WHS Privacy

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England Golf – World Handicap System (WHS) Privacy Notice

This privacy notice explains how England Golf collects and processes personal data of its members. The organisation is committed to being transparent about how it collects and uses that data and in order to meet its data protection obligations.

Where this notice refers to “we”, “our” or “us” this is a reference to the English Golf Union Limited (company no. 5564018) with registered office at The National Golf Centre, The Broadway, Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire, LN10 6PU, trading as England Golf. For the purpose of data protection laws, we are the controller of the personal data processed for the purposes set out below and we are responsible for looking after it.

What information does England Golf collect?

If you are a member of England Golf, we collect the following information about you:

your name, date of birth, email address, phone number, membership
number, membership type (18 or 9 hole), home club, gender and age;
information about the courses you play, dates you play, your scores and
information relating to your handicap;
information about competitions you play and your results from such competitions;
your England Golf member login details; and
we may also automatically collect information and personal data about

your computer for system administration including, where available, your IP address, operating system and browser type. We do this to help us analyse how members use the member login area (including behaviour patterns and the tracking of visits across multiple devices), to establish more about our website users and to assist us in managing your account and improving your online experience.

Please see our website privacy policy for further information about what information may be collected when you visit our website.

How we collect personal data?

We collect some of your information directly from you, either through information that you give to us or information that we collect through your communications with us. We also obtain some information from your golf club.

Information that you give us

You may share personal data about yourself and your circumstances by:

registering to use our member’s login area via www.englandgolf.org, and continuing to use the member’s login area;
completing a form in relation to a competition organised by us whether in person or online; and
making enquires or interacting with us directly whether in person, by telephone, or email.

You are not obliged to provide your personal data to us. However, if you do not provide your personal data to us, we will not be able to provide all services to you, respond to your queries, or allow you onto access the member’s login area. For example, if you do not provide us with your email address and date of birth we will not be able to provide you with a handicap.

Information that we collect about you

We collect personal data about you when you:

submit scores; and
participate in competitions that we organise; and
visit our website. Please see our website privacy policy for further information about what information may be collected when you visit our website.

Information that we receive from other sources

We receive personal data about you from golf clubs which are affiliated to us, from relevant county golf organisations, or via software providers acting on behalf of those clubs or counties.

Why do we need your personal data?

The main purpose for which we use your information is to provide you with your membership services.

We use your information:

to provide you with your membership services;
to calculate your handicap;
to run golf competitions;
to provide you with information that you request from us or which may be of interest to you;
to notify you about changes to our services;
to provide member support;
for research about our members’ behaviour and our services generally,
and to report to bodies such as Sport England; and
to develop and improve our services, website and platforms.

Basis for using your personal data

Legitimate business interests

We have a legitimate interest in processing personal data. As a member of a golf club affiliated to England Golf you are also a member of England Golf as the national governing body for the sport. We use your personal data as set out in this privacy policy for the legitimate interests of our business to enable us to:

provide you with and improve our membership services;
administrate and maintain the integrity of the handicapping system;
maintain appropriate membership records;
maintain records of disciplinary, anti-doping or safeguarding cases; and
operate a safe and lawful business.

Where we rely on legitimate interests as the legal basis for processing your personal data, we have considered whether or not those interests are overridden by your interests, fundamental rights and freedoms. We won’t use your information if we believe your interests should override ours, unless we have other lawful grounds to do so (such as if we have a legal obligation to process your personal data). If you have any concerns about our processing please refer to details of “Your rights” section below.

As we outline in “Your rights” section below, you will have the right to object to our using your information for our legitimate interests. However, please keep in mind that your objection to this sort of processing will affect our ability to carry out the tasks that we have set out above.

Performance of a contract

Processing may also be necessary for the performance of our contract with you. In order for us to fulfil our obligations under such contract (e.g. to provide you with the benefits of being a member of England Golf), we will need to collect, process and share (as further detailed below) your personal data.

Compliance with a legal obligation

Processing of your personal data may be necessary for compliance with our legal obligations.

We may share your personal data with:

your home club and the relevant county golf organisation, or contractors or suppliers acting on behalf of those organisations;
competition organisers and officials involved in competitions in which you take part, including contractors or suppliers acting on behalf of those organisations;
other organisations involved in the calculation of your handicap, for example where you play at a club other than your home club we may provide them with your current handicap;
carefully selected third parties which supply us with products and services, such as website and platform developers and cloud computing services. We will only share your information with these suppliers where it is necessary for them to provide us with the services we need;
our professional advisors (including without limitation tax, legal or other corporate advisors who provide professional services to us);
organisations with whom we have a legal obligation to share your data, which may include regulators, fraud prevention agencies, police, the courts or law enforcement agencies; and
HMRC or other tax bodies or agencies to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations.

Where is your personal data stored?

Your personal data will be stored and processed in the UK and / or the European Economic Area. Your data may be transferred to our platform developer which is based in New Zealand, a country that the European Commission has deemed to provide an adequate level of data protection.

How long will we keep your data?

We will retain your data for as long as it is necessary to fulfil the purposes set out in “Why do we need your personal data?” in this privacy notice. This means that we will keep your personal data for the duration of your membership with us.

We also keep your personal data for a period of time following your membership ceasing. Once the data is no longer required for the purposes set out above, the period of retention will be calculated in accordance with our Data Protection

Policy. When determining the relevant retention periods, we consider guidelines issued by relevant data protection authorities, as well as the time periods needed to comply with applicable regulations or laws, to meet regulatory and financial reporting obligations, for tax, accounting and audit purposes, and to fulfil and protect our contractual obligations and rights.

Security

We place great importance on keeping your personal data safe and secure. As such, we put in place appropriate technical and organisational measures / industry standard technology to protect it from unauthorised access and unlawful processing, accidental loss, destruction and damage.

The security measures we use are designed to provide a level of protection security appropriate to the risk of processing your personal data.

You are responsible for protecting your online membership account login details and must not share them with, or disclose them to anyone. Where you have chosen a password which allows you to login to the member’s login area, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We advise you not to share your password with anyone and to use a unique password.

Your rights

You have the right to

obtain access to, and copies of, the personal data that we hold about you;
require us to correct the personal data we hold about you if it is incorrect;
require us to erase your personal data in certain circumstances;
require us to restrict our data processing activities in certain circumstances;
receive from us the personal data we hold about you which you have
provided to us, in a reasonable format specified by you, including for the
purpose of you transmitting that personal data to another data controller;
object to our processing of personal data held by us about you; and
withdraw your consent, in circumstances where we rely on it to use your personal data.

We want to make sure that your personal data is accurate and up to date. You have the right to ask for inaccuracies in your data to be corrected, and in certain circumstances for us to stop processing your data or for your data to be erased. Some of these rights are not automatic, and we reserve the right to discuss with you why we might not comply with a request from you to exercise them.

If you wish to access or amend your data please contact us at compliance@englandgolf.org

If you are not satisfied with how we are processing your personal data, you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). You can also find out more about your rights under the GDPR (and other data protection legislation) from the Information Commissioner’s Office website available at: www.ico.org.uk.

Contact us

If you have any queries about this privacy notice or how we process your personal data you may contact our data protection officer:

Compliance@englandgolf.org;
Data Protection Officer, England Golf, The National Golf Centre, The Broadway, Woodhall Spa, Lincolnshire, LN10 6PU

Changes to our privacy notice

Any changes to this policy in the future will be posted on this page and, where appropriate, notified to you by email. Please check back frequently to see any updates or changes to this policy.