Privacy Policy & Cookies

Privacy Policy

What personal data does The Society collect and what is it used for?

We use members’ data for the administration of membership; the communication of information, and the organisation of events. The data we routinely collect includes members’ names, telephone numbers, addresses and email addresses. We collect this data directly from our members when they join the Society.

We publish news, including photographs, in the Envoy and the AEMES Journal.

Who is your data shared with?

Your personal data is not passed on by us to other organisations.

Where does this data come from?

Data for most of our members originally comes from them when they join or when they update their information.

How is your data stored?

This information is mainly stored in digital form on computers and in the form of written documents where necessary.

Who is responsible for ensuring compliance with the relevant laws and regulations?

Under the GDPR we do not have a statutory requirement to have a Data Protection Officer. The person who is responsible for ensuring we discharge our obligations under the GDPR is the Secretary of the Society.

Who has access to your data?

Members of the committee have access to members’ data in order for them to carry out their legitimate tasks for the Society. They are not free to use it for any other purpose.

What is the legal basis for collecting this data?

The Society collects personal data that is necessary for the purposes of its legitimate interests as a membership organisation For some data, such as keeping of minutes of meetings and that relating to financial matters, the basis for collection and retention is the general and efficient management of the Society.

How you can check what data we have about you?

If you want to see the basic membership data we hold about you, you should contact the Secretary. You can contact us with a “Subject Access Request” if you want to ask us to provide you with any other information we hold about you. If you are interested in any particular aspects, specifying them will help us to provide you with what you need quickly and efficiently. We are required to provide this to you within one month.

There is not usually a fee for this, though we can charge a reasonable fee based on the administrative cost of providing the information if a request is excessive, or for requests for further copies of the same information.

Does the Society collect any “special” data?

The GDPR refers to sensitive personal data as “special categories of personal data”.

The Society does not collect any special data.

How can you ask for data to be removed, limited or corrected?

Contact the Society Secretary or any Committee member.

How long we keep your data for, and why?

The Society normally keeps members’ data after they leave or their membership lapses in case they later wish to re-join. However, we will delete any former member’s contact details completely on request.

Other data, such as that relating to accounting matters, is kept for the legally required period.

Cookies

Our website uses cookies, as almost all websites do, to help provide you with the best experience we can. Cookies are small text files that are placed on your computer or mobile phone when you browse websites.

Our cookies help us:

• Make our website work as you’d expect
• Remember your settings during and between visits
• Improve the speed/security of the site
• Continuously improve our website for you
• Make our marketing more efficient

We do not use cookies to:

Collect any personally identifiable information (without your express permission)

Collect any sensitive information (without your express permission)

Pass personally identifiable data to third parties

Pay sales commissions

You can learn more about all the cookies we use below.

Granting us permission to use cookies

When you enter our website, we ask your permission for us to use Cookies. By clicking ‘Accept Cookies’ you are consenting to us using Cookies. Should you wish to remove or not use cookies from our site you can learn how to do this below, however doing so will likely mean that our site will not work as you would expect.

More about our Cookies

Name of cookie	Expires	Purpose
_ga	2 years	Registers a unique ID that is used to generate statistical data on how the visitor uses the website.
_gat	Session	Used by Google Analytics to throttle request rate
_gid	Session	Registers a unique ID that is used to generate statistical data on how the visitor uses the website.
collect	Session	Used to send data to Google Analytics about the visitor’s device and behaviour. Tracks the visitor across devices and marketing channels

Turning Cookies off

You can usually switch cookies off by adjusting your browser settings to stop it from accepting cookies (Learn how here). Doing so however will likely limit the functionality of ours and a large proportion of the world’s websites as cookies are a standard part of most modern websites.

It may be that your concerns around cookies relate to so called “spyware”. Rather than switching off cookies in your browser you may find that anti-spyware software achieves the same objective by automatically deleting cookies considered to be invasive. Learn more about managing cookies with antispyware software.