obligations to ensure we are not retaining data for longer than we are legally obliged

We are allowed to disclose your information in the following cases:

7.1 We are allowed to disclose your information in the following cases:

7.1.1 to our staff in order to provide our services;

7.1.2 to your employer, if they referred you to us but only for the purposes of confirming your referral and whether we are proceeding to provide you with services;

7.1.3 If we want to sell our business, or our company, we can disclose it to the potential buyer;

7.1.4 We can disclose it to other businesses in our group; 

7.1.5 We can disclose it if we have a legal obligation to do so, or in order to protect other people’s property, safety or rights;

7.1.6 We can exchange information with others to protect against fraud or credit risks;

7.2 We may contract with third parties to supply services to you on our behalf. These may include payment processing, search engine facilities, advertising and marketing and professional advisors. In some cases, the third parties may require access to some or all of your data. These are the third parties that have access to your information:

• James McKenzie Financial Planning

• James McKenzie Probate Services

• Fidelis Trust Services

• Office of Public Guardianship 

• Stripe Payment Portal

• GoCardless payments

• 10to8 online meeting (online booking service)

7.3 Where any of your data is required for such a purpose, we will take all reasonable steps to ensure that your data will be handled safely, securely, and in accordance with your rights, our obligations, and the obligations of the third party under data protection legislation and the law.

8.1 When you submit information via our Website or otherwise for the purposes of receiving our services, you may be given options to restrict our use of your data. We aim to give you strong controls on our use of your data (including the ability to opt-out of receiving emails from us which you may do by unsubscribing using the links provided above in this Privacy Policy.

8.2 Under Data Protection Legislation, you have the right to:

• request access to, deletion of or correction of, your personal data held by us at no cost to you;

• request that your personal data be transferred to another person (data portability);

• be informed of what data processing is taking place;

• restrict processing;

• object to processing of your personal data; and

• complain to a supervisory authority.

8.3 You also have rights with respect to automated decision-making and profiling as set out in section 11 below.

8.4 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.

8.5 To enforce any of the foregoing rights or if you have any other questions about our Website or this Privacy Policy, please contact us at [email protected]

9.1 Please note that our terms and conditions and our policies will not apply to other websites that you get to via a link from our Website. We have no control over how your data is collected, stored or used by other websites and we advise you to check the privacy policies of any such websites before providing any data to them.

10.1 If we change our Privacy Policy, we will post the changes on this page. If we decide to, we may also email you.

11.1 In the event that we use personal data for the purposes of automated decision-making and those decisions have a legal (or similarly significant effect) on you, you have the right to challenge to such decisions under GDPR, requesting human intervention, expressing their own point of view, and obtaining an explanation of the decision from us.

11.2 The right described in section 11.1 does not apply in the following circumstances:

a) the decision is necessary for the entry into, or performance of, a contract between the you and us;

b) the decision is authorised by law; or

c) you have given you explicit consent.

11.3 Where we use your personal data for profiling purposes, the following shall apply:

a) clear information explaining how the profiling will be provided, including its significance and the likely consequences;

b) appropriate mathematical or statistical procedures will be used;

c) technical and organisational measures necessary to minimise the risk of errors and to enable such errors to be easily corrected shall be implemented; and

d) all personal data processed for profiling purposes shall be secured in order to prevent discriminatory effects arising out of profiling.

12.1 Please also visit our Terms and Conditions section https://jmwills.co.uk/terms-conditions establishing the use, disclaimers, and limitations of liability governing the use of our Website.

13.1 By using our Website and/or our services and by way of acknowledgment, you consent to our Privacy Policy.

14.1 The Parties will use their best efforts to negotiate in good faith and settle any dispute that may arise out of or relate to this Privacy Policy or any breach of it.

14.2 If any such dispute cannot be settled amicably through ordinary negotiations between the parties, or either or both is or are unwilling to engage in this process, either party may propose to the other in writing that structured negotiations be entered into with the assistance of a fully accredited mediator before resorting to litigation.

14.3 If the parties are unable to agree upon a mediator, or if the mediator agreed upon is unable or unwilling to act and an alternative mediator cannot be agreed, any party may within 14 days of the date of knowledge of either event apply to LawBite to appoint a mediator under the LawBite Mediation Procedure.

14.4 Within 14 days of the appointment of the mediator (either by mutual agreement of the parties or by LawBite in accordance with their mediation procedure), the parties will meet with the mediator to agree the procedure to be adopted for the mediation, unless otherwise agreed between the parties and the mediator.

14.5 All negotiations connected with the relevant dispute(s) will be conducted in confidence and without prejudice to the rights of the parties in any further proceedings.

14.6 If the parties agree on a resolution of the dispute at mediation, the agreement shall be reduced to writing and, once signed by the duly authorised representatives of both parties, shall be final and binding on them.

14.7 If the parties fail to resolve the dispute(s) within 60 days (or such longer term as may be agreed between the parties) of the mediator being appointed, or if either party withdraws from the mediation procedure, then either party may exercise any right to seek a remedy through arbitration by an arbitrator to be appointed by LawBite under the Rules of the LawBite Arbitration Scheme.

14.8 Any dispute shall not affect the parties' ongoing obligations under this Privacy Policy.