Waste Removals Privacy Policy
This Privacy Policy explains how Waste Removals collects, uses, stores and shares personal data about its customers and prospective customers. It applies to all Waste Removals customers and potential customers in our service area, regardless of how you contact us or use our services.
Who We Are
Waste Removals is a waste collection and disposal service provider operating in our defined service area. For the purposes of applicable data protection laws, including the UK General Data Protection Regulation and the EU General Data Protection Regulation where applicable, Waste Removals acts as the data controller for the personal data described in this Privacy Policy.
Personal Data We Collect
We collect and process different types of personal data depending on how you interact with us and which services you use. The personal data we may collect includes:
Identification and contact details, such as your name, title, postal address, service address, billing address, email address and telephone numbers.
Service and account information, such as details of the services you request or receive, waste collection schedules, service history, customer reference numbers, login details for any online account and communications preferences.
Payment and billing information, such as bank account details, payment card details, payment history, invoices, credit notes and information needed for accounting and tax purposes.
Communication data, such as emails, phone call records where applicable, messages you send to us, feedback, complaints, and responses to any surveys or questionnaires.
Technical and usage data, such as IP address, device information, browser type, approximate location information derived from your IP address, and information about how you use our website and online services where these are provided.
Operational data, such as records of collections and deliveries, photographs related to service quality or access issues, and information about the safe provision of our services at your premises.
How We Collect Your Data
We collect personal data directly from you when you contact us by phone, email, post, online forms, or in person, when you request a quote, enter into a contract, make a payment, create an online account, or communicate with us in any other way.
We may also collect data automatically when you visit our website through cookies and similar technologies that provide us with technical and usage information.
In some cases, we receive personal data from third parties such as payment providers, credit reference agencies, publicly available sources, and business partners who refer you to our services.
Lawful Bases For Processing
We process your personal data only when we have a lawful basis under data protection laws. Depending on the context, our lawful bases include:
Contract: We process your data when it is necessary to enter into or perform a contract with you, such as to provide waste removal services, arrange collections, manage your account and handle billing.
Legal obligation: We process certain data to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations, including tax and accounting requirements, waste management regulations, and record keeping duties.
Legitimate interests: We process data where it is necessary for our legitimate business interests or those of a third party, provided your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests. This includes managing our operations, improving our services, ensuring security, preventing fraud, handling customer queries, and marketing our services to existing customers in a proportionate way.
Consent: In limited cases, we may rely on your consent, for example for certain marketing activities or optional cookies on our website. Where we rely on consent, you can withdraw it at any time by contacting us using the details provided below or by changing your preferences where applicable.
How We Use Your Personal Data
We use the personal data we collect for the following purposes:
To provide and manage waste removal and related services, including setting up and managing your account, planning and performing collections, and communicating with you about your service.
To process payments, issue invoices, manage debt recovery, and maintain accurate financial and accounting records.
To respond to your enquiries, handle complaints, provide customer support, and maintain our relationship with you.
To manage our business operations, including scheduling, routing, fleet management, service optimisation and quality control.
To comply with legal, regulatory, and health and safety obligations applicable to our waste management activities.
To send you information about our services that we believe may be of interest to you, where permitted by law and in line with your communication preferences.
To secure our systems, prevent and detect fraud or misuse of our services, and protect our rights and the rights of others.
Data Sharing and Processors
We may share your personal data with carefully selected third parties where necessary for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy and where permitted by law.
We use third party service providers acting as data processors to perform certain functions on our behalf. These processors may include IT and hosting providers, payment processors, accounting and bookkeeping service providers, customer relationship management and communication tools, route planning and logistics platforms, and document storage providers.
We ensure that all data processors are bound by contractual obligations that require them to process your personal data only in accordance with our instructions, to keep it secure, and to comply with applicable data protection laws.
We may also share data with professional advisers such as lawyers, auditors or insurers where necessary for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims or for compliance and governance purposes.
In some circumstances, we may be required to share personal data with public authorities, regulators, law enforcement bodies or courts where required by law or where necessary to protect our rights or the rights of others.
International Data Transfers
Where we transfer personal data outside the United Kingdom or the European Economic Area, we will ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect your data, such as using standard contractual clauses or transferring to countries that have been recognised as providing an adequate level of data protection.
Data Retention
We keep your personal data only for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected, including to meet legal, accounting or reporting requirements.
In general, we retain customer account and contract information for the duration of our relationship with you and for a reasonable period afterwards to deal with queries, resolve disputes and comply with legal obligations. Financial and billing records are usually kept for the period required by tax and accounting laws.
Where we no longer require your personal data for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy, we will delete or anonymise it in a secure manner.
Your Data Protection Rights
Under data protection law, you have a number of rights in relation to your personal data. These rights may be subject to certain conditions and exemptions. Your rights include:
The right of access: you can request a copy of the personal data we hold about you and information about how we process it.
The right to rectification: you can ask us to correct or complete inaccurate or incomplete personal data.
The right to erasure: you can ask us to delete your personal data in certain circumstances, for example where it is no longer needed for the purpose for which it was collected or where you withdraw consent and there is no other legal basis for processing.
The right to restrict processing: you can ask us to restrict the processing of your data in certain situations, such as while we are verifying its accuracy or responding to an objection you have raised.
The right to data portability: in certain circumstances, you can request that we provide your personal data in a structured, commonly used and machine readable format, and that we transmit it to another controller where technically feasible.
The right to object: you can object to our processing of your personal data where we rely on legitimate interests as the lawful basis, including profiling based on those interests. You always have the right to object to direct marketing.
Rights related to consent: where we rely on your consent, you can withdraw that consent at any time without affecting the lawfulness of processing carried out before the withdrawal.
Exercising Your Rights
If you wish to exercise any of your data protection rights or have any questions about this Privacy Policy or how we handle your personal data, you can contact us using the contact details provided on our main customer communications and invoices.
We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data or exercise your other rights. We aim to respond to all valid requests within the time limits set by data protection law.
Complaints
If you have concerns about how we handle your personal data, we encourage you to contact us first so we can try to resolve the issue. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the relevant supervisory authority for data protection in the country or region where you live or work, or where you believe a breach of data protection laws has occurred.
Changes To This Privacy Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices, legal or regulatory developments, or improvements to our services. The most current version will always apply to the personal data we hold and process. We encourage you to review this Privacy Policy periodically to stay informed about how we protect your personal data.
