Our Privacy Policy

Allied Surveyors & Valuers Ltd provides property survey and valuation services to private individuals and lender clients - see About Us for more information on our particular specialisations and company ethos.

As a company, we take our responsibility for complying with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) seriously at the highest management level and throughout our organisation.

Allied Surveyors & Valuers Ltd is a company incorporated in England and our registered office is Building 2, Riverside Court, Bowling Hill, Chipping Sodbury, Bristol, BS37 6JX (company number 6936426). We are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (registration number Z2093855). Our Company is regulated by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) and we are certified to ISO 9001:2015, the internationally recognised standard for Quality Management.

How we collect information from you

This Privacy Policy governs the manner in which our Company (whether as a Data Controller or Data Processor) collects, uses, maintains and discloses information. This covers information collected on individuals (Data Subjects) from various sources including:

users (“User”) of the alliedsurveyors.com website (“Site”)

our clients, for whom we carry out survey and valuation services

other parties involved in the process of us carrying out our services, such as estate agents

applications from surveyors / surveying practices to join Allied Surveyors & Valuers Ltd

our employees

This Privacy Policy applies to the Site and all products and services offered by Allied Surveyors & Valuers Ltd.

How we use collected information

We may collect and use personal information for the following purposes:

to provide services relating to property valuation and surveys

to fulfil our obligations as an employer

to improve customer service: information you provide helps us respond to your customer service requests and support needs more efficiently

to resolve complaints

to send periodic emails: we may use your email address to respond to your enquiries, questions or other requests. If you decide to opt-in to our mailing list, you will receive emails that may include company news, updates, related product or service information, etc. If at any time you would like to unsubscribe from receiving future emails, we include detailed unsubscribe instructions at the bottom of each email or you may contact us via our Contact Us page.

Retention Period

We will only store your personal information for as long as reasonably necessary to fulfil the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy and to comply with our regulatory and/or legal obligations.

Case Files: these are kept for 15 years to cover legal and operational requirements consistent with the status of being a limited company.

Personnel Records: these are kept for 6 years after an employee leaves the Company. We do not retain CVs for unsuccessful applicants after a vacancy has been filled.

Once the relevant retention period has expired, all records are destroyed as ‘Confidential Waste’.

Lawful Basis

We process the information we collect in line with the ‘Contract’ and ‘Legitimate Interest’ legal bases of GDPR. We only hold personal information that is necessary, fair and lawful for the purpose for which it was collected.

Contract:

for our employees, panel valuers, companies that supply our data processing services and our clients for whom we supply valuation and surveying services.

Our business receives instructions from Banks, Building Societies and financial institutions (lenders) to inspect and value properties for residential mortgage lending purposes. Where this is the case, we do not have a direct relationship with the end consumer (ie, the Bank, Building Society or financial institution’s customer - the mortgage applicant).

Our business also receives instructions to value and/or survey properties for residential purposes from members of the general public. Where this is the case, the member of public is our direct customer.

Legitimate Interest:

the personal information supplied to us by our clients in order that we can carry out our contract for them.

Personal identification information

We may collect personal identification information from you in a variety of ways, including, but not limited to, when Users visit our Site, subscribe to the newsletter, and in connection with other activities, services, features or resources we make available on our Site. Users may visit our Site anonymously. We will collect personal identification information from Users only if they voluntarily submit such information to us. Users can always refuse to supply personal identification information, except that it may prevent them from engaging in certain Site related activities.

Information is also collected from job applications, applications to join our panel of valuers and instructions received from our corporate clients, or received from you direct.

Non-personal identification information

We may collect non-personal identification information about Users whenever they interact with our Site. Non-personal identification information may include the browser name, the type of computer and technical information about Users means of connection to our Site, such as the operating system and the Internet Service Providers utilized and other similar information.

Web browser cookies

Our Site may use “cookies” to enhance User experience. A User’s web browser places cookies on their hard drive for record-keeping purposes and sometimes to track information about them. A User may choose to set their web browser to refuse cookies, or to alert you when cookies are being sent. If they do so, note that some parts of the Site may not function properly.

How we protect your information

We adopt appropriate data collection, storage and processing practices and security measures to protect against unauthorized access, alteration, disclosure or destruction of your personal information, username, password, transaction information and data stored on our Site and inhouse databases and filing systems.

We require our suppliers of 3rd party systems (used to process instructions from our clients) to provide appropriate levels of security to protect the information we add to and store within their systems.

In the event of a data breach that is likely to result in a high risk of adversely affecting your rights and freedoms, we have procedures in place to rigorously investigate the cause. We will contact you if we have the slightest concern that your personal information has been compromised. We would also report the event to the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) within 72 hours of becoming aware of the breach.

Sharing your personal information

We do not sell, trade, or rent your personal identification information to others. We may share generic aggregated demographic information not linked to any personal identification information regarding visitors and users of our Site with our business partners, trusted affiliates and advertisers for the purposes outlined above.

How we share employees’ personal information is detailed within our Employee Privacy Notice. Information sent to us as part of an application to join our Company or panel of valuers will be subject to the usual Pre-employment Screening checks for which we use Disclosure Scotland to carry our criminal record checks and Experian to carry out credit referencing and identity verification.

We would share information with legal or regulatory authorities, such as assisting with crime and fraud prevention.

We do not share your personal information with organisations outside of the United Kingdom.

Your Individual Rights

Right to be informed: these matters are covered in this Privacy Policy

Right of access / data portability: you can request a copy of the personal information that we hold for you. If the details of where to send the information are different from those in our records, we may need proof of your identity before being able to respond to your request.

Right to rectification: to ensure your data is correct and complete

Right to erasure: you can request that your information is deleted, but we might be prevented from doing so in order to comply with other obligations upon us.

Right to restrict/object to processing: this is not an absolute right and only applies in certain circumstances, eg, to be removed from a mailing list.

Rights related to automated decision making including profiling: we do not carry out these activities.

We will respond to your request for information (a Subject Access Request) within 30 days of receipt.

Allied Surveyors & Valuers Ltd has the discretion to update this privacy policy at any time. When we do, we will revise the updated date at the bottom of this page. We encourage Users to frequently check this page for any changes to stay informed about how we are helping to protect the personal information we collect. You acknowledge that it is your responsibility to review this privacy policy periodically and become aware of modifications.

Your acceptance of these terms

By using this Site and our related products and services, you signify your acceptance of this policy. If you do not agree to this policy, please do not use our Site or supply us with your personal information in any format. Your continued use of the Site and our products and services following the posting of changes to this policy will be deemed your acceptance of those changes.

Complaints

If you wish to complain about any matters covered by this policy, the relevant supervisory authority is the Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF.

Tel: 0303 123 1113

You can also Report a Concern via their website.

Contacting us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, the practices of this Site, your dealings with our Company or if you wish to request your information, please contact us via our Contact Us page, or alternatively you can contact our data protection officer at datarequest@alliedsurveyors.com.