Privacy Notice

Privacy Notice for franchisees and potential franchisees of AIMS Accountants for Business

1. Purpose of this notice

This notice describes how we collect and use personal data about you, in accordance with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR), the Data Protection Act 2018 and any other national implementing laws, regulations and secondary legislation, as amended or updated from time to time, in the UK (‘Data Protection Legislation’).

Please read the following carefully to understand our practices regarding your personal data and how we will treat it.

2. About us

AIMS Partnership Limited (“AIMS”, “AIMS Accountants for Business, “we”, “us”, “our” and “ours”) is a franchisor operating a franchise the franchisees of which offer accounting services. We are registered in England and Wales as a limited company under number: 02740695 and our registered office is at 3 Park Road, London, NW1 6AS.

For the purpose of the Data Protection Legislation and this notice, we are the ‘data controller’. This means that we are responsible for deciding how we hold and use personal data about you. We are required under the Data Protection Legislation to notify you of the information contained in this privacy notice.

Our Data Protection Point of Contact is Gary Robinson, Director, who is responsible for assisting with enquiries in relation to this privacy notice or our treatment of your personal data. Should you wish to contact our Data Protection Point of Contact you can do so using the contact details noted at paragraph 12 (Contact Us), below.

3. How we may collect your personal data

We obtain personal data about you, for example:

• you ask us to provide you with information about becoming a franchisee;
• you provide us with information during the course of your application to become franchisee;
• we enter into a franchise agreement with you and throughout the term of that agreement;
• you contact us by email, telephone, post;
• from third parties and/or publicly available resources (for example, from Companies House); or
• you visit our website.
• through automated technologies or interactions. As you interact with our website, we will automatically collect Technical Data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns. We collect this personal data by using cookies, server logs and other similar technologies. We may also receive Technical Data about you if you visit other websites employing our cookies. See our cookie policy  for further details.
• technical data is collected from analytics providers, advertising networks, and search information providers;

Children

• Our website and accountancy services are not aimed specifically at children because children are generally represented by their parent or guardians. We do not knowingly collect data relating to children.

4. The kind of information we hold about you

The information we hold about you may include the following:

• your personal details (such as your name and/or address);
• details of contact we have had with you in the run up to our proposed agreement and for the duration of our agreement;
• our correspondence and communications with you;
• information about any complaints and enquiries you make to us;
• information we receive from third parties and/or publicly available resources (for example, from Companies House);
• Technical Data including 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

5. How we use personal data we hold about you

We may process your personal data for purposes necessary for the performance of our contract with you and to comply with our legal obligations.

We may process your personal data for the purposes of our own legitimate interests provided that those interests do not override any of your own interests, rights and freedoms which require the protection of personal data. This includes processing for statistical and management purposes.

Please note that we may process your personal data for more than one lawful basis depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your data.

Click [here] to find out more about the types of lawful basis that we will rely on to process your personal data.

Generally we do not rely on consent as a legal basis for processing your personal data other than to send marketing communications to you via email, SMS message or by telephone. You have the right to withdraw consent to marketing at any time by contacting us using the details in section 12.

Situations in which we will use your personal data

We may use your personal data in order to:

• carry out our obligations arising from any agreements entered into between you and us provide you with information related to our agreement which we feel is important to or may interest you; and notify you about any changes to our mutual business;
• run our business (e.g. carry out administrative or operational processes);
• improve our services and products to you;
• consider whether we can pursue certain business development initiatives;
• send you marketing materials and invite you to events; and
• process and respond to requests, enquiries or complaints received from you

In some circumstances we may anonymise or pseudonymise the personal data so that it can no longer be associated with you, in which case we may use it without further notice to you.

If you refuse to provide us with certain information when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have entered into with you. Alternatively, we may be unable to comply with our legal or regulatory obligations.

We may also process your personal data without your knowledge or consent, in accordance with this notice, where we are legally required or permitted to do so.

Data retention

We will only retain your personal data for as long as is necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it is collected.

When assessing what retention period is appropriate for your personal data, we take into consideration:

• the requirements of our business;
• any statutory or legal obligations;
• the purposes for which we originally collected the personal data;
• the lawful grounds on which we based our processing;
• the types of personal data we have collected;
• the amount and categories of your personal data; and
• whether the purpose of the processing could reasonably be fulfilled by other means.

Change of purpose

Where we need to use your personal data for another reason, other than for the purpose for which we collected it, we will only use your personal data where that reason is compatible with the original purpose.

Should it be necessary to use your personal data for a new purpose, we will notify you and communicate the legal basis which allows us to do so before starting any new processing.

6. Data sharing

Why might you share my personal data with third parties?

We will share your personal data with third parties where we are required by law, where it is necessary to administer the relationship between us or where we have another legitimate interest in doing so.

What about other third parties?

We may share your personal data with other third parties, for example in the context of the possible sale or restructuring of the business. We may also need to share your personal data with a regulator or to otherwise comply with the law.

We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for the work they are engaged to carry out in accordance with our instructions.

7. Transferring personal data outside the United Kingdom (UK)

We will not transfer the personal data we collect about you outside of the UK.

8. Data security

We have put in place commercially reasonable and appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. 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.

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

However, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure. Although we take appropriate and proportionate steps to protect your confidential information, we cannot guarantee the security of your information transmitted electronically and accept no responsibility for any damage or loss caused.

9. Rights of access, correction, erasure, and restriction

Your rights in connection with personal data

Under certain circumstances, by law you have the right to:

• Request access to your personal data. This enables you to receive details of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are processing it lawfully. This is known as a Subject Access Request. Such requests have to be made in writing
• Request correction of the personal data that we hold about you. It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Should your personal information change, please notify us of any changes of which we need to be made aware by contacting us, using the contact details below.
• Request erasure of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have exercised your right to object to processing (see below).
• Object to processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this basis. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal information for direct marketing purposes.
• Request the restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal data about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.
• Request the transfer of your personal data to you or another data controller if the processing is based on consent, carried out by automated means and this is technically feasible.

If you want to exercise any of the above rights, please email our Data Protection Point of Contact: gary@aims.co.uk

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request for access is clearly unfounded or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with the request in such circumstances.

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access the information (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is another appropriate security measure to ensure that personal information is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it.

10. Right to withdraw consent

In the limited circumstances where you may have provided your consent to the collection, processing and transfer of your personal data for a specific purpose (for example, in relation to direct marketing that you have indicated you would like to receive from us), you have the right to withdraw your consent for that specific processing at any time. To withdraw your consent, please email our Data Protection Point of Contact, Gary@aims.co.uk

Once we have received notification that you have withdrawn your consent, we will no longer process your personal information (personal data) for the purpose or purposes you originally agreed to, unless we have another legitimate basis for doing so in law.

11. Changes to this notice

Any changes we may make to our privacy notice in the future will be provided to you via an update on our website: https://www.aims.co.uk/.

This privacy notice was last updated on 25^th November 2024.

12. Contact us

If you have any questions regarding this notice or if you would like to speak to us about the manner in which we process your personal data, please email our Data Protection Point of Contact – Gary Robinson, Director – gary@aims.co.uk or telephone him on 020 7616 6629.

You also have the right to make a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues, at any time. The ICO’s contact details are as follows:

Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF

Telephone – 0303 123 1113 (local rate) or 01625 545 745

Website – https://ico.org.uk/concerns