Privacy Policy

Gardeners Belmont Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how Gardeners Belmont collects, uses, stores and protects personal data about customers and prospective customers. It also explains your rights under the UK General Data Protection Regulation and other applicable data protection laws. This Privacy Policy applies to all Gardeners Belmont customers and prospective customers in our service area.

Who we are

Gardeners Belmont is a gardening and grounds maintenance service provider operating in the local Belmont area. For the purposes of data protection law, Gardeners Belmont is the controller of the personal data described in this Privacy Policy. This means that Gardeners Belmont decides how and why your personal data is used and is responsible for ensuring it is handled lawfully.

Personal data we collect

Gardeners Belmont may collect and process the following categories of personal data when you contact us, use our services or interact with us:

Identification and contact details, such as your name, postal address, property address, billing address, and any other address you provide, as well as any contact names you give us.

Communication details, such as the information you provide when you contact us to request a quote, make a booking, or ask a question, and any notes we make about our conversations or visits that are relevant to providing services to you.

Service and contract information, such as details of the gardening or maintenance services you request or receive, visit dates and times, work instructions, before and after descriptions of work, and any information about access to your property that you choose to provide.

Payment and billing information, such as records of invoices issued, payment status and payment method. We do not store full card details if card payment is used; only limited information necessary for accounting and reconciliation may be retained.

Technical and usage information, such as basic information generated if you visit our website, including the date and time of your visit and how you interact with the site, to the extent that this involves personal data.

Marketing preferences, such as whether you have agreed to receive marketing communications from us and the type of communications you have chosen to receive or opted out of.

How we collect personal data

Gardeners Belmont collects personal data directly from you when you contact us by phone, in person or online to request a quote, make a booking, provide instructions, or ask a question about our services. We may also collect personal data when we attend your property to carry out work and you provide additional information.

We may receive limited personal data from third parties if, for example, you are referred to us by an existing customer or an introducer. In these situations we only process the information that is necessary to contact you and provide our services.

Lawful basis for processing

Gardeners Belmont only processes your personal data when we have a lawful basis to do so under data protection law. We rely on the following lawful bases:

Contract. We process your personal data to take steps at your request before entering into a contract, and to perform a contract with you. This includes providing quotes, managing bookings, carrying out gardening services, invoicing you, and managing any issues, complaints or queries related to our services.

Legal obligation. We process certain personal data to comply with our legal obligations, for example to maintain accurate accounting records, comply with tax rules, and respond to lawful requests from public authorities.

Legitimate interests. We process personal data where this is necessary for our legitimate interests and where your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests. This may include keeping basic records of past work carried out at a property, managing and improving our services, preventing fraud or misuse of our services, and communicating with you about existing or similar services that may interest you if you are a customer or have previously requested a quote.

Consent. In some limited situations we may rely on your consent, for example where required to send certain forms of direct marketing or where we collect optional information that is not necessary to provide our services. Where we rely on consent, you can withdraw your consent at any time.

How we use personal data

Gardeners Belmont uses your personal data for the following purposes:

To provide our gardening and grounds maintenance services, including assessing your requirements, scheduling visits, carrying out work and keeping records of services delivered.

To manage quotes, bookings and customer relationships, including communicating with you about your requests, confirming appointments, rescheduling visits, and responding to your enquiries.

To issue invoices, process payments, maintain accounting records, and manage any refunds or disputes related to payments.

To operate, manage and improve our business, including analysing how our services are used, training staff, and maintaining internal records of past work.

To send you information about services that are the same as or similar to those you have already received or enquired about, where permitted by law, and to manage your marketing preferences.

To comply with legal and regulatory obligations, resolve disputes, enforce agreements and protect the rights, property and safety of Gardeners Belmont, our customers and others.

Data sharing and processors

Gardeners Belmont does not sell your personal data. We may share personal data with trusted third parties who act as processors on our behalf. These third parties only process your personal data as instructed by us and for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy. They are required to keep your data secure and to comply with data protection laws.

Examples of processors we may use include providers of accounting or invoicing software and other business administration tools, information technology and hosting services that support our business systems, and service providers that assist with secure data storage and backup.

We may also share personal data where we are required to do so by law, for example with tax authorities or law enforcement, or to establish, exercise or defend legal claims. In some circumstances we may share limited personal data with professional advisers, such as accountants, where necessary for them to provide services to us.

International transfers

Gardeners Belmont aims to store and process personal data within the United Kingdom or the European Economic Area wherever possible. If we use a processor that stores or accesses personal data from another country, we will ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect your data in accordance with data protection law, such as the use of approved standard contractual clauses or reliance on an adequacy decision.

Data retention

Gardeners Belmont keeps personal data only for as long as necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, including to meet legal, accounting or reporting requirements.

In general, we keep customer records, including basic contract information and details of services performed, for a period that allows us to address any queries, complaints or legal claims that may arise after the work is completed, and to comply with tax and accounting obligations. After the relevant retention periods have expired, personal data is securely deleted or anonymised so that it can no longer be associated with an identifiable person.

Where we process personal data based solely on your consent and we have no other lawful basis for keeping it, we will delete that personal data if you withdraw your consent.

Your data protection rights

Under data protection law, you have a number of rights in relation to your personal data. These rights apply to all Gardeners Belmont customers and prospective customers in our service area, subject to the conditions and exemptions set out in the law.

Right of access. You have the right to request confirmation of whether we process your personal data and to request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.

Right to rectification. You have the right to ask us to correct any inaccurate or incomplete personal data we hold about you.

Right to erasure. In certain circumstances, you have the right to ask us to delete your personal data, for example where it is no longer needed for the purposes for which it was collected or where you withdraw consent and there is no other lawful basis for processing.

Right to restriction of processing. You have the right to ask us to restrict the processing of your personal data in certain situations, for example if you contest the accuracy of the data or object to our use of it.

Right to data portability. Where we process your personal data by automated means based on your consent or on a contract with you, you may have the right to receive the personal data you provided to us in a structured, commonly used and machine readable format and to request that it is transmitted to another controller where technically feasible.

Right to object. You have the right to object to our processing of your personal data where we rely on legitimate interests as our lawful basis, including profiling related to those interests. You also have the right to object at any time to the processing of your personal data for direct marketing.

Right to withdraw consent. Where we rely on your consent to process personal data, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time. Withdrawing consent does not affect the lawfulness of processing carried out before your withdrawal.

To exercise any of your rights, you can contact Gardeners Belmont using the usual contact details you use when arranging services with us. We may need to verify your identity before responding to a request. We will respond within the time limits required by data protection law.

Security

Gardeners Belmont takes appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect personal data from unauthorised access, disclosure, alteration or destruction. Measures include restricting access to personal data to those who need it for their role, using secure systems for storing records where appropriate, and training staff to handle personal data responsibly. However, no method of transmission or storage is completely secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security.

Changes to this Privacy Policy

Gardeners Belmont may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our services, legal requirements or how we handle personal data. Any updated version will apply to all personal data held by us at the time of the change and to any new data collected thereafter. You are encouraged to review this Privacy Policy periodically to stay informed about how we protect your information.