Privacy Policy

Taking care of your information

At Community First we know none of what we do is possible without your support. That’s why taking care of the information you provide to us is so important. This privacy policy sets out how we collect, use and store your personal information.

Please read this policy carefully; by providing us with your personal information, you consent to the collection and use of the information you provide in accordance with this policy. Occasionally, we may make changes to this policy so do remember to check back from time to time.

If you have any questions on this policy, please call our team on 0300 500 8085 between 8am and 5pm, Monday to Friday or email us at support@cfirst.org.uk

Who we are

Volunteer First is a brand and service of Community First. Community First works with others to develop and deliver services that improve the health and wellbeing of Hampshire residents. We are an independent organisation with a diverse membership of over 500 charities and community groups. We believe that we are all stronger by working together. Community First is registered with the Charity Commission (number 1147527) and is a Limited Company by guarantee (number 08071971). Our registered office is:Leigh Park Community Centre, Dunsbury Way, Havant, Hampshire PO9 5BG.

How we collect information

Information is critical to ensuring we can provide safe and effective services.  It helps us operate as efficiently as possible and to make sure our interactions with you are timely, relevant and appropriate to you. To do this, we may collect information about you in the following ways:

  • When you interact with us such as when you register to become a volunteer, use our services or attend an event. Sometimes you might be interacting with an organisation working on our behalf but we are still responsible for your information.
  • When you interact with third parties such as when you book to attend an event through a third party website e.g. Eventbrite or Mailchimp and give your permission for your information to be shared with us. Similarly, if you engage with us on social media and messaging services like Facebook, Twitter or Instagram you might give us permission to access information from those accounts. The data we are given access to by social media services will vary but will always be in line with the Terms of that particular service.
  • When you visit our website we may gather information, such as which pages you visit or how long you spend reading a particular page. This data helps us to improve your online experience, for example by adding new features, or removing elements that make the website difficult to use. Like most websites we use cookies to help us do this. We may also use data and insights to help inform the choice of words and images that appear on the site, in order to improve visitors’ experience.
  • You can find out more in our how we use cookies section below. Depending on the type of device you’re using, your apps and settings may supply us with additional information about the device type, your operating system, and details associated with this.

 What information we collect

Depending on how you interact with us, the information that we collect may include your name, postal address, email address, telephone or mobile number, your contact preferences, the type of volunteering activities you express an interest in, the date or year of your birth, additional support needs specific to your volunteering and your gender (where this is required for monitoring equality and diversity information – this is anonymised for statistical reporting purposes). In addition we may also collect and process the following information about you:

  • Information that you provide by filling in forms on this website (our site). This includes information provided at the time of registering to use our site, subscribing to our service, posting material or requesting further services. We may also ask you for information when you report a problem with our site.
  • If you contact us, we may keep a record of that correspondence.
  • We may also ask you to complete surveys that we use for research purposes, although you do not have to respond to them.
  • Details of transactions you carry out through our site and of the fulfilment of your orders.
  • Details of your visits to our site including, but not limited to, traffic data, location data, weblogs and other communication data, whether this is required for our own monitoring purposes and the resources that you access.

Where you provide your consent we may share your information with specific third parties where you have expressed interest in volunteering with that organisation – to understand more about this please see the section below, “Who we share your information with”.

How we use your information

We will ask for your consent before we use your information to share with organisations you have expressed an interest in or send you emails about volunteering opportunities or community news. We may also use your information where we have a legitimate interest in order to carry out our activities, examples include:

  • To provide you with the services, products or information you have requested.
  • To process orders, deliver services and communicate with you about your orders such as providing contact information about specific volunteering opportunities you have expressed an interest in.
  • For administrative purposes, for example to contact you with a query about your registration or where you have contacted our Team.
  • To keep a record of your relationship with us.
  • To ask you to participate in surveys.
  • To carry out due diligence on equality and diversity monitoring in accordance with our internal policies.
  • To analyse and improve our website, services, products or information.
  • To understand our supporters better and develop audience propositions.

So we can let you know the latest news about our work and share with you how else you can help, we may contact you by direct mail, and by telephone, email or SMS, where you have agreed to be contacted. You can change how you hear from us at any time simply by getting in touch with our Team – please see the section “How to change the way we contact you” below.

When you enter information into a form on our website and start but don’t complete a form we may send you an email to check and see if there is any help we can give or any problems you encountered.

If you would prefer us not to process or analyse your information, you can let us know by contacting our Team.

Who we share your information with

We may share your information with partners, agents or service providers to allow them to perform services on our behalf or to help us improve the services we provide to you. These partners will only act under our instruction and will not use your information for their own purposes.

We always have contracts in place with our suppliers, which require them to comply with UK data protection law and have systems and processes to protect the security of your information. We promise to always keep your details safe and we’ll never sell your information to other organisations.

Where you have given your consent we may share your information with partners who promote their volunteering opportunities through our website. This is so they may contact you directly to provide information about any volunteering opportunities they offer that you have expressed an interest in.

We may disclose personal information if required to do so by law or if we believe that such action is necessary to protect your vital interests. We may disclose personal information where necessary for establishing, exercising or defending the legal rights of Community First.

Some organisations with which we may share your data:

Our technology partner

  • Pipemedia (Volunteer Plus)

Our social media partners

  • Facebook, Twitter, YouTube

Our analysis partners

  • Google inc.

We also provide statistical details to the following statutory partners, but do not share your personal data with them:

  • Hampshire County Council
  • South East Hampshire CCG
  • West Hampshire CCG
  • East Hampshire District Council
  • Havant Borough Council
  • Fareham Borough Council
  • Winchester City Council

How we keep your information safe

We make sure that appropriate physical, technical and human controls are in place to ensure we take good care of your information.

However, the transmission of information over the internet is never completely secure and as a result, while we strive to protect your personal information, Community First cannot guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us, and you do so at your own risk. Once we receive your data, we make every effort to try to ensure its security both on our systems and while in transit between our systems and our partners who work on our behalf.

All staff who have access to your personal data understand the importance of keeping your information safe and secure at all times and are given training to support them in this.

We cannot be responsible for the privacy policies and practices of other websites even if you access them using links from our websites and recommend that you check the policy of each site you visit.

We ensure that additional controls are in place for financial, sensitive and special categories of information, meeting regulatory and legal requirements for managing these types of information.

Sometimes we may need to use a service provider or partner outside the European Economic Area (EEA) – which may include a country that does not have the same level of data protection as the UK. In these circumstances, we take all reasonable steps to ensure the safety and security of your information as set out in this Privacy Policy, including adhering to the EU-US privacy shield agreement.

How long we keep your information

We will hold your personal information on our systems only for as long as is strictly necessary for the relevant activity, and meet any legal or regulatory requirement. This is so that we can provide the services or information you have requested, to administer your relationship with us, to ensure we don’t communicate with you if you’ve asked us not to and to comply with the law.

You have the right to object to your data being processed by us and can do so by contacting our Volunteer Service Team at Community First, Martinique House, Hampshire Road, Bordon, Hampshire, GU35 OHJ by email at support@cfirst.org.uk or by phone on 0300 500 8085.

You can request a copy of the personal information that we hold about you, known as a Subject Access Request. If you would like to do so, please send a description of the information you would like as well as approved proof of identity to the Volunteer Service Team at Community First, Martinique House, Hampshire Road, Bordon, Hampshire, GU35 0HJ by email at support@cfirst.org.uk

You have the right to lodge a complaint about the way we manage your data with the Information Commissioner’s Office.  You can contact them at Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF.  Tel, 0303123 1113 or online at www.ico.org.uk

How to change the way we contact you

We always want you to be happy with the communication you receive from us. If you want to change how you hear from us, or update your details, simply get in touch with our Team who can give you login access to your information through the website where you can update your details including your communication preferences. You can call us on 0300 500 8085 or email support@cfirst.org.uk

You can also change the way we contact you in the following ways:

  • Using the unsubscribe link in an email from us
  • From your login/profile page within the website

Where you tell us that no longer want to hear from us for marketing purposes, please be aware that we may still contact you for administration purposes such as fulfilling orders you have requested, or providing you with information you’ve requested or in helping resolve a query.

How we use cookies

Our website uses cookies to distinguish you from other users of our website. This helps us to provide you with a good experience when you browse our website and also allows us to improve our site. By continuing to browse the site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies.

A cookie is a small file of letters and numbers that we store on your browser or the hard drive of your computer if you agree. Cookies contain information that is transferred to your computer’s hard drive. We use the following cookies:

  • Strictly necessary cookies: These are cookies that are required for the operation of our website. They include, for example, cookies that enable you to log into secure areas of our website, use a shopping cart or make use of e-billing services.
  • Analytical/performance cookies: They 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: These are used to recognise you when you return to our website. This enables us to personalise our content for you, greet you by name and remember your preferences (for example, your choice of language or region).
  • Targeting cookies: These cookies record your visit to our website, the pages you have visited and the links you have followed. We will use this information to make our website and the advertising displayed on it more relevant to your interests. We may also share this information with third parties for this purpose.

You can block cookies by activating the setting on your browser that allows you to refuse the setting of all or some cookies. However, if you use your browser settings to block all cookies (including essential cookies) you may not be able to access all or parts of our site.

Use of cookies on our website

The table below explains the cookies we use and why.

Cookie Name Purpose More Information
complianceCookie Preference Cookie Used to store your acceptance of the cookie warning message initially shown when you first visit our website Expires 365 days from set/update
__utma Google Analytics cookies Used to distinguish users and sessions. The cookie is created when the javascript library executes and no existing __utma cookies exists. The cookie is updated every time data is sent to Google Analytics. To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout Expires 2 years from set/update
__utmb Google Analytics cookie Used to determine new sessions/visits. The cookie is created when the javascript library executes and no existing __utmb cookies exists. The cookie is updated every time data is sent to Google Analytics. To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout Expires 30 mins from set/update
__utmc Google Analytics cookies Not used in ga.js. Set for interoperability with urchin.js. Historically, this cookie operated in conjunction with the __utmb cookie to determine whether the user was in a new session/visit. To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout Expires at the end of browser session
__utmz Google Analytics cookies Stores the traffic source or campaign that explains how the user reached your site. The cookie is created when the javascript library executes and is updated every time data is sent to Google Analytics. To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout Expires 6 months from set/update
__ga Google Analytics cookies Stores a unique client identifier (Client ID), which is a randomly generated number. Once the ID is generated it is stored in the cookie and is included with each hit/request sent to Google Analytics. This ID is later used by Google Analytics servers to calculate user, session and campaign data. Expires 24 months from set/update
__gat Google Analytics cookies This is described by Google as “Used to throttle request rate” although there is little data about these cookies, the value (other than the domain) is set as “1”. Expires 10 minutes from set/update

 

You can also find out more about cookies at www.allaboutcookies.org and www.youronlinechoices.eu.

What if I’m under 18?

If you are under 18, please make sure that you obtain your parent/guardian’s permission beforehand whenever you provide personal information via our websites. Users under the age of 18 without this consent are not allowed to provide us with personal information. Also, if you do use our sites to obtain information about local community services, or supporting the work of Community First and its members, please let an adult know.

 Changes to this policy

This information was last updated in January 2020. From time to time, we may make changes to the information on this page so you may wish to check back from time to time. The amended information will apply from the date it is posted on the site and will govern the way in which we collect and use personal information from then on.

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