Data Protection

The Data Protection Act 1998 gives individuals a right of access to the personal data which organizations hold about them, subject to certain exemptions (see Exemptions). Requests for access to personal data are known as subject access requests. This page explains how to submit a subject access request to Employment Law Advocates, how we will handle your request, and your right to complain if you are dissatisfied.

If you submit a subject access request to Employment Law Advocates, you are entitled to be told whether we hold any data about you. If we do, you also have the right:

  • To be given a description of the data, the purposes for which the data are being processed, and those to whom the data may have been disclosed;
  • To be given a copy of the data in an intelligible form, with any unintelligible terms explained;
  • To be provided with any information available to Employment Law Advocates about the source of the data; and
  • If you specifically request it, to be given an explanation as to how any decisions taken about you solely by automated means have been made.

These rights apply to electronic data, and to data in “manual” (i.e. non-electronic) formats subject to certain limitations. Further information about your rights under the Data Protection Act is available on the website of the Information Commissioner.

If your request is for information other than information about yourself, such as information about decisions or actions by Employment Law Advocates, you cannot submit it as a Data Protection Act request.
Exemptions

The Data Protection Act includes various exemptions which specify the circumstances in which an organization can refuse to provide access to personal data. The most likely situations in which Employment Law Advocates could refuse a subject access request are where:

  • The release of the data would jeopardise the prevention or detection of crime, or the apprehension or prosecution of offenders;
  • The data is covered by legal professional privilege; or
  • The data relates to management forecasting or management planning, and its release to you would prejudice Employment Law Advocate’s business or activities.

The right of access to data in paper format is also subject to some limitations.

If Employment Law Advocates withholds data from you as a result of an exemption under the Data Protection Act, we will explain why the data have been withheld and the relevant exemption, unless doing so would itself disclose information which would be subject to the exemption.

The Data Protection Act allows us to refuse to provide you with a copy of your data if the effort in doing so would be disproportionate, or if the same or similar data have already been provided to you and a reasonable interval has not elapsed since your previous subject access request. In addition, if Employment Law Advocates reasonably requires further information from you in order to locate the data which you have requested, and we inform you of this, we are not required to comply with your request until you supply us with the information.

We have to protect the Data Protection rights and other legal rights of other individuals when we respond to subject access requests. Information which does not relate to you may be redacted or edited out, particularly if it relates to other individuals. Sometimes we may not be able to release data relating to you because doing so would also reveal information about other persons who have not consented to their data being released, and it would not be reasonable in the circumstances to release the data without their consent. In such cases, you will be informed that data about you have been withheld and the reasons for doing so.


Subject Access Requests

Requests for access to personal data must be in writing. When submitting a subject access request, please be as specific as possible about the information which you want access to, as this will assist us in processing your request. A general request such as “please send me all of the data which you hold about me” is likely to lead us to contact you for further information or clarification. Employment Law Advocates has the right to ask you for information which we reasonably need to locate the data which you have requested, and we may not respond to your request until you provide this information.

A subject access request must be accompanied by a fee of £10 (payable to Civil Law Advocates Limited), and proof of your identity. We require proof of ID to ensure that we are releasing data to the correct person, and the only acceptable forms of identification are passport or driving licence. The fee and proof of identity must be submitted for each subject access request, and we will not begin processing any request until the fee and proof of ID are received.

Upon receipt of the above, we will send you an acknowledgement of your request as soon as possible. This will indicate the deadline by when we will send you a response. We may also ask you to provide further information or clarification if we require it to process your request, and may contact you again for additional information or clarification if necessary.

We will respond as soon as possible, and in all cases within 40 calendar days of receipt of your fee. If we reasonably require further information from you to locate the data which you have requested, we will inform you as soon as possible, and the 40 day deadline will commence from the date when we receive the information from you.

Any copies of data which are provided to you must be in permanent form. We will normally send the data on paper to the postal address specified by you on the subject access request, unless we agree with you that the data can be supplied in a different format. The data may take the form of photocopies, printouts, extracts, or a combination of these, depending on what is most appropriate in the circumstances.

If Employment Law Advocates holds no data about you, you will be informed of this. You will also be informed of any cases where data about you have been withheld and the reasons for this unless doing so would itself reveal information which would be subject to an exemption.


Appeals

If you are dissatisfied with the handling of your Data Protection request, you are encouraged to contact our Director in the first instance to determine if they can resolve your concerns informally. This may lead to a quicker resolution of your complaint than a formal appeal.

If you remain dissatisfied, you can ask for an internal review of Employment Law Advocates’ handling of your request. Appeals should be submitted promptly, and within 12 months of the response to your request. If you wish to complain about a request to which we responded more than 12 months ago, you should contact the Information Commissioner as Employment Law Advocates will not process your appeal.

Appeals should be sent in writing to the Director at the following address. You should state as fully as possible why you think your request was not dealt with in accordance with the Data Protection Act, and the remedy which you are seeking:

Rad Kohanzad
Director
Employment Law Advocates
Hamilton House
1 Temple Avenue
London, EC4Y 0HA

Fax: +44 (0)20 7489 2047
Email: rad@employmentlawadvocates.com

Rad Kohanzad will acknowledge receipt of your appeal and will respond to your appeal within 40 working days of its receipt. If it is agreed that information should be released to you, the information will be provided to you as soon as is practically possible.

You can also ask the Information Commissioner for an assessment as to whether Employment Law Advocates has processed your data in accordance with the Data Protection Act. The Commissioner can be contacted at the following address:

Information Commissioner
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF
United Kingdom

Further information about how to enforce your rights under the Data Protection Act is available on the Commissioner’s website.

Copyright

The copyright of any data which is supplied to you will be owned by Employment Law Advocates unless otherwise indicated. The supply of information under the Data Protection Act does not give the person who receives it an automatic right to re-use the information in a way which would infringe copyright, for example, by making multiple copies, publishing and issuing copies to the public.

Brief extracts of any material which is supplied to you may be reproduced under the fair dealing provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (sections 29 and 30) for the purposes of research for non-commercial purposes, private study, criticism, review and news reporting. More extensive re-use must only be carried out with prior written permission from Employment Law Advocates.

Enquiries about the re-use of material should be directed to our Director.

Enquiries relating to Data Protection at Employment Law Advocates should be directed to our Director.

Information about your rights under the Data Protection Act and how to submit a subject access request is available on the website of the Information Commissioner. Other organisations, such as the Citizens Advice Bureau, may also be able to assist you in developing a subject access request.

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020 7489 2165
info@employmentlawadvocates.com

Employment Law Advocates
Hamilton House
1 Temple Avenue
London
EC4Y 0HA