Data Privacy Policy
This Privacy Policy sets out how Research Garage Group Ltd uses and protects any information that you give us when you use this website (“the Website”) or interact with us.
When, in this Policy, we refer to Research Garage we mean Research Garage Group Limited whose registered address is, London Road, Hinckley, Leicestershire, LE10 1HL (“Research Garage”) and which is registered in England and Wales under company number 010221262. In this Privacy Policy references to ( "we" and "us" or "our" ) or words of a similar import, refer to Research Garage.
Research Garage is the data controller with respect to your personal information and is responsible for ensuring that the personal data we collect is processed in accordance with relevant data protection laws.
Research Garage is registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (“ICO”) under registration reference Z6853850. If you have any questions or are unsure about anything contained within this privacy policy, please let us know by contacting our Data Protection Officer at llapworth@researchgarage.co.uk
This privacy policy applies to any and all personal information collected by or provided to Research Garage from any prospective and actual customers through our Website or other channels (such as email, telephone, post, social media, SMS or web chat, Newsletters/Blogs).
We may change this policy from time to time by updating this page. You should read the privacy policy on this Website from time to time to ensure that you are happy with any changes. If we propose a significant change, we will notify you by email and will otherwise post an alert that our policy has changed on our Website.
In this privacy notice, we provide you with information about the following: -
1. The information we collect about you.
2. What we do with your information
3. What legal basis do we rely on to process your information
4. Who do we share your information with
5. How long we keep your personal information?
6. Where we hold your personal information
7. Your rights in relation to your personal information
1. What information do we collect about you?
When you interact with us, we will process personal information about you. The nature of the personal data we will process will depend on the nature of our relationship with you, and if for example, you are a prospective customer, current customer, or simply visiting our website or submitting an enquiry to us.
Personal data we may process will include:-
• Your title and name
• Your contact information such as email address, phone number, home address, postcode,
• Demographic data- when making a finance application, such as date of birth
• vehicle details,
• Information about your credit history and affordability ratings that we will receive from credit or affordability checks that we will conduct from time to time using third parties such as credit reference agencies and publicly available data sources. (Including previous addresses, employment details, and bank account number, sort code). The information contained in and records of communications between us, including emails, letters, and text messages.
• Financial information to include payment information relating to your bank account and/or payment card.
• Details about the transactions you carry out with us, including Vehicle purchases, Vehicle support services, and purchases of other goods.
• CCTV footage in which you feature when you visit our premises.
• Dash Camera footage will be captured as all of our company vehicles such as demonstrator vehicles/Courtesy vehicles and Rental vehicles are all fitted with cameras along with a high proportion having trackers fitted also.
• Information captured in call recordings.
• Information you provide when completing surveys which we may ask you to complete from time to time.
• Information about how you navigate and use our Website such as the search terms you use, the pages you visit, and the amount of time you spend on the Website.
• Information contained within your driver’s licence.
• The contents of any complaints you may make about or to us.
• Details of any incidents involving you and your vehicle such as accidents, collisions, or other damage to the vehicle.
2. What do we do with your information we process
We require this information to ensure that we provide the best possible experience when you interact with us. In particular and depending on the nature of our relationship. In particular, we may process your personal information for some, or all, of the following purposes;
• To manage and administer the relationships between you and Research Garage
• Responding to enquiries and providing you with the services you request from us;
• To carry out our obligations arising from any contracts entered into between you and us including purchase of vehicles and provision of services, and to respond to queries from you regarding those contracts.
• To notify you about changes to our services and to otherwise communicate with you.
• To obtain feedback from you to improve the services we offer.
• To process and respond to customer complaints.
• To comply with any legal obligation (including in connection with a court order),
• Assisting with the prevention and detection of crime or fraud
• To process payments, and if necessary to collect arrears or recover debt from you.
• To provide you with reminders regarding your vehicle including, for example, when your vehicle is due to have a service or MOT undertaken.
• In accordance with your preferences, we will process personal data for the use of marketing and customer communications. To update your preferences please contact ( Insert contact email address)
• For market research, analytical purposes and to track sales.
• For internal record-keeping and administration
• Disability information through Motability scheme purchasing.
3. What legal basis do we rely on to process your information
Data protection law sets out a number of conditions that organisations can rely on in order to lawfully handle personal information. The conditions we rely on are as follows: -
Legitimate interests
The law permits us to handle your personal information where necessary in our legitimate interests provided that this isn’t outweighed by your interests. Many of the purposes we handle your personal information, described above, fall into this category as they are essential activities that enable us to run Research Group effectively. For example, enabling us to use third-party service providers, to monitor, review and improve the services we provide to you. We may, if necessary, also use your information to defend our legal rights or to obtain legal advice and to manage any complaint that you might have. We ensure that your rights and interests are protected when we do this.
Consent
We are permitted to use your personal data when you give us your consent for us to do so. We will only use your personal data to contact you for direct marketing purposes if you give us your consent to do so. If you choose to provide special category data in order to prove eligibility for any programme, we may run from time to time you allow us to use this for this purpose.
Where we rely on consent as the lawful basis for processing your personal information, you can withdraw your consent at any time. The withdrawal of consent shall not affect the lawfulness of processing based on consent before its withdrawal.
Performance of a contract
Where we have made contractual commitments to you or you have made the same to us. For example, we will process personal data to fulfil your vehicle order.
Required by law
We will, if required by law, disclose your personal information for example in response to a court order. We will disclose your personal information if requested by a law enforcement agency or where we believe it is necessary to investigate, prevent, or take action regarding illegal activities, suspected fraud, situations involving potential threats to the physical safety of any person, non-compliance with of our terms and conditions, or otherwise permitted or required by law and consistent with legal requirements.
4. Who do we share your information with
Service providers
We will not pass your personal information to anyone outside our organisation, except to carefully selected third parties (professional advisers and other service providers who help us run our business e.g., IT support providers. Please see the company names along with their individual privacy notices:
Reynolds & Reynolds https://www.reyrey.com/your-privacy-rights
Mentor Dealer Management Systems https://mentorsystems.co.uk/privacy-policy/
EDynamics privacy_policy.pdf (edynamix.com)
Thewholecaboodle https://www.thewholecaboodle.com/privacy-policy
Stellantis https://www.stellantis.com/en/privacy
Managed Racks https://www.managedracks.co.uk/privacy-policy
Keyloop Dealer management systems https://keyloop.com/privacy-notice
We may pass your personal information to third-party finance company (s) for the purposes of them providing you with finance. Those organisations may carry out credit checks and may disclose your data to credit reference agencies for that purpose.
We may pass your personal information to third parties if we are under a duty to disclose or share your personal information in order to enforce or apply the terms of any agreements we have with or otherwise concerning you (including agreements between you and us; or to protect our rights, property or safety or those of our customers, employees or other third parties;
Mils Legal Ltd t/a MILS https://www.mils.co/privacy-policy#Privacy%20Policy
Redwood Collections https://www.redwoodcollections.com/privacy-policy
We may pass your personal information to the relevant franchise Stellantis partner relating to your vehicle. They may contact you directly regarding your vehicle to obtain feedback and/or to provide offers. A link to our franchise manufacturer partners' privacy policy can be accessed here:
Stellantis - https://www.stellantis.com/en/privacy
Police and law enforcement agencies
We may pass personal information to external agencies and organisations (including the police and other law enforcement agencies) for the purpose of preventing and detecting fraud (including fraudulent transactions) and in connection with the prevention and detection of crime.
A prospective purchaser of our business
In the event that we sell or buy any business or assets, in which case we may disclose your personal data to the prospective seller or buyer of such business or assets or where we are required to forward the information in order to comply with a regulatory or legal process.
5. How long do we keep your personal information
We will keep your personal information for as long as we need it to provide the services and products you request from us. We may also keep it to comply with our legal obligations, to resolve complaints, and to enforce our rights. As a result, the length of time that we keep your information will vary depending on the purposes for which we have it. In any event, we will review what information we need on an ongoing basis and will only retain it for the minimum amount of time that we need it.
6. Where we hold your personal information
Your personal information may occasionally be processed and held by third parties outside the United Kingdom (UK) or European Economic Area (EEA).
Whereas in the UK/EU, we implement a high standard of data protection law, some parts of the world do not implement such stringent laws. As a result, if we do send personal information overseas, we will make sure that appropriate safeguards are in place to ensure it is protected in accordance with European and UK data protection laws. These might include: -
• Sending personal information only to countries that European Authorities have indicated have adequate data protection laws in place e.g., Canada or Switzerland;
• Putting in place contracts with the recipient containing terms that the European Authorities have approved as providing adequate protection; organisations that are members of a scheme that has been approved by European Authorities as achieving adequate protection.
For more information about where we send your information, please contact llapworth@reaserchgarage.co.uk
Cookies on our Website
Cookies are small text files stored on your computer (or mobile device) by web pages as you visit them. Cookies are not programs and cannot harm your computer.
Our Website uses cookies to enhance your experience on our Website(s) and to help us analyse data about how visitors are using our Website(s).
For more information about how we use cookies, please refer to our separate Cookie policy https://www.researchgarage.co.uk/cookie-policy on our website.
Links to other websites
Our Website may contain links to other websites of interest. However, once you have used these links to leave our Website, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information that you provide whilst viewing such sites and such sites are not governed by this privacy statement. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question.
6. Your rights in relation to your personal information
You have the right to request that we don’t send marketing material to you and you can do this at any time by:
• Clicking on the unsubscribe link at the bottom of promotional e-mails
• Phoning the telephone number included in any postal correspondence
• Using the opt-out option on any promotional SMS communication
• E-mailing us at any time at llapworth@researchgarage.co.uk
Your rights in relation to your personal data
We will try and keep your personal information up to date but rely on you telling us promptly if your name, address, telephone number, or any other details change. If you think the personal information, we hold about you is inaccurate or incorrect, you can request that we correct this information) by emailing us at llapworth@researchgarage.co.uk
Data Protection laws also meant that you have a number of additional rights including the right to access your personal information and to receive a copy of it. To request access to your personal information, please email us at llapworth@researchgarage.co.uk
You can also request to have your personal data erased or transferred either to you or a third party in a commonly structured format and to have your personal information restricted.
Please be aware that some of these rights only apply in limited circumstances and therefore even if you wish to exercise them, we may not always be required to comply.
For further information about how these rights apply, or to exercise your rights, please e-mail us at llapworth@researchgarage.co.uk
How to contact us
If you have any questions, comments or requests regarding this Privacy Policy, please contact the Company, in writing at: -
Research Garage Group Limited
60, London Road, Hinckley,
Leicestershire, LE10 1HL.
Please mark your correspondence - for the attention of Lee Lapworth
Complaints
If you have any questions about how Research Garage handles your personal information or are unhappy about how we have done so, you can contact us at:
• By email: llapworth@researchgarage.co.uk
• By post: Research Garage Group Limited, London Road, Hinckley, Leicestershire, LE10 1HL
• By phone: 01455 637152
You also have the right to raise any complaint you may have with the ICO. You can do this by contacting them
• By post at The Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF
• By email on dpo@ico.org.uk
• By telephone to 0303 123 1113.
This Privacy Notice was last modified in September 2023