Members privacy notice

The College is the data controller for the information you provide to us either during an application to take a membership examination, become a member or whilst a member.

If you have any queries about the process or how we handle your information please contact us at dataprotection@rcpsych.ac.uk.

What will we do with the information you provide to us?

All of the information you provide will only be used for the purpose of completing your application, contacting you once you are a member or fulfilling legal or regulatory requirements if necessary.

We will not share any of the information you provide with any third parties for marketing purposes or store any of your information outside of the European Economic Area. The information you provide will be held securely by us and/or our data processors whether the information is in electronic or physical format.

We will use the contact details you provide to us to contact you to progress your application and during your membership period for the delivery of legitimate services. This may include keeping you informed about projects for which we are seeking funding.

We will make your name, your membership grade, year of membership, and your region (e.g. London, South West Division, France) available on our website within the search facility. This can be used by anyone to search for members of the College.

If you are a member of a committee we will also publish the details of this on our website.

What information do we ask for, and why?

We do not collect more information than we need to fulfil our stated purposes and will not retain it for longer than is necessary.

The information we ask for is used to maintain a record of you as a member, lay member or officer and to contact you.

We may contact you to ask if you would like to participate as a contributor or editor for the Journals.

We will process:

  • contact details
  • Continuous Professional Development (CPD) records
  • revalidation progress and position
  • training portfolio
  • mentor status
  • exam results and any resulting relevant communication
  • event preferences
  • photographs – taken in an event setting
  • any dietary requirements for event catering
  • place of work
  • communication preferences
  • banking details for payment of event fees, registration fee, any earnings received from the College equal opportunities information, so we can promote equality and diversity. This is not mandatory information – if you don’t provide it, it will not affect your status with the College. This information will not be made available to any staff outside of the College in a way which can identify you. Any information you do provide, will be used only to produce and monitor equal opportunities statistics.

This list is not exhaustive.

Who do we share with?

It may be necessary to share personal data with UK-wide Regulatory or Public Authority bodies linked to the profession of psychiatry.

We will only do this where we have a statutory or regulatory requirement to do so.

We maintain a public members list which includes some information that you provide – for example: full name, grade and year of election and region.

Use of data processors

Data processors are third parties who process data for us. We have contracts in place with our data processors. This means that they cannot do anything with your personal information unless we have instructed them to do it. They will not share your personal information with any organisation apart from us. They will hold it securely and retain it for the period we instruct.

The data processors we use are:

  • External events providers e.g. conference locations
  • Organisations which manage financial transactions
  • Software providers/hosts for databases which hold your personal data.

How long is the information retained for?

The information we process is retained for as long as you are a member of the College. It may then be further retained for a period specified in our Record Retention Schedule.

For example, complaints are retained for 10 years, legal advice is retained for the life of the College, member registration forms are destroyed after 5 years. If you wish to learn more about our retention periods please contact us using the details below.

Meeting recordings

Some meetings organised by the College attended by members may be recorded. Recording of meetings is carried out as a backup for minuting purposes. The minutes are the official record of the meeting and as such the recording is deleted immediately after the minutes relating to the recording have been approved. If inappropriate behaviour is captured in a meeting recording, that recording may be retained by the College.

Legal basis for processing

As a membership organisation the processing of members personal data is required in order for us to pursue our legitimate interests.

Your rights

Under the Data Protection Act 2018 and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), you have rights as an individual which you can exercise in relation to the information we hold about you.

Access to personal information

Members can find out which personal information we hold by making a ‘subject access request’ under the Data Protection legislation. If we do hold information about you we will:

  • give you a description of it
  • tell you why we are holding it
  • tell you who it could be disclosed to
  • let you have a copy of the information in an intelligible form

To make a request for any personal information we may hold you need to put the request in writing addressing it to our Data Protection Officer, at the address provided below.

If you agree, we will try to deal with your request informally, for example by providing you with the specific information you need over the telephone. 

Other rights

If we do hold personal data about you, you can:

  • ask for incorrect data to be amended
  • ask for data to be erased where there is no longer an ongoing need for processing
  • ask for access to your data to be restricted
  • ask for a copy of your personal data in a format that allows you to easily transfer it into another organisation
  • object to the processing of your personal data and your objection will be considered
  • ask not to be contacted in relation to fundraising projects

If you wish to exercise any of these rights please contact us using the details below. 

Complaints or queries

The College takes any complaints we receive about the way in which we use personal data very seriously. We encourage people to bring it to our attention if they think that our collection or use of information is unfair, misleading or inappropriate.

If you want to make a complaint about the way we have processed your personal information you can contact us using the details at the bottom of this notice.

You can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office directly:

Wycliffe House
Waterlane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF

Telephone: 0303 123 1113
Information Commissioner's Office online

If you wish to make a complaint about fundraising practices, the Fundraising Regulator can be contacted in writing to:

Fundraising Regulator, 2nd Floor
CAN Mezzanine Building
49-51 East Road
London N1 6AH

Telephone: 0300 999 3407
Fundraising regulator complaints online

Changes to this privacy notice

We keep our privacy notice under regular review. This privacy notice was last updated in May 2021. 

How to contact us

If you want to request information about our privacy policy you can write to us at dataprotection@rcpsych.ac.uk or at the below address:

Data Protection Officer
Royal College of Psychiatrists
21 Prescott Street
London E1 8BB

 

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