Candidate Privacy Notice

Data Controller: Pickering Solicitors (Tamworth) Limited, Etchell House, Etchell Court, Bonehill Road, Tamworth B78 3HQ. 

As part of any recruitment process, the firm collects and processes personal data relating to job applicants. The firm is committed to being transparent about how it collect and uses that data and to meeting its data protection obligations.

Data Protection Principles

We will comply with data protection law and principles which means that your data will be:

• Used lawfully, fairly and in a transparent way.
• Collected only for valid purposes that we have clearly explained to you and not used in any way that is incompatible with those purposes.
• Relevant to the purposes we have told you about and limited only to those purposes.
• Accurate and kept up to date.
• Kept only as long as necessary for the purposes we have told you about.
• Kept securely.

The information we may hold about you.

In connection with your application to work with us, the firm may collect, store and use a range of personal information about you. This may include:

• your name address and contact details, including email address and telephone number;
• details of your qualification, skills, experience and employment history;
• information from the SRA or other professional bodies
• information about your current level of remuneration, including benefit entitlements;
• whether or not you have a disability for which the firm needs to make a reasonable adjustment during the recruitment process;
• information about your entitlement to work in the UK;
• information from  Disclosure and Barring Service in respect of criminal convictions as appropriate;
• data collected from psychometric or skills testing.

We may also collect store and use the following types of more sensitive personal information:

• information about your race or ethnicity, religious belief, and sexual orientation
• information about your health, including any medical condition,health and sickness records.
• information about criminal convictions and offences.

We may collect this information in a variety of ways. For example data might be obtained from you or from a recruitment agent, contained in application forms, CVs or covering letters, obtained from your passport or other identity documents, collected through interviews or other forms of assessment, obtained through social media or professional bodies. We may seek information from third parties such as references supplied by former employers only once a job offer to you has been made and we will Inform you that we are doing so. 

How we will use information about you

The firm needs to process data to take steps at your request prior to entering into a contract with you. It may also need to process your data to enter into a contract with you.

In some cases the firm needs to process data to ensure that it is complying with its legal obligations. For example it is required to check a successful applicant's eligibility to work in the UK before employment starts.

The firm has a legitimate interest in processing personal data during the recruitment process and for keeping records of the process. Processing data from job applicants allows the firm to manage the recruitment process, assess  and confirm a candidate's suitability for employment and decide to whom to offer a role. The firm may also need to process data from job applicants to respond to and defend against legal claims.

For certain roles, the firm is obliged to seek information about criminal convictions and offences. Where the firm seeks this information it does so because it is necessary for it to carry out its obligations and exercise specific rights in relation to employment.

If your application is unsuccessful, the firm may keep your personal data on file in case there are future employment opportunities for which you may be suited. The firm will ask for your consent prior to retaining this data for this purpose and you are free to withdraw your consent at any time.

We will use your sensitive personal information in the following ways:

• we will use information about your disability status to consider whether we need to provide appropriate adjustments during the recruitment process, for example whether adjustments need to be made during a test or interview.
• we will use information about your race or national or ethnic origin, religious, philosophical or moral beliefs or your sex life or sexual orientation to ensure meaningful equal opportunity monitoring and reporting
• we will use information about any criminal convictions to assess your suitability for a particular role as some roles within the firm require a high degree of trust and integrity.

Information about criminal convictions

For certain roles we are required to carry out a criminal records check in order to satisfy ourselves that there is nothing in your criminal convictions history which makes you unsuitable for the role. 

If you fail to provide personal information.

If you fail to provide personal information when requested which is necessary for us to consider your application, such as evidence of qualifications or work history, we will not be able to process your application successfully. For example if we require a credit check or references for this role and you fail to provide us with relevant details, we will not be able to take your application further.

Automated decision-making.

You will not be subject to decisions that will have a significant impact upon you based solely on automated decision-making.

Who has access to data?

Your information may be shared internally for the purposes of the recruitment exercise. 

We will only share your personal information with third parties for the purposes of processing your application  e.g. with a recruitment consultant. All third party service providers such as these are required to take appropriate security measures to protect  your personal information in line with our policies.

The firm will not transfer your data outside the European Economic Area.

Data Security

The firm takes the security of your data seriously and has internal policies and controls in place to ensure that your data is not lost accidentally destroyed, misused or disclosed and is not accessed except by our employees in the proper performance of the duties in accordance with our Information Management and Security and Data Protection & Data Privacy policies. We limit access to your personal information to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal information on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected security breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected breach where we are legally required to do so.

How long does the firm keep data?

If your application for employment is unsuccessful, we will hold your data on file for twelve months after the end of the relevant recruitment process. 

If your application for employment is successful, personal data gathered during the recruitment process will be transferred to your employee file and retained during your employment. The periods for which your data will be held will be communicated to you via a new privacy notice.

Your rights

As a data subject, under certain circumstances, by law you have the right to:

• Request access to your personal information ( commonly known as a 'data subject access request'). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal information we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.
• Request correction of the personal information that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate information we hold about you corrected.
• Request erasure of your personal information. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal information where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it.  You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal information where you have exercised your right to object to processing (see below).
• Object to processing of your personal information where we are relying on a legitimate interest) or those of the third party and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal information for direct marketing purposes.
• Request the restriction of processing of your personal information. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal information about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it .
• Request the transfer of your personal information to another party.

If you want to review, verify, correct or request erasure of your personal information, object to the processing of your personal data, request that we transfer a copy of your personal information to another party, please contact the Data Security Manager in writing.

Data Security Manager, Pickering Solicitors (Tamworth) Ltd,  Etchell House, Etchell Court, Bonehill Road, Tamworth, Staffordshire, B78 3HQ or email datasecurity@pickerings-solicitors.com

If you believe that the firm has not complied with your data protection rights, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues.