Privacy Policy

Introduction

Visit Ards and North Down and www.visitardsandnorthdown.com is the consumer-facing brand of Ards and North Down’s Borough Council’s Tourism Service Unit. 

When we collect your information, we take care that it is handled securely and processed in accordance with the law. This policy explains when and why we collect personal information, how we use it, the conditions under which we may disclose it to others and how we keep it secure.

Who are we?

Visit Ards and North Down is the trading name of Ards and North Down Borough Council Tourism Service Unit.  Ards and North Down’s Borough Council (with registered offices at Town Hall, The Castle, Bangor, BT20 4BT) as a data controller, is registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office and is committed to protecting your privacy when you use our services. Council’s Privacy Notice explains how Ards and North Down Borough Council, (as a Data Controller), collects, uses and protects personal data that it holds.

The Privacy Notice below explains how the Ards and North Down Borough Council Tourism Service Unit, hereafter referred to as Visit Ards and North Down, collects, uses and protects personal data that it holds.

We reserve the right to make changes to this Policy at any time. Your continued use of our products, applications, services and websites that are subject to this Policy will signify your acceptance of any and all changes to this Policy made by us from time to time.

Data Protection Officer

As a public authority, Council must have a Data Protection Officer who makes sure we respect your rights and follow the law. If you have any concerns or questions about how we look after your personal information, please contact the Data Protection Officer at:

dataprotection@ardsandnorthdown.gov.uk

or alternatively, phone 0330 013 3333

To view Ards and North Down Borough Council’s full privacy statement, please click here.

Further information about local authorities’ responsibilities within Northern Ireland can be found at government's one stop portal NIDirect.

How we get your personal data and why we collect it

Most of the personal information we process is provided to us directly by you for one of the following reasons:

• You have made an enquiry to us
• You have requested our services
• You have subscribed to our e-newsletters. You can unsubscribe from these at any time, simply by clicking unsubscribe link at the bottom of the email.
• You have visited our website which collects cookies information that you have consented to
• You have subscribed to our website, submitted an event via the website form, or signed up via our Itinerary Planner on the Site.
• You have entered a website competition on the Site – Please check the individual terms and conditions associated with each competition. By entering our competitions and completing our entry forms you are agreeing to receive information about those competitions and to be highlighted on our digital media channels, should you win that competition.
• You wish to attend, or have attended an event.

Visit Ards and North Down collects personally identifiable information, such as your email address, name, home or work address or telephone number and in some occasions, financial information.

Visit Ards and North Down also collects anonymous demographic information which is not unique to you such as your postcode, age, gender, preferences, interests and information regarding what pages are accessed and when.

There is also information about your computer hardware and software that is automatically collected by Visit Ards and North Down when you visit our website. This information can include your IP address; browser type; domain names; access times, referring website addresses and any of our cookies you have previously consented to.

We use the information that you have given us in order to:

• Operate Visit Ards and North Down’s website and associated promotional channels and deliver the services you have requested
• Inform you of other products or services available from Visit Ards and North Down and its affiliates where you have requested us to
• Contact you via surveys to conduct research about your opinion of current services or of potential new services that may be offered

A digital CCTV system operates on Visit Ards and North Down’s premises. It is continuously recorded for the purposes of public safety and security. 

Links to other websites:

Our web site and electronic communications may contain links to other websites, both those of government departments and of other organisations. This privacy notice applies only to our Site, so you should always be aware when you are moving to another site and read the privacy statement of any site that collects personal information. 

Your UK GDPR rights

Unless subject to an exemption, under The Data Protection Act 2018 & the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) individuals are provided with certain rights when their personal data is being processed by the Council:, you have the following rights with respect to your personal data:

The right to be informed - You have the right to be informed about how and when we may process personal data. This is typically done via a privacy notice.

The right of access - You have the right to ask us for copies of your personal information. This right always applies, there are some exemptions which means that you may not always receive all the information we process.

You can request access from the Data Protection Officer using the contact details provide at the top of this statement.

The right to rectification - You have the right to ask us to rectify information you think is inaccurate. You also have the right to ask us to complete information you think is incomplete.

The right to erasure - The right to erasure is also known as ‘the right to be forgotten’. You have the right to ask us to erase your personal information in certain circumstances where there is no compelling reason for its continued processing, for example; upon the withdrawal of consent for direct marketing. 

The right to restrict processing - You have the right to ask us to restrict the processing of your information in certain circumstances.

The right to data portability - This only applies to information you have given us. You have the right to ask that we transfer the information you gave us from one organisation to another, or give it to you. This right only applies if we are processing information based on your consent or under, or in talks about entering into a contract and the processing is automated.

The right to object to processing - You have the right to object to the processing of your personal data if it is for: processing based on legitimate interests or the performance of a task in the public interest/exercise of official authority (including profiling); direct marketing (including profiling); and processing for purposes of scientific/historical research and statistics.

Rights in relation to automated decision making and profiling - The UK GDPR provides safeguards for individuals against the risk that a potentially damaging decision is taken without human intervention. You have the right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing, including profiling. 

The right to withdraw consent at any time, where relevant - We are required to make it as easy to withdraw consent as to give consent.

The right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority

The Information Commissioner for Northern Ireland may be contacted here:

Information Commissioner's Office 
3rd Floor 
14 Cromac Place 
Belfast 
BT7 2JB 

Email: ni@ico.org.uk 

Online: https://ico.org.uk/concerns/ 

Tel: 028 9027 8757 or 0303 123 1114

As a general rule, you are not required to pay any charge for exercising your rights. If you make a request, we have one month to respond to you.

You can access the personal information that is held about you by submitting a Subject Access Request (SAR) to the Council.  This request must be in writing and clearly specify the information you require and be made to the Data Protection Officer (contact details at the top of this document). 

The legal basis for the processing and the purpose of the processing. 

A key function of Visit Ards and North Down is to encourage tourism, provide advice and information about travelling to and holidays in Ards and North Down and to publicise or advertise holidays in the borough. Visit Ards and North Down also provides assistance with tourism product development and by marketing local tourism providers at regional and international level. We may carry out surveys and collect statistics and information relating to the tourist industry and assist in making Ards and North Down attractive to tourists. 

As such, Visit Ards and North Down collects and uses your personal information to operate the visitardsandnorthdown.com website and deliver the services you have requested. Visit Ards and North Down also uses your personally identifiable information to inform you of other products or services available from Visit Ards and North Down and its affiliates, where you have requested us to. Visit Ards and North Down may also contact you via surveys to conduct research about your opinion of current services or of potential new services that may be offered.  

Profiling 
We may analyse your personal information to create a profile of your interests and preferences so that we can contact you with information relevant to you. We may make use of additional information about you when it is available from external sources to help us do this effectively. We may also use your personal information to detect and reduce fraud and credit risk.

Like many other websites, our website uses cookies. 'Cookies' are small pieces of information sent by an organisation to your computer and stored on your hard drive to allow that website to recognise you when you visit. They collect statistical data about your browsing actions and patterns and do not identify you as an individual. For example, we use cookies to store your country preference. This helps us to improve our web site and deliver a better, more personalised service.  

It is possible to switch off cookies by setting your browser preferences. For more information on how to switch off cookies on your computer, visit our full cookies policy. Turning cookies off may result in a loss of functionality when using our web site. 

Digital Marketing, Social Media Monitoring & Advertising 
As part of our marketing and communications activity, we collect technical, web and aggregated data for the purposes of digital marketing including search engine marketing and on-line advertising.  We use advertising options available on social networks to target specific audiences using interest, location and demographic data made available in the social network and search engines. 

To ensure compelling and integrated communications, there are occasions where we may integrate a user's activity by tracking user's behaviour with a combination of cookies and pixel tagging data on our website visitardsandnorthdown.com with relevant social media advertising and web site advertising channels. 

We also use social media listening software to surface and bring publicly available social content to our attention. 

The social media and digital advertising platforms we currently use are: 

• Facebook
• Instagram
• YouTube
• Mailchimp
• You may also see display advertisements for Visit Ards and North Down on other websites.

You can view the Privacy Statements for each other these platforms via their respective websites.

Social Media User Generated Content- Ards and North Down Borough Council uses social media platforms to promote the area to visitors. Social media is monitored during office hours and House Rules apply to comments. Download the Terms of Use/House Rules for Council social media channels 

If you use any of our social network pages or applications or you use one of our products or services that allow interaction with social networks, we may receive information relating to your social network accounts. For instance:

• If you click on a ‘like’ or similar engagement button in one of our social media channels, we may record the fact that you have done so. In addition, the content that you are viewing may be posted to your social network profile or feed. We may receive information about further interactions with this posted content (for example, if your contacts click on a link in the posted content), which we may associate with the details that we store about you
• If you ‘like’ or ‘follow’ one of our pages on a social network site, we may receive information about your social network profile, depending on your social network account privacy settings.

For more information and for details about how you can control access to your social network profile, you should view the privacy policy and other guidance available on your social network’s website.

Your marketing choices – clear opt in – consent / opt out

You have a choice about whether or not you wish to receive information from us. If you want to receive direct marketing communications from us then you can select your choices by ticking the relevant boxes situated on the form on which we collect your information. 

We will not contact you for marketing purposes by email, post, phone or text message unless you have given your prior consent.

You can change your marketing or research preferences at any time by clicking the ‘unsubscribe’ link on any email we send you. You can also do this by contacting us via:

Post
‘Contact Us’ form on the website
Telephone: 0300 013 3333

How long do we keep your information? 

We review our retention periods for personal information on a regular basis. We are legally required to hold some types of information to fulfill our statutory obligations. We will hold your personal information in line with our ‘Retention and Disposal Schedule’ and on our systems for as long as is necessary for the relevant activity, or as long as is set out in any relevant contract or agreement you hold with us. In any event, your personal data will not be held for longer than a period of 5 years from the last contact date.

Who has access to your information? 
We will not sell or rent your information to third parties. 
We will not release your information to third parties for them to use for their own direct marketing purposes without your prior consent.

Organisations we may share information with:  
We work closely with a number of third party service providers, agents, subcontractors and other organisations for the purposes of completing public tasks and providing data processing services to you on our behalf (acting as authorized data processors). Examples of authorized data processors could include billing and fulfillment partners, IT solution providers, data analytics providers who process information on our behalf for the purposes outlined above.

For example, we may use the services of third parties to personalize content, process ticket orders, deliver packages, send postal mail and emails, provide marketing assistance, process credit card payments and provide customer services.

In order to arrange events, workshops, familiarisation trips, webinars etc., we will also share your information with our tourism partners, such as Tourism Northern Ireland, Visit Belfast and Tourism Ireland, and with tourism product and service providers, e.g., accommodation providers, event organisers. 

How we store your personal data

If we need to use your information for research or reports the information will be anonymised and any personal data will be securely destroyed.

3rd Party Data Processing

• Subscriptions, event submission forms, website itinerary planner sign ups and competition forms The personal information you provide when subscribing to the Site, submitting event forms, itinerary planner sign up, and / or competition forms on the Site is collected and processed by Simpleview. Learn more about Simpleview’s privacy practices here 
• E-zine sign ups-We use Mailchimp as our as our marketing automation platform. The personal information you provide when subscribing to e-newsletters on this Site will be transferred for processing by Mailchimp in accordance with their Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. Learn more about Mailchimp’s Privacy Policy here.
• Purchasing Tickets-We use Ticketsource as our ticketing platform. The personal information you provide when purchasing tickets via this Site will be transferred for processing by Ticketsource in accordance with their Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions. Learn more about Ticketsource’s privacy practices here.

The list of 3rd party organisations we may share information with is included in  Annex A of this document. Please note this list may change regularly and Visit Ards and North Down will ensure it is kept as accurate and up to date as possible.

We may also be required to disclose your information by law, for example, by a court order, or when we receive a Freedom of Information request, or for the purposes of prevention of fraud or other crime. Visit Ards and North Down is required to participate in the National Fraud Scheme, which requires the disclosure of financial information. 

People who subscribe on visitardsandnorthdown.com:

When a subscription is entered we collect the personal information of the applicant. This information is used for the delivery of the service requested and for subsequent Visit Ards and North Down monitoring and reporting. We will not share or use the supplied personal information for the purposes of direct marketing without your explicit consent. Where you have given consent you can withdraw it at any time. 

Visit Ards and North Down will publish aggregated anonymised data on its performance on its website. We will keep personal information contained in application files in line with our retention policy. This means that information relating to subscribers will be retained for a minimum of 5 years. It will be retained in a secure environment and access to it will be restricted.

Securing Your Information

We accept no responsibility for and cannot guarantee the security of your data during transmission to us, however once we receive the personal information you have given us, we undertake to ensure that it is treated securely, as per our obligation under the Data Protection Principle no. 6. We restrict access to personal data to employees, contractors and agents who need to know such personal data in order to operate, develop or improve the services that we provide. We ensure that we have appropriate physical and technological security measures to protect your information; and we ensure that when we outsource any processes that the service provider has appropriate security measures in place.

We will implement appropriate technical and organisational measures to ensure a level of security appropriate to the risks that are presented by the processing of your personal data. In particular, we will consider the risks presented by accidental or unlawful destruction, loss, alteration, unauthorised disclosure of, or access to personal data transmitted, stored or otherwise processed.

All information submitted to our websites is encrypted. When you are on a secure page, a lock icon will appear on the top of web browsers such as Microsoft Edge and Google Chrome. 

Non-sensitive details (your email address etc.) are transmitted normally over the Internet, and this can never be guaranteed to be 100% secure. As a result, while we strive to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us, and you do so at your own risk. Once we receive your information, we undertake to ensure that it is treated securely on our systems. Where we have given (or where you have chosen) a password which enables you to access certain parts of our websites, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share your password with anyone. 

Aged 16 or Under 

We are concerned to protect the privacy of children aged 16 or under. If you are aged 16 or under‚ please get your parent/guardian's permission beforehand whenever you provide us with personal information. 

Transferring your information outside of Europe 

As part of the services offered to you through this website, the information, which you provide to us, may be transferred to countries outside the European Union (“EU”). By way of example, this may happen if any of our servers are from time to time located in a country outside of the EU. These countries may not have similar data protection laws to the UK. By submitting your personal data, you are agreeing to this transfer, storing or processing. If we transfer your information outside of the EU in this way, we will take steps to ensure that appropriate security measures are taken with the aim of ensuring that your privacy rights continue to be protected as outlined in this Policy. 
If you use our services while you are outside the EU, your information may be transferred outside the EU in order to provide you with those services. 

Review of this Policy 

We keep this Policy under regular review. This Policy was last updated in October 2021.

• We may update this policy from time to time by publishing a new version on our website.
• You should check this page occasionally to ensure you are happy with any changes to this policy.
• We may notify you of changes to this policy by email or through private messaging system or via our website.

If we need to use your information for research or reports the information will be anonymised and any personal data will be securely destroyed.

Annex A

Visit Ards and North Down– 3rd Party Organisations we may share Information with.

• Other departments within Ards and North Down Borough Council
• Tourism Northern Ireland
• Tourism Ireland
• Fáilte Ireland
• Visit Belfast
• Department for Communities
• Department for the Economy
• Department of Finance
• Eyekiller
• HM Revenue & Customs
• NI Audit Office
• Northern Ireland Hotels Federation
• Northern Ireland Statistics & Research Agency
• NI Local Authorities and Councils
• Simpleview
• Visit Britain
• Waterways Ireland
• B&B Ireland
• What’s On NI
• Visit Strangford Lough
• Ulster Scots Agency
• Ticketsource
• Mailchimp
• National Trust
• Microsoft

Please note: This list may change regularly – Visit Ards and North Down will ensure it is kept as accurate and up to date as possible.