Home owners services privacy notice

The proper handling of personal information is very important to the delivery of our services.

To make that we treat personal information correctly, we aim to meet in full to the requirements of data protection law.

This privacy notice has therefore been produced to explain as clearly as possible how we process your personal data.

Why we collect your personal information

We collect personal data for the purpose of billing and collecting the service charge and ground rent. The payment of the service charge and ground rent arises from the leasehold agreement made between the council and the lessee or the freehold transfer. The council has powers under the following legislation to collect and process your personal data:

  • Housing Act 1985 as amended (including 450A, B and C amended by the Housing and Planning Act 1986)
  • Landlord and Tenant Act 1985
  • Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Act 2002
  • Law of Property Act 1925
  • Housing (service charge loans) SI 1992 no.1708 as amended in 2000 and 2009
  • Financial Services and Markets (Exemption) Order 2001
  • Financial Services and Markets (Regulated Activities) Order 2001 as amended 2013
  • Financial Conduct Authority guidelines (Mortgage Conduct of Business rules)

How we use your information

Information held by Southwark Council’s Homeowners Services is used to bill and collect the service charge and ground rent. If we provide building insurance cover on your behalf, the contract also allows us to share your information with the building insurance provider.

To improve the service we deliver we may also use your information to communicate with you about housing services. This could include these services:

  • Repairs and maintenance
  • Major works
  • Resident services

Who has access to your data?

We may need to share your data with other organisations we work with or those who provide services on our behalf. These include:

  • auditors
  • IT and software providers
  • housing service providers and contractors (including the building insurance provider)
  • other councils

Occasionally, your information may be accessed by contracted IT providers. Access by IT providers will only be for reasons of technical support, and any viewing of data will be incidental to this.

There are other specific situations where we may be required to disclose information about you, such as:

  • where we are required to provide the information by law
  • where disclosing the information is required to prevent or detect a crime, including fraud
  • where disclosure is in the vital interests of the person concerned

Your data protection rights

You have these rights in relation to the data we hold to administer your lease:

  • the right to be informed about the collection and use of your data
  • the right to obtain access to your data
  • the right to have any inaccurate or incomplete data rectified
  • the right to have personal data erased in specific circumstances
  • the right to restrict processing of data in specific circumstances
  • the right to object to processing of your data in certain circumstances

You also have a right to make a complaint about our handling of your personal data to the Information Commissioners Office by visiting www.ico.org.uk or calling 0303 123 1113 .

More information

If you’d like to know more about the information we hold, or the way we use it, please email the Data Protection Officer at Southwark council at dpo@southwark.gov.uk or write to Data Protection Officer PO Box 68763, London SE1P 4DJ.

More information about data protection law and how it applies to you can be found on www.ico.org.uk.

Page last updated: 11 July 2019

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