Data Privacy Notice

Village Church Belfast

Data Controller: Village Church Belfast

Date of Policy: 27.08.20

This is the privacy statement and data protection policy for Village Church Belfast. It covers how we will process (use and store) your data, what data we hold, your individual rights and how you can interact with us about your data. This policy covers our use of Personal data, which is any information about a living individual which allows them to be identified from that data (for example a name, photographs, videos, email address, or address). Identification can be by the information alone or in conjunction with any other information. Our processing of personal data is governed by the General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (the “GDPR” and other legislation relating to personal data and rights such as the Human Rights Act 1998).

Who are we? This Privacy Notice is provided to you by Village Church Belfast and Charity No. XN45793 which is the Data Controller for your data. For clarity, the term Data Controller covers all VCB staff (and relevant volunteers) who process your information. 


How is your data collected?

  • If you register for one of our events

  • If you fill out a connection card

  • If you check your visiting child in to one of our children groups

  • If you make a financial donation to the church

  • If you are an authorised user of the church’s database


How is your data processed?

Village Church Belfast processes data containing:

  • Names, titles, and photographs.

  • Contact information including telephone numbers, postal /residential addresses, and email addresses.

  • Where you give financially in support of VCB or pay for church activities (event bookings etc.), financial identifiers such as bank account numbers, payment card numbers, payment/transaction identifiers, policy numbers, and claim numbers.


What are we doing with your data?

We only hold data that either we are legally obliged to or that helps us fulfil our missional and charitable aims as a church.

Therefore, we will hold and process data to:

  • Enable VCB to keep in touch with you

  • Maintain our own accounts and records which enables us to meet all legal and statutory obligations e.g. safeguarding records and gift aid declarations

  • Administer our membership records of adult and child members

  • Enable us to follow up membership, course and event enquiries

  • Fundraise and promote the interests of the Church and charity

  • Process and record financial donations that you have made (including Gift Aid information)

  • Update and inform you of our gatherings, events, and any matters of interest related to VCB church community

  • To manage our employees and volunteers

What is our legal basis for processing your personal data? 

  • Most of our data is processed because it is necessary for our legitimate interests to enable our charitable and missional aims. For example, maintaining membership records, safeguarding our children, recording our financial donations and operating team rotas for the effective function of Sunday gatherings.

  • Some of our processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation. Retaining safeguarding records and gift aid declarations are examples of this.

  • We may also process data if it is necessary for the performance of a contract with you, or to provide a direct service to you. For example, if you buy tickets or register for a church event.

  • Where your information is used other than in accordance with one of these legal bases, we will first obtain your consent to that use.



Will we share your data? 

We use your data for our own purposes only. You can be reassured that we will treat your personal data as strictly confidential. It will only be shared with third parties where it is necessary for the performance of our tasks or where you first give us your prior consent. For example, our data is held on Planning Centre (our church database system). It is likely that we will need to share your data with some or all of the following (but only where necessary):

  • Our agents, servants and contractors. For example, we utilise a commercial email system provider(MailChimp) to send out email newsletters on our behalf.

How long will we keep your personal data?

Our general rule is to keep data no longer than necessary. Where you continue to actively engage with our church services, activities and events, we will retain the appropriate membership data for you so that we can best serve your involvement. We will carry out an annual process of review, by which we assess who is actively engaging in church membership, and where this is not the case we will remove your data. Additionally;

  • We will keep some records permanently if we are legally required to do so. For example, this covers service, wedding, baptism registers and some safeguarding records.

  • We may keep some other records for an extended period. For example, it is current best practice to keep financial records for a minimum period of 7 years to support HMRC audits.


What are your rights regarding your personal data?

You have the following rights with respect to your personal data (when exercising any of the rights listed below, to process your request, we may need to verify your identity for your security. In such cases, we will need you to respond with proof of your identity before you can exercise these rights).

  • The right to access information we hold on you. At any point, you can contact us to request the information we hold on you as well as why we have that information, who has access to the information and where we obtained the information from. Once we have received your request we will respond within one month.

  • The right to correct and update the information we hold on you. If the data we hold on you is out of date, incomplete or incorrect, you can inform us and your data will be updated. If you are a regular attendee, you also have access to Planning Centre to be able to update aspects of your personal data.

  • The right to have your information erased. If you feel that we should no longer be using your data or that we are illegally using your data, you can request that we erase the data we hold. When we receive your request, we will confirm whether the data has been deleted or the reason why it cannot be deleted (for example because we need it for our legitimate interests or regulatory purpose(s)).

  • The right to object to processing of your data. You have the right to request that we stop processing your data. Upon receiving the request, we will contact you and let you know if we are able to comply or if we have legitimate grounds to continue to process your data. Even after you exercise your right to object, we may continue to hold your data to comply with your other rights or to bring or defend legal claims.

  • The right to withdraw your consent to the processing at any time for any processing of data to which consent was sought. You can withdraw your consent easily by telephone, email, or by post (see Contact Details below).

Further processing 

If we wish to use your personal data for a new purpose, not covered by this Notice, then we will provide you with a new notice explaining this new use prior to commencing the processing and setting out the relevant purposes and processing conditions. Where and whenever necessary, we will seek your prior consent to the new processing.

Website and online information:

This website address is: www.villagebelfast.com and is part of and managed by Village Church Belfast

What personal data we collect through our website and why we collect it

  •     Forms. We may collect and retain information submitted by forms on this website for administrative purposes.
     

Embedded content from other websites

Articles on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.

These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracing your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

You are very welcome to get in contact with us…

If you have any queries or concerns about how we use your data, please do get in contact with us.

Address: 25 Upper Newtownards Road, Belfast, BT4 2PA

Email: info@villagebelfast.com

Tel: 02890656696