Welcome to Berkeley Genetics Limited privacy notice.

Berkeley Genetics Limited respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal data. This privacy notice will inform you as to how we look after your personal data when you provide personal data to us and tells you about your privacy rights and how the law protects you.

Purpose of this privacy notice

This privacy notice aims to give you information on how Berkeley Genetics Limited collects and processes your personal data including any data you may provide: through our website (berkeleygenetics.com); through our online portal, when you enquire about a product or service; when you purchase a product or service or when you sign up to our newsletter or take part in a competition.

Generally, our website and online portal is not intended for children, and we do not collect data relating to children.

It is important that you read this privacy notice together with any other privacy notice or fair processing notice we may provide on specific occasions when we are collecting or processing personal data about you so that you are fully aware of how and why we are using your data. This privacy notice supplements the other notices and is not intended to override them.

Controller

Berkeley Genetics Limited is the controller and
responsible for your personal data (collectively referred to as “Company”,
“we”, “us” or “our” in this privacy notice).

We have appointed a data protection officer who is responsible for overseeing questions in relation to this privacy notice. If you have any questions about this privacy notice, including any requests to exercise your legal rights, please contact the data protection officer using the details set out below.

Contact details

Our full details are:

1. Full name of legal entity: Berkeley Genetics Limited
2. Name or title of data protection officer: Mr Jonathan Hughes
3. Email address: jon@berkeleygenetics.com
4. Postal address: 41 Devonshire Street, London, W1G 7AJ, UK

View our ICO certificate

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance.

This version was last updated on 14th August 2024.

It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with us.

Our website may include links to third-party websites, plug-ins and applications. Clicking on those links or enabling those connections may allow third parties to collect or share data about you. We do not control these third-party websites and are not responsible for their privacy statements. When you leave our website, we encourage you to read the privacy notice of every website you visit.

Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).

We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together follows:

• Contact Data includes billing address, delivery address, self-isolation address, email address and telephone numbers.
• Financial Data includes bank account and payment card details.
• Transaction Data includes details about payments to and from you and other details of products and services you have obtained from us.
• Service Data includes details which relate to the services you have enquired about or may require from us.
• Technical Data includes internet protocol (IP) address, your login data, browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform and other technology on the devices you use to access our website or online portal.
• Profile Data includes your username and password, purchases or orders made by you, your interests, preferences, feedback and survey responses.
• Usage Data includes information about how you use our website, our online portal and our products and services.
• Marketing and Communications Data includes your preferences in receiving marketing from us and our third parties and your communication preferences.
• Medical Data including your NHS number.
• Test to Release Data including date of arrival in the UK, coach number, flight number, vessel name, date on which last departed or transited through non-exempt country, non-exempt territory or non-exempt region and country, territory or region travelling from or via before entering the UK.

We also collect, use and share Aggregated Data such as statistical or demographic data for any purpose. Aggregated Data may be derived from your personal data but is not considered personal data in law as this data does not directly or indirectly reveal your identity. For example, we may aggregate your Usage Data to calculate the percentage of users accessing a specific website feature. However, if we combine or connect Aggregated Data with your personal data so that it can directly or indirectly identify you, we treat the combined data as personal data which will be used in accordance with this privacy notice.

We collect Special Categories of Personal Data about you (this may include details about your race or ethnicity, religious or philosophical beliefs, sex life, sexual orientation, political opinions, trade union membership, information about your health and genetic and biometric data).

“Special categories” of particularly sensitive personal information require higher levels of protection. We need to have further justification for collecting, storing and using this type of personal information. We have in place an appropriate policy document and safeguards which we are required by law to maintain when processing such data. We may process special categories of personal information in the following circumstances

a) In limited circumstances, with your explicit written consent.

b) Where it is needed in the public interest.

c) Where it is necessary to protect your vital interests.

d) Where it is necessary to comply with a legal obligation on us.

e) Where it is necessary for preventative or occupational medicine.

Less commonly, we may process this type of information where it is needed in relation to legal claims.

We do not collect any information about criminal convictions and offences.

Where you are to take a Test you will be required to complete certain forms and a sample of your DNA will be collected (Sample). The Sample together with the information you provide in the relevant forms is used by us to provide our services to you in respect of such Test and the Sample. As part of this process, we may collect, store and use the following personal data in the following ways:

• We will collect contact data (name, address, email address and a contact telephone number) from you or your clinician or employer.

• We collect your full name, date of birth, gender, racial or ethnic origin and other special categories of data, including genetic data contained within the Sample, your medical conditions, health risk factors and you and your family’s medical history. You will be asked to provide this information when completing our medical history form and consent forms. This information is required to understand your family history and hereditary markers you may have.

We will store:

(a) The Sample for a short period following the Report being generated (such period being no longer than 6 weeks).

(b) The genetic data used to generate the Report for a period of 5-6 years in accordance with industry standards and guidelines please see: The Retention and Storage of Pathological Records and Specimens – Institute of Biomedical Science (ibms.org).

(c) The Report for an indefinite period.

We may, where requested by your clinician, undertake further analysis of genes that didn’t from part of the original test request:

• Where the Report identifies a genetic variant whose significance is not yet known (a variant of uncertain significance or VUS), we will process your personal data (including special categories of data) periodically to re-analyse the result and compare our findings with other third-party data available to us. This is so we can monitor whether a VUS is still present, or a different analysis has become applicable and forms part of general scientific research of VUSs and mutations in genes. We will notify you of any changes in the status of a VUS.

• We will link your personal data, including the Report with the personal data (and any Reports) of your family members who have or may take a Test with Berkeley Genetics, where you have confirmed that you would like us to link your data with your family members.

• In certain circumstances you may be directed by your clinician to take a Test (such as to inform your treatment choices) and where we test a Sample and provide a report to you, this processing of special categories of personal data is necessary for the purpose of the potentially preventative medicine, medical diagnosis and/or provision of health care or treatment provided to you by your clinician.

• In certain circumstances, where we have identified a VUS in the Report, the processing of special categories of personal data is necessary for the scientific research purposes or statistical purposes available by the re-analysis of the result of your Test.

We also collect, use and share aggregated data, including data available from public sources. However, if we combine aggregated data with your personal data so that it can directly or indirectly identify you, we treat this as your personal data.

We may anonymise your personal data (so that it can no longer be associated with you) and use such data and analysis of such data to conduct possible future interpretations of the results and analysis of Tests and for other research, educational, training and statistical purposes on an anonymised basis. We may transfer such anonymised data to third parties, and we may use such anonymised data freely for our own commercial purposes.

When you complete a Test and submit the required information and data in relation to any dependants, we will need to process your dependant’s personal data (which may include special categories of their personal data).

If you fail to provide any personal data that we need to provide the services associated with the Test then we may not be able to provide our services to you, which includes analysing the Sample and preparing a Report. We will notify you of this at the relevant time.

Please note that when you complete our consent form for the test you are agreeing that we can use the personal data, including special categories of personal data, collected for the purpose of undertaking the Test and providing our services in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

Where we need to collect personal data by law, or under the terms of a contract we (may) have with you (or you have with a third party) and you fail to provide that data when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have (or the relevant third party has) or are trying to enter into with you (for example, to provide you with goods or services). In this case, we may have to cancel a product or service you (might) have with us (or the relevant third party) but we will notify you if this is the case at the time.

We use different methods to collect data from and about you including through:

• Direct interactions. You may give us your Identity, Contact and Financial Data by filling in forms or by corresponding with us by post, phone, email or otherwise. This includes personal data you provide when you:

1. apply for our products or services;
2. create an account on our website/online portal;
3. subscribe to our service or publications;
4. request marketing to be sent to you;
5. enter a competition, promotion or survey; or
6. give us some feedback.

• Automated technologies or interactions. As you interact with our website or online portal, we may automatically collect Technical Data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns. We collect this personal data by using cookies, server logs and other similar technologies. We may also receive Technical Data about you if you visit other websites employing our cookies. Please see our cookie policy for further details.

• Third parties or publicly available sources. We may receive personal data about you from various third parties and public sources as set out below:

1. Technical Data from analytics providers such as Google based outside the UK.
2. Contact, Financial and Transaction Data from providers of technical, payment and delivery services such as Stripe Inc. based outside the UK.
3. Identity and Contact Data from publicly availably sources such as Companies House and the Electoral Register based inside the UK.
   

We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances:

• Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you (or you have entered into with a third party).
• Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests.
• Where we need to comply with a legal or regulatory obligation.

Generally we do not rely on consent as a legal basis for processing your personal data other than in relation to sending third party direct marketing communications to you via email or text message. You have the right to withdraw consent to marketing at any time by contacting us cancertesting@berkeleygenetics.com.

We have set out below, in a table format, a description of all the ways we plan to use your personal data, and which of the legal bases we rely on to do so. We have also identified what our legitimate interests are where appropriate.

Note that we may process your personal data for more than one lawful ground depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your data. Please contact us cancertesting@berkeleygenetics.com if you need details about the specific legal ground we are relying on to process your personal data where more than one ground has been set out in the table below.

We strive to provide you with choices regarding certain personal data uses, particularly around marketing and advertising. We have established the following personal data control mechanisms:

We ask for confirmation of your marketing preferences.

We may use your Identity, Contact, Technical, Usage and Profile Data to form a view on what we think you may want or need, or what may be of interest to you. This is how we decide which products, services and offers may be relevant for you (we call this marketing).

You will receive marketing communications from us if you have requested information from us or purchased goods or services from us or if you provided us with your details when you entered a competition or registered for a promotion and, in each case, you have not opted out of receiving that marketing.

We will get your express opt-in consent before we share your personal data with any company outside Berkeley Genetics Limited for marketing purposes.

You can ask us or third parties to stop sending you marketing messages at any time by:

• logging into the website and checking or unchecking relevant boxes to adjust your marketing preferences;
• following the opt-out links on any marketing message sent to you; or
• contacting us cancertesting@berkeleygenetics.com. at any time.

Where you opt out of receiving these marketing
messages, this will not apply to personal data provided to us as a result of a
product/service purchase.

You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when websites set or access cookies. If you disable or refuse cookies, please note that some parts of our website or online portal may become inaccessible or not function properly.

We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If you wish to get an explanation as to how the processing for the new purpose is compatible with the original purpose, please contact us cancertesting@berkeleygenetics.com.

If we need to use your personal data for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so.

Please note that we may process your personal data without your knowledge or consent, in compliance with the above rules, where this is required or permitted by law.

We may have to share your personal data (including special categories of personal data) with the parties set out below for the purposes set out in the table above.

• The test provider through whom you have taken a Test (such as your clinician), acting as a controller of your personal data. We will share the report produced with your clinician where you have asked us to do so.

• If you have requested support services as part of your test, we will share your contact information and the report with the clinician engaged by us to provide such support services to you.

External Third Parties including:

1. Our third-party service providers, acting as processors (such as the Lab which processes your Sample and produces the report) and with whom we will share your Sample.
2. Service providers acting as processors and/or joint controllers based in France, Germany, Belgium and the USA who provide IT and system administration services and sub-contracting services.
3. Your insurance provider or private healthcare provider where you are relying on medical insurance to cover the cost of the test.
4. Professional advisers acting as processors and/or joint controllers including lawyers, bankers, auditors and insurers based in the UK who provide consultancy, banking, legal, insurance and accounting services.
5. HM Revenue & Customs, regulators and other authorities acting as processors and/or joint controllers based in the UK who require reporting of processing activities in certain circumstances.
6. Public Health England and similar authorities/organisations who have a legal right to such information.

• We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.
  

We may transfer your personal data outside the UK.

Whenever we transfer your personal data out of the UK, we ensure a similar degree of protection is afforded to it by ensuring at least one of the following safeguards is implemented:

• We will only transfer your personal data to countries that have been deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data by the European Commission or the UK.

• Where we use certain service providers, we may use specific contracts approved by the European Commission or the UK which give personal data the same protection it has in the UK.

Please contact us if you want further information on the specific mechanism used by us when transferring your personal data out of the UK.

We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a breach where we are legally required to do so.

How long will you use my personal data for?

We will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements.

To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal requirements.

Details of retention periods for different aspects of your personal data are available in our retention policy which you can request from us by contacting us.

In some circumstances you can ask us to delete your data: see Request erasure below for further information.

In some circumstances we may anonymise your personal data (so that it can no longer be associated with you) for research or statistical purposes in which case we may use this information indefinitely without further notice to you.

Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data.

You have the right to:

Request access to your personal data (commonly known as a “data subject access request”). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.

Request correction of the personal data that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate data we hold about you corrected, though we may need to verify the accuracy of the new data you provide to us.

Request erasure of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have successfully exercised your right to object to processing (see below), where we may have processed your information unlawfully or where we are required to erase your personal data to comply with local law. Note, however, that we may not always be able to comply with your request of erasure for specific legal reasons which will be notified to you, if applicable, at the time of your request.

Object to processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground as you feel it impacts on your fundamental rights and freedoms. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal data for direct marketing purposes. In some cases, we may demonstrate that we have compelling legitimate grounds to process your information which override your rights and freedoms

Request restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of your personal data in the following scenarios: (a) if you want us to establish the data’s accuracy; (b) where our use of the data is unlawful but you do not want us to erase it; (c) where you need us to hold the data even if we no longer require it as you need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or (d) you have objected to our use of your data but we need to verify whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to use it.

Request the transfer of your personal data to you or to a third party. We will provide to you, or a third party you have chosen, your personal data in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format. Note that this right only applies to automated information which you initially provided consent for us to use or where we used the information to perform a contract with you.

Withdraw consent at any time where we are relying on consent to process your personal data. However, this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent. If you withdraw your consent, we may not be able to provide certain products or services to you. We will advise you if this is the case at the time you withdraw your consent.

If you wish to exercise any of the rights set out above, please contact the Data Protection Officer whose details are detailed above.

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. We may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response.

We try to respond to all legitimate requests within one month. Occasionally it may take us longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, we will notify you and keep you updated.

Lawful basis

Legitimate Interest means the interest of our business in conducting and managing our business to enable us to give you the best service/product and the best and most secure experience. We make sure we consider and balance any potential impact on you (both positive and negative) and your rights before we process your personal data for our legitimate interests. We do not use your personal data for activities where our interests are overridden by the impact on you (unless we have your consent or are otherwise required or permitted to by law). You can obtain further information about how we assess our legitimate interests against any potential impact on you in respect of specific activities by contacting us cancertesting@berkeleygenetics.com.

Performance of Contract means processing your data where it is necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are a party or to take steps at your request before entering into such a contract.

Comply with a legal or regulatory obligation means processing your personal data where it is necessary for compliance with a legal or regulatory obligation that we are subject to.