Privacy notice

At Ramsay Paterson LLP, we respect the privacy of those who provide personal information to us. This privacy notice provides details of how we collect and process personal data and for which purposes.

Ramsay Paterson LLP is the data controller for the purposes of data protection law and we are responsible for your personal data (referred to as “we”, “us” or “our” in this privacy notice). We are a limited liability partnership registered in England and Wales registered number OC390014. We are a regulated law firm, authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority, SRA No. 607966 and registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Contacting us: by email: info@ramsaypaterson.co.uk; by post: Lynwood, Newland Garden, Sherborne, Dorset, DT9 3AF; by telephone: 0117 303 5223.

If you are not happy with any aspect of how we collect and use your data, you have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). We would encourage you to contact us first if you do have a complaint so that we can try to resolve it for you.

What personal data do we collect

We need to collect personal information from our clients (including prospective clients) in order to be able to deliver our services. In addition, we will also collect personal information from individuals who are not instructing clients, including visitors to our website and blog, suppliers, other professionals with whom we collaborate (e.g. in hosting events), members of forums and groups we facilitate, attendees at events, suppliers and job applicants (all referred to as business contacts).

Business contacts: where we collect data from general business contacts, who are not instructing clients, we may process information such as name, job title and contact information.

Corporate clients: we are predominantly engaged by corporate clients (i.e. other corporate entities) and as such those clients are not data subjects. However, taking instructions from such clients may mean that personal information about other individuals may be provided to us. For example, this may be personal information relating to, without limitation, any of our clients’ employees, workers, directors, self employed consultants, trustees or governors. Such personal information will vary depending on the instruction but it could include, for example, their names, their employment status, special data relating to protected characteristics under any discrimination law etc.

If you give us information on behalf of someone else, you must ensure that you are processing that data lawfully, in accordance with data protection requirements.

Individual clients: if you are an individual client using (or enquiring about) our services, we may process personal information such as name and job title, contact information, payment information, Other information relevant to provision of our services, information as required by regulatory requirements, such as anti money laundering legislation and information that you provide to us so that we can provide our services to you (and as we are specialist employment lawyers you might provide us with a significant amount of personal information, including personal information about other persons relevant to the matter in question).

Depending on the type of advice you need, we may also need to collect sensitive data about you in order to deliver our services, such as information about health, race or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs or trade union membership. We ask you for your explicit consent for processing sensitive data, so when you submit your details, we will send you a further communication asking for you to confirm your consent to this processing.

For what purpose do we collect data

We will collect personal information from you to:

  • verify your identity;
  • enable us to effectively deliver our services (which may also include, for example, instructing counsel or other experts your behalf, liaising with other professional service providers in relation to matters that we are handling, or liaising with the opposing party on a matter you have instructed us on;
  • manage client relationships for example, providing clients with information on our services and legal updates that we consider may be relevant to them; arranging and hosting events;
  • investigate or settle disputes;
  • comply with any applicable law, court order, other judicial process, or the requirements of a regulator;
  • enforce our agreement with you (for example, collecting invoiced fees); and
  • process as otherwise required or permitted by law.

We will only process personal Information where we have a lawful reason for doing so. The lawful basis for processing personal information by us will be at least one of the following:

  • the processing is necessary for the performance of a contract you are party to or in order to take steps at your request prior to you entering into a contract;
  • the processing is necessary in order for us to comply with our legal obligations (such as compliance with anti-money laundering legislation);
  • the processing is necessary for the pursuit of our legitimate business interests (including that of the delivery and the promotion of our services); and/or
  • processing is necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims.

Marketing communications

We may send you marketing communications (i) you have instructed us in the past or asked for information from us about our services or (ii) you agreed to receive marketing communications and in each case you have not opted out of receiving such communications since. If you are a limited company, we may send you marketing emails without your consent. However you can still opt out of receiving marketing emails from us at any time.

At any time, you can ask us or third parties to stop sending you marketing messages at any time by emailing us at info@ramsaypaterson.co.uk or by following the unsubscribe links on any marketing message sent to you.

Sharing your personal data with others

Where you supply us with personal data as a client, we will assume, unless you instruct us otherwise in writing, that we can disclose your personal data as we believe is reasonably necessary to provide our services, or as is required under applicable law. We may have to share your personal data with other people or organisations as set out below:

  • Event hosts/organisers, in connection with management of an event, in which case the details (usually name, job title and organisation) will only be used by the third party for that specific purpose.
  • Service providers who provide IT and system administration services, business and legal sector research, administrative services, marketing and business development.
  • Professional advisers including lawyers, bankers, auditors and insurers who provide consultancy, banking, legal, insurance and accounting services.
  • HM Revenue & Customs, regulators and other authorities based in the United Kingdom and other relevant jurisdictions who require reporting of processing activities in certain circumstances.
  • Third parties to whom we sell, transfer, or merge parts of our business or our assets.

We require all third parties to whom we transfer your data to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We only allow such third parties to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.

Data security

Your data is mainly stored and processed on secure servers in the European Economic Area (EEA). We will occasionally process your data outside of the EEA (for example when using certain third party services) but will only do so if appropriate safeguards are place in accordance with our legal and regulatory obligations in relation to the personal information.

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

Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure. We will do our best to protect your personal data, but we cannot guarantee the security of your data electronically transmitted to us; any transmission is at your own risk. Once we have received your information, we will use our security measures to try to prevent unauthorised access.

Data retention

We will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements. You can ask the lawyer dealing with your case for more details about retention periods.

Use of cookies

Our website uses minimal cookies, for the option of sharing the content via Twitter or Facebook. A cookie is a small text file which is placed onto your computer (or other electronic device) when you use our website.

You may delete and block all cookies from our website, but parts of the site may not work as a result. Most web browsers allow some control of most cookies through the browser settings. You can find out more about cookies through various websites online.

Your legal rights

Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data. These include the right to:

  • Request access to your personal data.
  • Request correction of your personal data.
  • Request erasure of your personal data.
  • Object to processing of your personal data.
  • Request restriction of processing your personal data.
  • Request transfer of your personal data.
  • Right to withdraw consent.

You can see more about these rights at:
https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/individual-rights/


If you wish to exercise any of the rights set out above, or more information on how to do so, please email us at info@ramsaypaterson.co.uk