Privacy Notice

This Privacy Notice is designed to help you understand how and why the York and North Yorkshire Growth Hub processes your personal data. This notice should be read in conjunction with York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority’s (YNYCA) Corporate Privacy Notice, and any supplementary privacy notices for specific services or functions, such as the Equity Platform Privacy Notice.

Who are we?

York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority (YNYCA) is a ‘Data Controller’ as defined by Article 4(7) of the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR).
The York and North Yorkshire Growth Hub is now part of the York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority (YNYCA) and was one of 39 growth hubs set up by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to promote growth and improvement services to businesses.

YNYCA has appointed Veritau to be its Data Protection Officer. Their contact details are:
Information Governance Office,
Veritau,
West Offices,
Station Rise,
York,
North Yorkshire,
YO1 6GA
Email: information.governance@veritau.co.uk
Tel: 01904 552848

What personal information do we collect?

In various places within this website, and via our employees (either on the telephone, face-to-face, or via email) we may ask for the following information, including but not limited to:

Name and job title
Contact information, including email address and phone number
Information such as postcode, preferences and interests
Information relating to your business (e.g. business name, industry, your customers etc.)
Anonymous Diversity Monitoring information (e.g. age, ethnicity, gender, mental and physical health information)

Why do we collect your personal information?

Your data is collected via the website and YNYCA employees as an essential part of the services we deliver. The reasons for this includes the following:
To keep you up-to-date on business support opportunities and add you to our mailing list (when you have opted-in to this).
To track the support that you have accessed (whether via the website, or through our employees) to understand your progress through our services and support preferences
For evaluation and research purposes to understand the impact of our services.
To understand more about the individuals, and types of businesses, that access our support services.
In order to deliver our business support services, we must collect data about you and your business and log this onto our CRM system. This allows us to track and monitor your progress and the success of our services.
We will always ask for your consent when it concerns marketing information and being added to our mailing list. You will not be sent any regular updates unless you have opted-in to this.
If you have received a service from the Growth Hub, we may ask you if you would like to complete an anonymous diversity monitoring survey. This helps us to understand whether our services are inclusive and reach a wide range of people. Any answers you provide will be collected and stored separately from any other personal data you have shared with us to protect your identity.

Who do we obtain your information from?

The information we hold on you comes from publicly available sources in addition to information that you share directly with the Combined Authority, or through business support staff working for your local authority (City of York Council, North Yorkshire Council) such as when you contact us via our website, email, face to face or via the telephone.

Who do we share this information with?

The data you share with us will never be sold to third parties and will be treated with confidentiality. However, there are some instances in which we would be required to share your data. Sharing is limited to the following reasons:

We occasionally work with 3rd party organisations – who help us to deliver our workshops and other events. We will never share your personal details with these third parties without your express consent. Should you wish to take part in any YNYCA events which are hosted by another organisation: the organisation will be named – and you will be given notice of their involvement when you sign up to the event.
We work jointly with City of York Council and North Yorkshire Council to deliver our programmes to improve our services and avoid duplication. In cases where we are working jointly with another council we share your personal data with them to enable this and so that they can communicate with you about any programme you are attending and offer you follow on support.
We may contract external organisations to follow-up with you for research and evaluation purposes only. In order to do this, we will need to share your contact details and business name (any confidential business information that you tell us will not be passed on). Your data may be used to produce evaluation reports for us, so that we can monitor the success of our services. All of the findings will be anonymised and will not be published or referred to in a way which identifies any individual or business. Once the contractual agreement is completed, the external organisation will have to safely dispose of all of your data (i.e. contact information) and they will no longer be able to contact you for any other purposes. It is highly beneficial to us if you take part in these evaluation projects, as it allows us to improve our services. However, you are under no obligation to take part and can choose to opt out.
Department for Business and Trade (DBT) who fund our programmes may occasionally request data and insights into the types of businesses that we have engaged with, in order to understand how Growth Hubs across the country are performing. The types of data shared could include personal information (i.e. your name and contact details) and organisational information (i.e. business size, number of employees). DBT requires your data purely for monitoring purposes and will not process it in any other manner.
To prevent duplication of support services, we may let your relevant local authority know that your business has been working with us. However, we will not share any personal information without your permission.

How long do we keep your information for?

Data held	Retention period
Personal information	For as long as you remain an ‘active user’. This means that you are regularly in touch with a Growth Hub employee to receive business support, or you are opted-in to our marketing emails. If you opt-out of emails and request your details are removed, this will be done within 1 week to allow employees the capacity to remove all of the information. If you become ‘inactive’ for more than 12 months, we will also remove your personal data.
Organisational information	The Growth Hub will continue to store this information indefinitely. As long as Growth Hubs are operating, this data is needed to provide insights on our customers and understand trends. However, this will only include publicly available information. Any personal details or confidential information will be removed as stated above.

What is our lawful basis for processing your information?

YNYCA relies on the following lawful basis to process your personal data:

Article 6 (1)(a) – The data subject has given consent to the processing of his or her personal data for one or more specific purpose.
Article 6 (1)(e) – Processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest.

For more information about how YNYCA uses your data, including your privacy rights and the complaints process, please see our Corporate Privacy Notice.