1. Introduction

Squirrels Architecture & Agroecology Ltd, trading as Squirrels Architecture (“we,” “us,” or “our”), is a company registered in England and Wales under company number 12237939, with our registered office at Higher Barn Farm, Slade Lane, Washford, Watchet, England, TA23 0LY. We are committed to safeguarding the privacy of our website visitors. This policy applies where we are acting as a data controller with respect to the personal data of our website visitors; in other words, where we determine the purposes and means of the processing of that personal data. In this policy, “we”, “us” and “our” refer to Squirrels Architecture & Agroecology Ltd.

2. What information do we collect?

We may collect, store, and use the following kinds of personal information:

• Contact Data: The personal information you voluntarily provide to us through our contact form. This is limited to your name and email address.

• Communication Data: Information contained in or relating to any communication that you send to us. This includes the content of the communication and the metadata (such as your email address) associated with it.

• Usage Data: When you browse our website, we may automatically collect session information. This includes your Internet Protocol (IP) address, geographical location, browser type and version, operating system, length of visits to certain pages, and page interaction information (like scrolling and clicks). The source of this data is our analytics tracking system.

• Recruitment Data: If you apply for a job opportunity advertised on our website, we will collect the information you provide as part of your application, which may include your name, contact details, CV, covering letter, and any other information you choose to include.

• Future Collection of Additional Data: In the event we introduce user accounts, client portals, or e-commerce functionalities (such as selling products or services) to our website, we may also collect the following information:

Account Data: Information required to create and maintain a user account, which may include a username, password, and personal profile information.

Transaction Data: Information required to process a transaction, such as your billing and/or shipping address, and details of your purchase.

Payment Data: Information related to payments (such as credit card details). Please note: in such an event, we would use a third-party payment processor, and this data would be handled by them in accordance with their own security standards (see Section 4).

Please do not supply any other person's personal data to us unless we prompt you to do so.

We do not collect any financial information, payment details, or sensitive personal data. We do not have user accounts, so we do not collect or store passwords.

3. Purposes and Legal Bases for Processing

We use the information we collect for specific purposes, and we only do so when we have a legal basis for processing.

• To Respond to Your Inquiries: We process your Contact Data and Communication Data to respond to the specific inquiry you submitted through our contact form.

Legal Basis: Our legitimate interests (namely, the proper administration of our website and business, and communicating with potential clients).

• To Send Marketing Communications: We may process your Contact Data to send you occasional company updates, newsletters, or project showcases (approximately twice per year).

Legal Basis: Your consent. We will only send you these communications if you have positively opted-in (e.g., by ticking a box on our contact form) or if you have requested to be on our mailing list.

• For Research and Analysis: We process your Usage Data to analyse the use of our website and services.

Legal Basis: Our legitimate interests (namely, monitoring, improving, and securing our website and services).

• To Process Job Applications: We process your Recruitment Data to assess your suitability for a role, administer the recruitment process, and communicate with you about your application.

Legal Basis: Taking steps at your request prior to entering into a contract with you, and our legitimate interests in running a fair and effective recruitment process. Where relevant, we may also process this data to comply with a legal obligation (for example, right-to-work checks).

• To Comply with Legal Obligations: We may process any of your personal data where such processing is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which we are subject.

• To Provide Services and Manage Accounts: In the event we offer user accounts, we may process your Account Data to provide and operate those services, such as giving you access to a client portal.

Legal Basis: Performance of a contract with you (i.e., to provide the service you signed up for).

• To Process Transactions: In the event we offer products or services for sale, we may process your Transaction Data and Payment Data to fulfil your order, process payment, and provide you with the purchased goods or services.

Legal Basis: Performance of a contract with you (i.e., to complete the sale).

4. How we store, use, and share your information

Our company website is hosted on the Wix.com platform. Wix.com provides us with the online platform that allows us to showcase our architectural services to you. Your data may be stored through Wix.com's data storage, databases, and the general Wix.com applications. They store your data on secure servers behind a firewall.

In the event that we introduce e-commerce and accept payments through our website, we will use a platform that adheres to robust security standards. For example, direct payment gateways offered by platforms like Wix.com adhere to the standards set by PCI-DSS as managed by the PCI Security Standards Council, which is a joint effort of brands like Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Discover. PCI-DSS requirements help ensure the secure handling of credit card information by our store and its service providers.

When you submit our contact form, your data is also sent to our main company email address and may be stored in our internal contact list for the purposes described in this policy.

We will take appropriate technical and organisational precautions to secure your personal data and to prevent its loss, misuse, or alteration. We do not sell, rent, or share your personal information with any third parties for their marketing purposes.

5. Data Retention & International Data Transfers

Personal data that we process for any purpose shall not be kept for longer than is necessary for that purpose.

• Contact Data and Communication Data from inquiries will be retained for as long as necessary to manage your inquiry and for a reasonable period thereafter for our business records.

• Contact Data processed for marketing purposes (our mailing list) will be retained for as long as you have given us consent to do so. We will remove your data from this list promptly if you choose to unsubscribe or withdraw your consent.

• Recruitment Data will be retained for the duration of the recruitment process and for a reasonable period thereafter, in case of any recruitment-related queries or claims, after which it will be securely deleted unless you consent to us retaining it for consideration of future opportunities.

• Usage Data is typically retained in an aggregated, anonymised form for analytical purposes.

• Account Data and Transaction Data (if collected in the future) will be retained for as long as your account is active and for a necessary period thereafter to comply with our legal and financial record-keeping obligations.

Notwithstanding the other provisions of this section, we may retain your personal data where such retention is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation to which we are subject.

As our website is hosted on the Wix.com platform, your personal data may be stored or processed outside the United Kingdom. Where this is the case, we will ensure that an appropriate safeguard is in place, such as an adequacy decision covering the relevant country, or standard contractual clauses approved for use in the UK, so that your data continues to receive a level of protection equivalent to that under UK data protection law. You can contact us using the details in Section 13 if you would like more information about the safeguards we use.

6. Your Data Protection Rights

Under data protection law, you have a number of rights regarding your personal data. These principal rights are:

• (a) The right to access: You can ask for copies of your personal data.

• (b) The right to rectification: You can ask us to rectify inaccurate personal data and to complete incomplete personal data.

• (c) The right to erasure: You can ask us to erase your personal data (also known as the “right to be forgotten”).

• (d) The right to restrict processing: You can ask us to restrict the processing of your personal data.

• (e) The right to object to processing: You can object to the processing of your personal data (for example, for direct marketing purposes).

• (f) The right to withdraw consent: To the extent that the legal basis of our processing is consent, you can withdraw that consent at any time.

• (g) The right to data portability: You can ask us to transfer your personal data to another organisation, or to you, in certain circumstances.

You may exercise any of your rights in relation to your personal data by written notice to us, using the contact details set out in Section 13.

If you believe our processing of your personal information infringes data protection laws, you have a legal right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority. In the UK, this is the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).

7. How to Withdraw Consent

You can withdraw your consent for us to contact you for marketing purposes at any time.

The simplest way is to click the “unsubscribe” link that will be included in the footer of every marketing email we send you.

Alternatively, you may contact us here [REQUIRES LINK].

8. Cookies and Other Tracking Tools

Our website, which is built on the Wix.com platform, may use cookies. Cookies are small pieces of data stored on a visitor's browser that help with the performance, operation, and security of the website. In the future, they may also be used to manage shopping cart functionality or to keep you logged in to a client portal.

It's important to note that third-party services, such as Google Analytics or other applications offered through the Wix App Market, which place cookies or utilise other tracking technologies through Wix's services, may have their own policies regarding how they collect and store information. As these are external services, such practices are not covered by our Privacy Policy.

When you first visit our website, insofar as those cookies are not strictly necessary for the provision of our website, we will ask you to consent to our use of cookies.

9. Third-Party Websites

Our website may include hyperlinks to, and details of, third-party websites. We have no control over, and are not responsible for, the privacy policies and practices of third parties.

10. Personal Data of Children

Our website and services are targeted at persons over the age of 18. If we have reason to believe that we hold personal data of a person under that age in our databases, we will delete that personal data.

11. Privacy Policy Updates

We reserve the right to modify this privacy policy at any time by publishing a new version on our website, so please review it frequently. Changes and clarifications will take effect immediately upon their posting.

12. Data Access & Amendments

If you would like to: access, correct, amend or delete any personal information we have about you, or if you have any questions about this policy, you are invited to contact us.