Privacy Policy

Privacy Policy

Privacy Policy

Watsons is responsible for and committed to protecting your data. Our registered address is 18 Meridian Way, Norwich, Norfolk, NR7 0TA. We are an independent partnership firm, regulated by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS).

Watsons respects the privacy of our customers and visitors to our website. With the latest changes to UK privacy laws, The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a positive step towards giving you, the customer, full control over how your data is used and how you are contacted.

In this policy we will advise you how we collect, store and use your data, plus what controls you have over how the data is used. When we talk about sensitive personal data, we mean any information relating to an identified or identifiable living person e.g.

  • Name
  • Date of Birth
  • National Insurance number
  • Address
  • Location
  • Race
  • Sexuality
  • Ethnicity
  • Political Opinion etc.

It also includes information on how you may interact with our websites or web applications e.g.

  • IP address
  • Cookies, etc.

Please read the following policy carefully to understand our views and practices regarding your personal data and how we will treat it. For the purposes of data protection laws in the UK, the data controller is Watsons, meaning we are solely responsible for determining the purpose and means by which the data we hold is processed.

You can view our full Cookie Policy here.

We are registered as a data controller with the Information Commissioner’s Office under number ZA664431

Lawful basis for processing data

Your data will be processed under the ‘legitimate interest’ lawful basis (to process personal data for business and commercial purposes). This means we will continue to send marketing communications data based upon existing (or any new) relationships with our customers, but even so, we will not unfairly put our legitimate interests above what is best for you.

The new GDPR states, “the processing of personal data for direct marketing purposes may be regarded as carried out for a legitimate interest.”

  • Legitimate Interest is the most flexible, lawful basis for processing data;
  • Watsons have already conducted a Legitimate Interest Assessment (LIA) and have a record of this to ensure we can justify our decision;
  • This is most likely appropriate where data is used in ways that customers may reasonably expect, with minimal privacy impact;
  • Using this as our lawful basis for processing data means Watsons are taking on extra responsibility for considering and protecting our customer’s right and interests;
  • This lawful basis sets out to provide a balance of benefits to both Watsons and individual customers.

Registering for the Engage Portal

Those customers registering for our Engage Portal, our customer platform for all of our Block & Estate customers, will not automatically opt-in to receive marketing communications from us.

Registering for the portal allows you to access your personal tenancy information, raise maintenance requests, and stay up-to-date on news relevant to you and your building.

All qualified customers of Watsons will receive our quarterly newsletter as standard, but no marketing communications will be sent highlighting any other services of Watsons.

Recording phone calls

We may record telephone calls you make to our offices to:

• check for mistakes
• train staff
• prevent, detect, investigate and prosecute fraud

We do this in the interests of offering a good service to our customers.
Your information will not be transferred outside of the European Economic area and the recording will not be shared with other organisations unless they have a legal right to it.

We will normally delete call recordings 2 months after the call was made.
The information you provide will be managed as required by general data protection regulations.

You have the right to receive a copy of the call recording subject to the terms of a Subject Access Request, that is available on request, and as long as we still have the call recording data available.

You also have the right to request that the call recording be deleted if you believe we are processing it for longer than necessary.

Why we collect data and what we use it for

Watsons will process personal information for certain legitimate business purposes, which include some or all of the following:

  • Enhance, modify, personalise or otherwise improve our services and marketing communications for the benefits of our customers;
  • To enhance the security of our network and information systems;
  • To better understand how customers/users interact with our website and digital marketing;
  • To provide email communications to existing or new customers we think will be of interest;
  • To determine the effectiveness of promotional campaigns and advertising;
  • To identify and prevent fraudulent activity.

How long do we keep your data?

We will keep your data only for as long as we need to. How long we need data depends on what we are using it for, whether that is to provide services to you, for our own legitimate interests (described above) or so that we can comply with the law.

We will actively review the information we hold and when there is no longer a legitimate interest in us holding the information, we will either delete it securely or in some cases anonymise it.

Controlling your personal information

You can opt out of receiving any marketing or communications from us at any time, simply by following the unsubscribe link on any of our email communications. This will automatically opt you out of receiving any further email marketing communications from us about our property services or other relevant information.

Please note that if you tell us that you do not wish to receive marketing communications emails, you may still receive service emails (for example, those which are necessary to confirm scheduled appointments or to update you on the status of your individual business with us). This is so we can fully meet any contracts we hold with you.

Should you wish to update or modify the personal information we hold on you, please contact us at any time requesting our Data Management & Amendment Form using the following contact email: a.crawford@watsons-property.co.uk

Please note that once you ask us to stop sending marketing emails, we will keep a minimal note of your personal information and your request so that we can provide evidence that we are securely keeping a copy of this information, by law under the new GDPR rules.

Who has access to this information?

Your details will be kept within the Watsons organisation until such time as you ask for them to be removed or we decide that, in absence of any response, they should be removed. Your details will not be sold or otherwise disposed of to any third party except where we are legally obliged to do so or where we believe that such action will protect the interests of Watsons and/or the security of our staff.

How secure are your details?

When you register your details with us, we will take all reasonable steps to keep these details secure and free from unauthorised access.

Sharing information with third parties

Third party service providers

As required in accordance with how we use data, we will share your personal information with the third-parties that perform services for us, on our behalf, which may include providing email communication services, web platform services, digital marketing services, data analytics services, payment processing, web hosting, auditing and other similar services. Third parties are subject to confidentiality obligations and may only use personal data to perform the necessary functions and not for other purposes.

Third party affiliates

We may share some data with our affiliates, in which case they must comply with this privacy policy.

Third party websites

Our website may also contain links to other websites of interest. However, once you have used these links to leave our site, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting such sites and these sites are not governed by this privacy policy. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy policy applicable to the website in question.

You can view our full Web Cookie Policy here.

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PLEASE NOTE

Our Offices Will Be Closed Over the Festive Period From the 25th December 2024 - 2nd January 2025​

For out of hours contact/emergencies please see information below:

  • For Tenants/Landlords – Please call our main lettings number – 01603 751555 – and follow the instructions. These instructions will provide you with an out of hours contact number, plus the number of an emergency plumber.
  • For Leaseholders – Please call our main Block & Estate Management number – 01603 226500 – and follow the prompts. Listed are numbers for various contractors, depending on the type of emergency.

From all of us at Watsons, - Have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!​