Rushden and District Community Charity ("we", "us", "our") is a volunteer-run charity supporting people and organisations in the Rushden area with mobility aids, household items and other practical help. We also operate a local charity shop to raise funds for this work.
For the purposes of UK data protection law, we are the "data controller" for the personal information collected and used in connection with our website and our charity activities.
Registered charity number: 1213340
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or how we handle your personal data, you can contact us using the details at the end of this page.
The information we collect depends on how you interact with us. We aim to collect only what we genuinely need to run the charity and provide support.
We may collect:
- Contact details – such as your name, address, email address and phone number.
- Information you share when requesting help – for example, details about your circumstances, the support you need and any accessibility needs.
- Donation details – including records of financial donations, Gift Aid status, and details of items you donate to the charity shop.
- Volunteer information – such as your availability, skills, experience and any relevant background information you choose to share.
- Communication records – including messages sent via our Get Help and Contact Us forms, emails, phone calls or conversations in person that we record in our notes.
- Website usage information – such as IP address, pages visited and how you found our site, collected via cookies and similar technologies (see the Cookies and website tracking section below).
Some of the information you share with us when requesting support may be sensitive or relate to your health or personal circumstances. We treat this information with particular care and only collect it where it is necessary for us to understand and respond to your needs.
We use the personal data we collect for the following main purposes:
- To respond to requests for help – assessing what support may be available, arranging mobility aids or household items, and keeping in touch with you about your request.
- To manage donations and Gift Aid – processing and acknowledging donations, keeping records for financial and Gift Aid purposes, and thanking you for your support.
- To coordinate volunteering – handling volunteer enquiries, arranging shifts and roles, and keeping in touch with you about volunteering opportunities.
- To run and improve our services – maintaining internal records, monitoring demand for support, planning future services and improving how we work.
- To manage our charity shop – recording item donations, tracking sales and ensuring the shop runs smoothly in support of our charitable aims.
- To communicate with you – answering questions, providing updates about our work where appropriate, and responding to feedback or complaints.
- To meet our legal and regulatory obligations – for example, complying with charity law, tax requirements, Gift Aid rules and data protection law.
We do not use your personal data for automated decision-making that has legal or similarly significant effects on you.
| Why we use your data | Our legal basis |
|---|---|
| Responding to requests for help and providing support services. | Legitimate interests – to run the charity and provide support to people who ask for our help. In some cases, consent where we need your explicit agreement to record sensitive information. |
| Managing donations, Gift Aid and financial records. | Legal obligation – to meet our tax and charity law duties. Legitimate interests – to thank supporters and manage our relationship with you. |
| Coordinating and communicating with volunteers. | Legitimate interests – to manage and support our volunteers effectively. |
| Sending you information about our work where you have agreed to receive it. | Consent – we send these communications only where you have asked us to or where the law allows us to do so. |
| Operating and improving our website, including basic analytics. | Legitimate interests – to keep our website running securely and understand how it is used. Consent – for non-essential cookies where required. |
| Keeping records, responding to concerns and ensuring we comply with the law. | Legal obligation – for example, in relation to accounting or regulatory requirements. Legitimate interests – to protect our organisation and the people we support. |
We treat your information as confidential and only share it where this is genuinely necessary and lawful.
We may share your personal data with:
- Trusted partners and referrers – for example, local organisations, charities or agencies involved in supporting you, but only where it is appropriate and we have a lawful reason to do so.
- Service providers – such as companies that host our website, provide email or IT services, or support our record keeping. These providers are required to keep your information secure and only use it on our instructions.
- Professional advisers and regulators – including accountants, insurers, the Charity Commission or HMRC, where this is necessary to meet our legal and regulatory duties.
We do not sell your personal data and we do not allow third parties to use it for their own marketing.
We take appropriate steps to keep your personal data safe, whether it is held on paper or in digital form.
We store information:
- In secure electronic systems, which are protected by passwords and, where possible, additional security measures.
- In paper files kept in locked storage when not in use.
Only volunteers and trustees who need to see your information to carry out their role have access to it. We provide guidance to our team on handling personal data responsibly.
We keep personal data only for as long as it is needed for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy, including to meet legal, accounting or reporting requirements. When information is no longer needed, we delete it or dispose of it securely.
Under UK data protection law, you have a number of rights in relation to your personal data. These include the right to:
- Access – ask for a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
- Rectification – ask us to correct information that is inaccurate or incomplete.
- Erasure – ask us to delete your personal data in certain circumstances (sometimes called the "right to be forgotten").
- Restriction – ask us to limit how we use your data in certain situations.
- Objection – object to our use of your data where we are relying on legitimate interests or where we are using your data for direct marketing.
- Data portability – ask us to provide you or another organisation with a copy of certain information in a structured, commonly used format.
- Withdraw consent – where we rely on your consent (for example, for certain communications), you can withdraw this at any time.
To exercise any of these rights, please contact us using the details in the "How to contact us about privacy" section. We may need to confirm your identity before we can carry out your request.
If you are unhappy with how we have handled your personal data, please contact us first so we can try to resolve the issue. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK data protection regulator, at www.ico.org.uk.
Like many websites, we use cookies and similar technologies to help our site function properly and to understand how it is used.
Cookies are small text files that are placed on your device when you visit a website. Some cookies are essential for the site to work (for example, to remember your preferences), while others help us improve the website or understand which pages are most useful.
For more detailed information about the cookies we use, how long they last and the choices you have, please read our separate Cookie Policy.
Some of the service providers we use to run our website and electronic systems may store or access data outside the UK or the European Economic Area (EEA).
Where this happens, we take steps to make sure appropriate safeguards are in place, such as using providers that rely on approved standard contractual clauses or other mechanisms recognised under UK data protection law.
If you would like more information about these safeguards, please contact us using the details below.
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time, for example if our activities change or if the law is updated.
Any significant changes will be highlighted on this page and, where appropriate, we may let you know in other ways (for example, by updating information on our main website pages).
The current version of this Privacy Policy will always be available on this page, together with the date it was last updated.
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, how we use your personal data or if you would like to exercise any of your rights, please contact us:
By email: hello@rdccharity.org.uk
By phone: 07519002997
By post: Rushden and District Community Charity, 113 High Street South, Rushden NN10 0PB
Please include your name and contact details and let us know how we can help. If your query relates to your personal data, please mark it for the attention of the person responsible for data protection.
Rushden and District Community Charity – Registered charity number 1213340.