About this policy
The charity is committed to protecting and respecting privacy. This policy describes how we collect, store and process personal data when you use our website (https://www.norfolksennetwork.org/), subscribe to our newsletter, or when we provide services to you or your child.
We will use personal data only for the purposes and in the manner set out below to ensure that we process any personal data in compliance with the Data Protection Acts 1998 and 2018 and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and any subsequent amendments to data protection legislation.
By providing us with your personal data you agree to us processes information provided in line with this Privacy Policy. This policy will be updated from time to time as the need arises.
Who we are and how you can contact us
We are Norfolk SEN Network; a registered charity whose aim is to help children and young people with special educational needs to find the right educational placement or provision to meet their needs. Where the child is aged 16 or under, we will work with their parents or guardians of the child to meet this aim. Where they are aged 16 to 25, we may deal with the young person directly. Our registered charity number 1044353 and our registered address is 2A Eastern Crescent, Norwich, NR7 0UE.
You can contact us in writing at the address given above, by emailing norfolksennetwork@hotmail.co.uk or by using the contact form on our website. If you would like to speak to us, please call us on 0330 043 0225.
For the purposes of the Data Protection legislation, the Data Controller is the Chair, Clayton Anderson and we are registered with the ICO with registration number 2913541x
What personal data we collect about you
This applies to personal information that we collect, has been provided to us, use and otherwise process in connection with the relationship you have with the charity as a service or supplier.
We collect and process the following but not limited to:
personal data that you provide to us – you might make contact with us via our website, or by telephone, post, or social media, or you might provide your details to us at an event so that we can provide you with further information about our services (either because you would like us to provide you or your child with assistance, or because you would like to hear more about our work or are interested in supporting us).
- The personal information that you provide to us will usually include your name and contact details e.g., telephone number, address, and email address.
- If we are providing our services to you, then we will need to ask you to provide some further information. If you are a young person who we are assisting directly, then we will ask you to provide us with your name, date of birth, details of where you are currently attending school, sixth form, or college, details of your special educational needs, copies of any reports (obtained either by you, or shared with you) commenting on your special educational needs, and any correspondence between you and the school/sixth form/college and/or Local Authority relating to this.
personal data that we receive from third parties – If we are providing assistance to parents or guardians on a child’s behalf to ensure that they are placed in the best school or given appropriate assistance for their needs we will need information about the child including name, date of birth, details of current school, details of special educational needs, copies of any reports commenting on special educational needs, and any correspondence between parent’s and the school and/or Local Authority relating to this.
Alongside personal data which we receive from parents and young people directly we may receive further information from the child or young person’s school and from the Local Authority.
personal data about use of our website – This is technical information and includes details such as your IP address, your login information, browser type and version, time zone setting, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform, as well as details of how you navigated to our website and where you went when you left, what pages you viewed or searched for, page response times, download errors, length of visits to certain pages and page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks, and mouse-overs).
Sensitive Personal Information is defined as racial and ethnic origin, religious, political, or philosophical beliefs, genetic data, and biometric data for the purposes of unique identification, trade union membership or information about health/sex life and personal information relating to criminal convictions or offences. However, in some circumstances we may need to collect or request voluntarily some Sensitive Personal Information for legitimate purposes. We will need to collect Sensitive Personal Information to advise you and provide our services to you.
What we use your personal data for
We use your personal data in the following ways:
- to provide you with the information and services that you request from us.
- to provide you with our newsletter and keep you up to date regarding our events or services, in accordance with your marketing preferences (see How we use your personal data for marketing).
- to manage and administer our charity.
- to review and improve our services.
- to carry out obligations arising from any contract between both parties.
- to third parties in order to comply with all legal and regulatory requirements.
- personal data about your use of our website is used to administer our website and for internal operations, including troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, research, statistical and survey purposes. To improve our website to ensure that content is presented in the most effective manner for you and for your computer or mobile device and as part of our efforts to keep our site safe and secure.
Purposes for processing personal data
- where consent has been obtained.
- to perform obligations under any contract between both parties.
- for legitimate interests provided these are not overridden by interests, fundamental rights, and freedoms, e.g., respond to enquiries.
- To comply with a legal obligation to disclose personal information to government and/or regulatory authorities and other third parties where required to do so by applicable law, e.g. to comply with a court order, for taxation purposes etc.
If you do not provide us with any of your personal data, we may not be unable to provide our services to you, or commitments as described above.
Data Privacy Rights
The following rights are defined in legislation and the General Data Protection Regulations.
- The right to withdraw consent to the processing of personal data. However, we may continue to process personal information if there is an alternative legal basis for processing.
- The right to request access or obtain a copy of the personal data we hold. This is called a subject access request. You can exercise this right by sending us a written request at any time. Please mark your letter “Subject Access Request” and send it to us by post or email using the details in the contact us section. Any request will be processed within 30 days in accordance with GDPR.
- The right of rectification including to require corrections to inaccurate personal data.
- The right to request restriction of processing or to object to processing personal data if processing is based on legitimate interests or direct marketing etc.
- The right to request the erasure of personal data where it is no longer necessary.
- The right to data portability.
- The right to object to automated decision making including profiling (if any) that has a legal or significant effect on an individual. We do not make use of automated decision making or profiling.
- The right to complain to a data protection authority e.g., the Information Commissioner Office (ICO) if it is considered that we have infringed applicable data privacy laws when processing personal data. Whilst you are not required to do so, we encourage you to contact us directly to discuss any concerns that you may have and to allow us an opportunity to address these before you contact the Information Commissioner’s Office.
| Categories of personal data used | Purpose | Legal basis | Additional legal ground for processing special category personal data |
| Name and contact details | To respond to your queries regarding our services | Legitimate interest (in growing our charity and developing new relationships). | N/A |
| Name, contact details, and your marketing preferences | To send you appropriate marketing communications in accordance with your marketing preferences | Consent and/or legitimate interests (to grow and develop our business) | N/A |
| Name, contact details, and details relating to your schooling and special educational needs (or your child’s schooling and special educational needs). | To correspond with you regarding the assistance you require and how we are able to assist. | Legitimate interest (to grow and develop our business) or contract (where you have instructed us to provide services and paid your annual fee). | Explicit consent |
| Name, contact details, and details relating to your schooling and special educational needs (or your child’s schooling and special educational needs). | To work with you regarding the steps to be taken to help with getting the needs of you/your child met. | Contract | Explicit consent |
When we will share your personal data with others
We share your data with the following in the day to day running our business:
- the Local Authority.
- The Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal.
- a child’s school.
We may also share your personal information with third parties on a one-off basis, for example, if:
- we sell or buy any business or assets (including our own), in which case we will disclose your personal data to the prospective seller or buyer of such business or assets.
- we are under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order to comply with any legal obligation, or in order to enforce or apply our website terms of use and other agreements; or to protect the rights, property, or safety of our customers, ourselves, or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organisations for the purposes of fraud protection and credit risk reduction.
Data Retention
Personal data will not be kept for longer than necessary to fulfil the specific purposes outlined in this Privacy Policy and to allow us to comply with legal requirements, including, without limitation, any tax, and commercial obligations.
The criteria used to determine data retention periods include the following:
- if you have signed up to receive our newsletter, we will retain your name and email address or postal address until you unsubscribe.
- after an enquiry about our services in case of a follow up query or provision of services.
- The period in which claims may be legally made (for at least 7 years) if relevant.
- if we provide services to you, then we will retain a complete copy of your file for either 7 years from the date we last hear from you, or until the child who we assisted turns 19 years old (whichever is later).
- In accordance with legal and regulatory requirements.
- Permitted under applicable law.
- we may anonymise your personal data or use it for statistical purposes. We keep anonymised and statistical data indefinitely, but we take care to ensure that such data can no longer identify or be connected to any individual.
Please note that although reasonable efforts will be made, it may not always be possible to completely remove or delete all personal information from our database because of backups and other technical reasons. Where this is the case, we will take steps to ensure that personal data is suppressed to render it unusable.
Security
We take every care to ensure that your personal data is kept secure. The security measures we take include:
- ensuring that our staff receive regular data security awareness training
- only storing your personal data on our secure servers
- ensuring that paper records are stored in locked filing cabinets on our office premises
- maintaining up to date firewalls and anti-virus software to minimise the risk of unauthorised access to our systems
- enforcing a strict policy on the use of mobile devices and out of office working
- using reCAPTCHA technology on our website
Unfortunately, sending information via the internet is not completely secure. Although we will do our best to protect your personal data, we cannot guarantee the security of personal data sent to our website; you send us personal data at your own risk. Once we have received your personal data, we will use strict procedures and security features (some of which are described above) to try to prevent unauthorised access.
How we use your personal data for marketing
We will add your details to our marketing database if:
- you register as a Member of Norfolk SEN Network.
- we provide support to you, and you ask us to add you to our mailing list.
The marketing communications we send are contained within a bi – monthly newsletter which we send either by post or by email, depending on the preference you have indicated.
You can ask us to only send you marketing communications by particular methods (for example, you may be happy to receive emails from us but not post), or you may ask us not to send you any marketing communications at all.
You can check and update your current marketing preferences at any time by calling or emailing us using the details set out in the contact us section above. We never share your personal data with third parties for marketing purposes.
When we will send your personal data to other countries
Your personal data may be transferred to, and stored at, a destination outside the European Economic Area (“EEA”) by us or by our sub-contractors. Where we, or our sub-contractors, use IT systems or software that is provided by non-UK companies, your personal data may be stored on the servers of these non-UK companies outside the EEA. We will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that your data is treated securely and in accordance with this privacy policy.
Cookies
Our website does not collect any identifiable data about you using cookies.
How we keep this policy up to date
We will review and update this policy from time to time. This may be to reflect a change in the goods or services we offer or to our internal procedures or it may be to reflect a change in the law.
The easiest way to check for updates is by looking for the latest version of this policy on our website (https://www.norfolksennetwork.org/) or you can contact us to ask us to send you the latest version of our policy.
Each time we update our policy we will update the policy version number at the end of the policy and the date on which that version of the policy came into force.
This is policy version 3 which came into effect on June 2025
| Reviewed | 30.09.2022 | P. Brickley |
| Reviewed | 09.07.2024 | P. Brickley |
| Reviewed | 20.06.2025 | C. Anderson |
