Privacy Policy

We hope you will enjoy being a customer of Activa, and we want to make sure your experience is as safe and useful as possible. Here you can find out what data we collect from you, how we use it, conditions where we may disclose this data to others, how we keep it secure and how our website works.

Arnold Clark Finance Ltd (SC039597) (“Arnold Clark”) trading as Activa Contracts (“Activa” , “we” and “us”) takes the issue of security and data protection very seriously and strictly adheres to guidelines published in the United Kingdom Data Protection Act of 1998 and the General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679 in force from 25th May 2018. Arnold Clark are is notified as a Data Controller with the Office of the Information Commissioner under registration number Z580926X and we are the data controller of any personal data that you provide to us. Any questions relating to this policy and our privacy practices should be sent to

Personal information that we collect, why we collect it and how we use it

We obtain information about you when you use our website. Personal information is collected in order for our customer services adviser to contact you regarding your enquiry or for the purposes of email marketing. This section sets out in more detail what information we collect, why we collect it, how we use it and how long we keep your information.

Personal information we collect includes:

  • Title
  • First Name (optional)
  • Last Name
  • Company Name
  • Post Code
  • Email Address
  • Telephone Number (optional)
  • Please be aware that if you choose to contract with Activa, in pursuance of this contract, then further and more detailed information will need to be provided and stored. For a personal lease agreement this will include all listed above, as well as, DOB, gender, drivers licence details, finance information and current and former employer information. All information will be held securely under our rigorous security conditions and will be kept on our systems for 7 years from the end of the contract, for tax and audit purposes.
  • For Driver Records on a corporate account they will require all of the above and either NI number or employee number. All information will be held securely under our rigorous security conditions and will be kept on our systems for 7 years from the end of the contract, for tax and audit purposes.
  • If you make a complaint through our customer services department then to assist you with this complaint we must collect your name, contact information, information on your complaint as well as, DOB and/or provided identification to ensure we are speaking with the authorised individual. For our legitimate interest this information will be stored in our systems and physical archive for 7 years after the complaint and then securely destroyed. Phone calls may be recorded, and any recorded calls will be retained for a maximum of 6 months and only be used for training and quality purposes and/or to prevent or detect crime.
  • If you to visit any Activa site or any site belonging to the Arnold Clark we use CCTV to monitor all of our premises, therefore your image and potentially your vehicle registration will be captured and stored for up to 8 weeks depending on the system used at the branch.
  • If you injure yourself at on an Activa site then we are under a legal obligation to fill in an accident form this will include, full name, contact information, nature of injury and description of treatment. We are legally required to keep these forms for 5 years after the incident then after they will be securely shredded.
  • If you enter one of our competitions, we require your name, e-mail address and daytime telephone number so we can contact the winner. The competitions are subject to terms and conditions. One entry per person. All entrants will be considered, and the winner will be picked at random by the Activa Marketing team. Winners will be contacted by phone or e-mail after the prize draw. All prizes are non-transferrable and non-refundable. Entrants must be 17 years or older to enter and claim a prize from any of our competitions. Unclaimed prizes may be offered to other competition entrants within 48 hours of first notification to the winner. Competitions run on social media are not endorsed, sponsored, administered by, or associated with Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. If you do not opt in to receive marketing from us then your data will be deleted following the outcome of the prize draw.
  • Occasionally, we may use your e-mail address to send you information about changes to this website, we will ask you for permission to do so.

We review our data retention periods regularly and will only hold your personal data for as long as is necessary for the relevant activity, or as required by law (we may be legally required to hold some types of information), or as set out in any relevant contract we have with you.

Marketing

It is your choice whether you receive information such as marketing from us and you can select this by ticking the relevant boxes on the form where we collect your information. We will not contact you for marketing purposes unless you have given your prior consent. If you have opted-in to receive special offers, news and updates from Activa we may use your email address to send you information about changes to this website or to inform you of new products or special offers available within Activa.

You can opt-out of receiving these emails at any point, please email to do so.

Also, all of our email marketing correspondence gives you the option to opt-out of receiving further marketing emails. Please note that you will still receive emails directly related to an enquiry you have submitted via our contact form.

If you have opted-in to receive marketing material from us, we will use your name and email address to send out this information.

Access to Your Information

You may request, at any time, a copy of the personal information which we hold about you, at no cost. Should you wish to access or update the personal information that we hold, please contact us by sending a written request to Customer Services Department, Arnold Clark Automobiles Limited, 454 Hillington Road, Hillington Park, Glasgow, G52 4FH or

If you wish to have the information which we hold about you removed, please request this in writing to Customer Services Department, Arnold Clark Automobiles Limited, 454 Hillington Road, Hillington Park, Glasgow, G52 4FH or - as long as your information is not pertinent to the completion of a contract or required for any legal reason it will be removed.

If you are concerned that we are not using your information in accordance with the law, or are not satisfied with our response to a request made above, then you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office.

The Information Commissioner in Scotland can be reached by the following means;

The Information Commissioner’s Office - Scotland
45 Melville Street
Edinburgh
EH3 7HL
scotland@ico.org.uk
0303 123 1115

The Information Commissioner in England can be reached by the following means;

Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF
0303 123 1113
Data Security

Please be aware that the transmission of information via the internet is not always completely secure. Although we will do our best to protect your personal data, we cannot guarantee the complete security of your data transmitted to us electronically; any transmission is at your own risk. Once we have received your information, we will use strict procedures and security features to restrict unauthorised access.

All credit/debit card data taken through our websites is encrypted in accordance with PCI-DSS.

Data Storage and Use of Data Outside of the European Economic Area

We store your data on secure servers inside the European Economic Area (EEA).

Some of our third party contractors are based outside of the EEA however, we have strict control over how and why your data can be accessed. By submitting your personal data, you are consenting to this transfer, storing or processing. If we transfer your data outside the EEA we will take steps to ensure that appropriate security measures with the aim that your rights continue to be protected as set out in this policy.

Disclosing Your Information

As a subsidiary of Arnold Clark Automobiles Limited (SC036386) we may disclose your personal information to another member of our group, which means our ultimate holding company and its subsidiaries as defined in section 1159 of the UK Companies Act 2006 – GTG Training Limited (SC290157), Arnold Clark Insurance Services Limited (SC192797), Harry Fairbairn Limited (SC043023), Towquest Limited (02299882) and Assure Alarms Limited (SC139217) (collectively referred to as “Arnold Clark Group”).

We may disclose your personal information to third parties under the following circumstances:

  • If we sell any business or assets, in which case we may disclose your personal data to the prospective buyer of such business or assets.
  • If Arnold Clark Automobiles Limited or substantially all of its assets are acquired by a third party, in which case personal data held by it about its customers will be one of the transferred assets.
  • If we are under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order to comply with any legal obligation, or in order to enforce or apply our terms of use and other agreements; or to protect the rights, property, or safety of the Arnold Clark group, our customers, or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organisations for the purposes of fraud protection and credit risk reduction.
  • We work with various third party providers to help us deliver our products and services, and we only disclose your information as far as is necessary to provide the service. However, we have contracts with third party suppliers we will have completed necessary security checks and full due diligence to ensure that your data is kept safe once passed to the third party. All third parties only have the right to use your data to complete an obligation, they do not have marketing rights over your data. Your data is used including in the following circumstances:
    • We may contract a data cleansing organisation to ensure all data is accurate and up to date.
    • All phone call recordings are kept by a third party who only have processing rights over your data and will not contact you.
    • We use a third party to finance particular deals, they only have processing rights over your data and will not contact you.
How we use cookies

We use cookies to help improve our websites and make your browsing experience more useful, more relevant and tailored to you. In order to comply with the most recent legislation and in the interests of transparency, we have updated our privacy policy to give you clearer information on the way we use technology such as cookies and how they affect your privacy.

Cookies are small text files, placed on your hard disk by a web page server. They are uniquely assigned to you, and can only be read by a web server in the domain that issued the cookie to you.

We will use encrypted information gathered from the cookies to improve your online experience with Activa Contracts.

Some of the cookies we use will expire after you close the browser window. These are called session cookies. Some cookies last longer than this, because they are used to identify return visits to the website. Please note that cookies do not harm your computer or any software you may have.

After browsing our website you may receive personalised banner advertisements whilst browsing other reputable websites. We are committed to providing you with information on products and offers which are relevant to you. Any banner advertisements you receive will relate to products which have been viewed whilst browsing this website on your computer or other device. This service is provided by Arnold Clark via a reputable third party specialist provider, through the use of cookies placed on your device. Please note that cookies do not harm your computer or any software you may have.

In accepting our cookie policy you agree that all cookies listed below can be enabled while you use our website. The cookies will operate as established below. In the event that you reject our cookie policy all cookies will be disabled with the exception of the necessary cookies which are required for the website to run, however, these to not store or use any personal information.

What cookies we use and why

Types of cookies:

  • Session cookies are deleted when you leave our websites. They help keep track of your progress so you don’t have to enter the same information more than once.
  • Persistent cookies stay on your device after your browsing session has ended. They will remember settings, preferences and details for the next time you use the websites.
  • First party cookies are set by the website owner, i.e. Arnold Clark.
  • Third party cookies are set by other parties, such as Google and Twitter.
  • Necessary cookies are required for the operation of our website.
  • Performance or analytical cookies allow us to recognise and count the number of visitors and to see how visitors move around our website when they are using it. This helps us to improve the way our website works, for example, by ensuring that users are finding what they are looking for easily.
  • Functionality cookies are used to recognise you when you return to our website. This enables us to personalise our content for you, for example, remember your preferences (for example, your postcode in Find a Dealer search).

This section is a table which explains why we use certain cookies and what they do.

Performance Cookies

Name Type/Expiry Description
Google Analytics
(_ga,
_gat_UA-1101016-30,
_gid)
Persistent, Third party These enable the function of Google Analytics. This software helps us take and analyse visitor information such as browser usage, new visitor numbers, response to marketing activity and browsing times. That anonymous information helps us to improve the website and your browsing experience, and to make our marketing campaigns relevant. The data stored by these cookies can be seen only by the relevant teams at Arnold Clark and Google and never shows any confidential information. For more information about how Google may use this data - visit: https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/

Functional Cookies

Name Type/Expiry Description
cookieconsent Persistent Ensures that user does not repeatedly see the Cookie Consent banner after accepting
Session storage (retained until browser tab/window is closed) Session & Local Storage Caching of some API requests for vehicle data and pricing (no personally identifying data is stored).
Storage of session identifier. This is used to manage access to the application, no personally identifying data is stored.
Local storage (generally this is retained indefinitely, or until browser data is cleared by the user) Session & Local Storage Garage data (stores vehicle IDs and vehicle options, no personally identifying data is stored)

Third Party Cookies

Name Type/Expiry Description
_ga Persistent, Third Party This cookie is asssociated with Google Analytics and is used to distinguish unique users by assigning a randomly generated number as a client identifier. https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/
_gat_UA-1101016-30 Persistent, Third Party Used by Google Analytics to throttle request rate. https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/
_gid Persistent, Third Party This cookie is asssociated with Google Analytics and is used to distinguish unique users by assigning a randomly generated number as a client identifier. https://www.google.com/policies/privacy/

To find out even more about cookies, visit www.aboutcookies.org

IP Addresses

If you accept the additional cookies to run during your session we may then collect information about your computer in the form of server logs, including where available your IP address, operating system and browser type, for system administration. This is statistical data about our users’ browsing actions. Disabling cookies ensures that your IP address will not be recorded.

We recommend that you accept cookies, as we use them to:

  • Customise elements of our website’s layout and content, and test different designs of our websites to improve your experience.
  • Recognise when a user has visited before, meaning we can see how many unique visits we receive. We can then make sure the websites are easy to use and have enough capacity.
  • Remember your preferences and settings, such as text size and language.
  • Recognise your device so you don’t have to provide the same information during your visit, or on subsequent visits.
  • Help us identify errors and resolve them effectively.
  • Establish what information is relevant to you while you are browsing our websites.
  • Collect statistical, anonymous information about how our visitors use/interact with our digital services so we can improve them.
  • Learn which parts of our websites are most popular and improve them.
  • See how effective our online messages are.
Links

Our website may, from time to time, contain links to and from the websites of our partner networks, advertisers and affiliates. If you follow a link to any of these websites, please note that these websites have their own privacy policies and that we do not accept any responsibility or liability for these policies. Please check these policies before you submit any personal data to these websites.

Social Networking

The Website may offer you the opportunity to share or follow information about us (or the website or our services) using third party social networking functionality (such as through “share this”, “like” or “follow” buttons).

We offer this functionality in order to generate interest in us, the website and our services among the members of your social networks, and to permit you to share and follow opinions, news and recommendations about us with your friends. However, you should be aware that sharing personal or non-personal information with a social network may result in that information being collected by the social network provider or result in that information being made publicly-available, including through Internet search engines.

Please note that we do not exercise any endorse or control the policies or practices of any third party social network whose functionality you may access through the website. You should always read the privacy policy of any social network through which you share information carefully in order to understand their specific privacy and information usage practices.

Changes to our Privacy & Cookies Policy

Any changes we may make to our privacy & cookies policy in the future will be posted on this page and, where appropriate, notified to you by e-mail.

This policy was last updated: 22nd August 2019