Privacy and Cookies

 

We want to make your visits to The Mersey Forest website reliable and hassle-free. We also want to keep improving the website.

We use cookies (small files made up of numbers and letters) so that the website works correctly and so that we can improve the website over time based upon how our audience is using it (for example by seeing which pages are most popular).

We don't have access to any information that would personally identify you unless you explicitly provide it to us (for example by adding your name to our list of supporters or by leaving a comment on one of our news stories). Your visits to the website are represented only by a random series of numbers and letters to distinguish you from other visitors.

If you wish to restrict or block the cookies which are set by The Mersey Forest, or indeed any other website, you can do this through your browser settings. We have created a brief PDF guide to managing cookies in each of the major browsers (correct at the time of writing). Another useful resource is www.aboutcookies.org which contains comprehensive information on how to manage cookies on your computer. To find out about managing cookies when browing the internet on your mobile phone, you will need to refer to your handset manual.

The Mersey Forest uses a "session" cookie for the duration of your visit to store user interface messages across pages and previous searches. It will expire when you finish visiting our website (usually when you close your browser). The Mersey Forest also utilises various third party services that use some "persistent" cookies as well as "session" cookies. The persistent cookies will remain until their expiry date or you empty your cookies using your browser.

We are committed to safeguarding the privacy of our website visitors; this policy sets out how we will treat your personal information.

What information do we collect?
We may collect, store and use the following kinds of personal data:
(a) information about your computer and about your visits to and use of this website (including your IP address, geographical location, browser type, referral source, length of visit and number of page views)

(b) information that you provide to us for the purpose of subscribing to our website services, email notifications and/or newsletters (for example details entered when signing up as a supporter of The Mersey Forest)
(c) any other information that you choose to send to us
 

Google Analytics

We use Google Analytics to analyse the use of this website. Google Analytics generates statistical and other information about website use by means of cookies, which are stored on users' computers (see Cookie section at top of this page). The information generated relating to our website is used to create reports about the use of the website. Google will store this information. Google's privacy policy is available at: https://www.google.com/privacypolicy.html.

Web beacons
A web beacon is a small graphic image placed on a web page or in an email that is designed to allow us to monitor visitors to our sites. Opening an email sent to our mailing list results in a web beacon being triggered so that we can monitor the readership and effectiveness of our email campaigns. Our email campaigns are sent using Mailchimp. Read Mailchimp's robust policies on user privacy.
 

Using your personal data
Personal data submitted on this website will be used for the purposes specified in this privacy policy or in relevant parts of the website. We may use your personal information to:

(a) administer the website
(b) send you email notifications that you have specifically requested (or that you might reasonably expect to receive – see below)
(c) provide third parties with statistical information about our users – but this information will not be used to identify any individual user

(d) deal with enquiries and complaints made by you relating to the website
(e) administer competitions

We do not use your personal data for automated decision making or profiling.

Legal basis for use
We will only use your personal data for one of the purposes described above if we have a legal basis to use it for that particular purpose. The legal basis is either your explicit consent or what is known as 'legitimate interest'. Legitimate interest applies to business contacts, and to other people who have expressed interest in The Mersey Forest in a way that suggests to us that they would reasonably expect us to use their data for the purpose in question.

For example, someone might have asked for information about a community group, and we might as a result consider it likely that they would be interested in news about future meetings of the group, and in news about The Mersey Forest in general. We might therefore send them an email newsletter from time to time. However, there will always be an opportunity to opt out.

Retention period
We keep your personal data for a period appropriate to the purpose of use. For example, if you have requested our email newsletter, we consider you to have requested it for as long as it is produced, or until you opt out. We may therefore keep your personal data for many years. If, on the other hand, you have entered a competition, and we have no legal basis for using your personal data for other purposes, we will delete your data as soon as the competition is over.
 

Disclosures
We may disclose information about you:
(a) to the extent that we are required to do so by law
(b) in connection with any legal proceedings or prospective legal proceedings
(c) in order to establish, exercise or defend our legal rights (including providing information to others for the purposes of fraud prevention and reducing credit risk)
 

Except as provided in this privacy policy, we will not provide your information to third parties.
 

Security of your personal data
We will take reasonable technical and organisational precautions to prevent the loss, misuse or alteration of your personal information. We will store all the personal information you provide on our secure (password- and firewall-protected) servers. Of course, data transmission over the internet is inherently insecure, and we cannot guarantee the security of data sent over the internet.
 

Policy amendments
We may update this privacy policy from time to time by posting a new version on our website. You should check this page occasionally to ensure that you are happy with any changes.
 

Your rights
You may instruct us, at any time, to:
(a) let you know what personal data we hold about you,
(b) delete any personal data we hold about you,
(c) stop using your personal data for a particular purpose,
(d) correct or update your personal data if it is incorrect, or
(e) provide your personal data to other parties

If we have not dealt with an instruction or complaint to your satisfaction, you can contact the Information Commissioner's Office: https://ico.org.uk/.

Unless otherwise stated, your personal data is not provided to us as part of a statutory or contractual requirement or obligation.
 

Third party websites
The website contains links to other websites. We are not responsible for the privacy policies or practices of third party websites.
 

Contact
If you have any questions about this privacy policy or our treatment of your personal data, please write to us by email to mail@merseyforest.org.uk or by post to The Mersey Forest Offices, Risley Moss, Ordnance Avenue, Birchwood, Warrington, WA3 6QX.

Data controller
The data controller responsible for our website is The Mersey Forest. For some purposes, the necessary data only is securely shared with a trusted third-party processor, who is instructed only to use the data for this purpose. Personal data is never transferred outside the UK.