Privacy Notice

Access Skills is committed to ensuring your privacy is protected. This Privacy Notice sets out details of the information that we may collect from you and how we may use that information. Please take your time to read this Privacy Notice carefully. This is also displayed on the Access Skills website.

About us

Access Skills is an independent training provider delivering leadership and management diplomas including adult apprenticeships. In addition, we also provide a job board service for employers and job seekers (applicants). We are the data controller of any personal information you provide to us. This means that we are responsible for complying with data protection laws and guidance. This Privacy Notice describes what personal information we may collect from you, why we use your personal information and more generally the practices we maintain and ways in which we use and protect your personal information.

We have appointed a Data Protection Officer (DPO) to oversee our handling of personal information. If you have any questions about how we collect, store or use your information, or if you wish to remove your consent you can contact our DPO:
Access Skills,
12th Floor,
Cobalt Square,
83-85 Hagley Road,
Birmingham,
B16 8QG,
Tel: 0121 510 2169,
Fax: 0845 363 6185.
Email: info@accessskills.co.uk

Whose information do we collect?

• Previous, current and prospective learners and employers and job seekers (applicants)
• Previous, current and prospective third parties
• Access Skills website users
• Business, partners, contacts, associates and other suppliers

When do we collect and share information about you?

• When you enquire about a programme and we process your application
• When managing your programme and register/certification of your qualification with an awarding organisation
• Whenever you use the Access Skills website
• If you respond to a customer survey, provide feedback, and/or complete questionnaires
• If you contact us for any other reason
• When you use our partner websites such as Quality Compliance Systems
• When we send your details to government agencies such as the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) and the department for Education and to fulfil its statutory functions including the Apprenticeship Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009 and Ofsted inspections. This information may include issuing/verifying Unique Learner Numbers (ULN) and to update/check Personal Learning Records. The ESFA may share ULN and Personal Learning Records with other education related organisations, such as careers services, colleges, universities, government departments and public bodies responsible for funding education such as Advanced Learner Loan accounts.
• To provide data in a medical emergency. The information provided will only be used in these circumstances.
• When you visit our website to create an account, post a job, and/or apply for a job
• When engaging with AI Chatbot

What personal information do we collect and use?

For us to manage your training programme/qualification we need to collect and process personal data about you. The personal information that we collect will depend on your relationship with us. We will collect different information depending on whether you are enquiring about a programme or the job board platform, a registered learner or employer, prospective customer, website user, or other third party.

Cookies

Cookies are small text files which a website may put on your computer or mobile device when you first visit a sites or page. The cookie will help the website, or another website, to recognise your device the next time you visit. Web beacons or other similar files can also do the same thing. We use the term “cookies” in this statement to refer to all files that collect information in this way.

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users of the application or the site. This helps us to provide you with a good experience when you use the application or browse the sites and also allows us to improve the service, the application and the site. You can choose to accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can modify your browser setting to decline cookies if you prefer. This may prevent you from taking full advantage of the website. 

Personal Information

• General information such as your name, address, contact details, date of birth, gender, family and relationship information and nationality
• Information about your job including job title, employment history, education history and professional accreditations/ qualifications
• Information relevant to your programme. This will depend on the nature of the policy but could include details of your role and responsibilities or business activities.
• Information relevant to your personal circumstances to enable support
• Financial information such as your bank details, credit card and payment details
• Information obtained through our use of cookies. (see above)
• Information captured during our telephone calls and emails
• Your contact preferences
• IP address
• Device ID information 

We collect personal information from a number of different sources, including:

• Directly from you or from someone else on your behalf
• From other third parties who provide a service in relation to your programme
• Through publicly available sources such as internet search engines and social media sites
• Through customer surveys and responses to various marketing campaigns
• From your use of our website and cookies (see above)
• From government agencies such as ESFA 

What is the purpose of us using your personal information?

We may process your personal information for a number of different purposes. For each purpose we must have a legal ground for such processing. When the information that we process is classed as sensitive personal information, we must have an additional legal ground for such processing.

Generally, we will rely on the following legal grounds:

• Where you have provided your clear consent to process your personal data for a specific purpose.
• The processing is necessary for a contracted service with you or because you have requested for specific steps to be taken prior to entering into a contract.
• The processing is necessary for us to comply with the law.
• There is a vital interest in processing necessary to protect life such as in a medical emergency.
• The processing is necessary for us to perform a task or function in the public interest which has a clear basis in law.
• The processing is necessary for legitimate interests or the legitimate interests of a third party, unless there is a good reason to protect the individual’s personal data which overrides those legitimate interests.

We may also disclose your information to the third parties listed below for the purposes described in this Privacy Notice. These might include:

• third parties who assist in the administration of qualifications such as loss, call handlers, accountants, auditors, funders and other experts
• our regulators
• industry bodies
• debt collection agencies
• credit reference agencies
• online search engines
• social media platforms
• employers and job seekers (applicants)
• job board software platform
• our third party service providers such as IT suppliers, actuaries, auditors, lawyers, marketing agencies, payment processing agencies, document management providers and tax advisers
• third parties who undertake analysis for the purposes of product improvement
• selected third parties in connection with the sale, transfer or disposal of our business. We will ensure that such third parties have the appropriate technical and organisational measures in place to safeguard your data

How long do we keep personal information for?

We will only keep your personal information for as long as reasonably necessary to fulfil the relevant purposes set out in this Privacy Notice and in order to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations.

Your rights

Under data protection law you have certain legal rights in relation to the personal information that we hold about you. You may exercise these rights at any time by contacting us using the details set out below.

In some cases, we may not be able to comply with your request (e.g. we might not be able to delete your data) for reasons such as our own obligations to comply with other legal or regulatory requirements. However, we will always respond to any request you make and if we can’t comply with your request, we will tell you why.

You (Job seekers) can deactivate or delete your account at any time and choose not to make your profile searchable on the job board platform. To deactivate, please go to your “Login Account”. 

Your rights include:

The right to access your personal information

You are entitled to a copy of the personal information we hold about you and certain details of how we use it. There will not usually be a charge for dealing with these requests. Your information will usually be provided to you in writing, unless otherwise requested, or where you have made the request by electronic means, in which case the information will be provided to you by electronic means where possible.

The right to rectification

We take reasonable steps to ensure that the information we hold about you is accurate and complete. However, if you do not believe this is the case, you can ask us to update or amend it.

When you create an account on the website and log-in to your “Login Account” area, it is protected by your username and password and may only be accessed by you. You can manage the content and information in your Account at any time, by logging in to your account. 

The right to erasure (also known as ‘the right to be forgotten’)

In certain circumstances, you have the right to ask us to erase your personal information. Examples would include where the data is no longer required for the original purpose, consent has been withdrawn and there is no overriding legitimate grounds for continuing the processing, or for compliance with the national law.

The right to restriction or suspension of processing

In certain circumstances, such as a question over its accuracy, you are entitled to ask us to stop using your personal information or to suspend its use.

The right to data portability

In certain circumstances, you have the right to ask that we transfer any personal information that you have provided to us to another third party of your choice.

The right to object to marketing

You can ask us to stop sending you marketing messages at any time. The right not to be subject to automated decision-making (including profiling)

Where you are sent job alerts, you have the right to unsubscribe from these notifications anytime. 

The right to lodge a complaint with the ICO

We would hope that you will always raise any issues with us first, and that we will be able to resolve them to your satisfaction. However, if this isn’t possible then you always have a right to complain directly to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) if you believe that any use of your personal information by us is in breach of applicable data protection laws and regulations.
Please see below for contact details of the ICO:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
Tel: 0303 123 1113 (local rate) or 01625 545 745 (national rate)
Email: casework@ico.org.uk
Making a complaint will not affect any other legal rights or remedies that you have.

How we protect your information

We use a range of organisational and technical security measures to protect your information.
Where we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share a password with anyone, and to use a password that is appropriate (i.e. a mixture of upper and lower case letters, and characters, which isn’t used on other sites and isn’t easily guessed).

We restrict access to your information as appropriate within Access Skills to only those who need to know that information for the purposes set out above.

Firewalls are used to block unauthorised traffic to the servers and the actual servers are located in a secure location which can only be accessed by authorised personnel. Our internal procedures cover the storage, access and disclosure of your information.

Changes to our Privacy Notice

We keep our privacy statement under regular review and we will place any updates on our web page. This Privacy Notice was last updated on August 2024