What is the purpose of this privacy notice?

This privacy notice aims to give you information on how I collect and process your personal data through your use of this website, including any data you may provide through this website when you: sign up to my newsletter/purchase a product OR service.

This website is not intended for children and I do not knowingly collect data relating to children.

You must read this privacy notice together with any other privacy notice I may provide on specific occasions when I am collecting or processing personal data about you so that you are fully aware of how and why I am using your data. This privacy notice supplements the other notices and is not intended to override them.

Polly Smith IBCLC owned and run by Polly Smith who is the data controller registered with the Information Commissioners Office. As a registered IBCLC Polly Smith is required by the IBCLC Code of Conduct to respect people’s right to privacy and confidentiality so protecting your privacy is fundamental to my practice. This notice explains what information I collect from you, why I collect this information, under what circumstance this information may be shared, how long it is stored and how you can access it.

 My email address is polly@pollysmithibclc.co.uk

My postal address is: 30 Waterhouse Lane, Southampton SO15 8QD

My website address is : www.pollysmithibclc.co.uk

If you are not happy with any aspect of how I collect and use your data, you have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). I would be grateful if you would contact me first if you do have a complaint so that I can try to resolve it for you.

Sensitive Data

During our contacts by phone, text, messenger, email, via the contact page on our website, via social media and face to face I will collect and record personal information about you and your baby. This information will include medical information relevant to the issue you are seeing me about. I may use your contact information to contact you at a later date for the purposes of follow up. Whilst I take steps to ensure your information is secure communications by text, email, messenger, social media and my website may not be secure so keep this in mind when using these methods.

I am required by IBCLC code of ethics to keep clear and accurate records relevant to my practice. This is to enable me to contact you and to provide safe and effective care for you and your baby. These records, which will contain your personal/medical information and that of your child, include summaries of our consultations and copies of emails and any other messages you’ve sent to me during our conversations together where necessary. They are stored on electronic devices which are password protected and have security software installed. I also store paperwork in a locked metal filing cabinet.

I require your explicit consent for processing sensitive data (medical information) and I will request this.

I may use your infant’s information, anonymised, without notice; for auditing or research purposes.

I may also use consultation data as case studies, anonymised, without notice for auditing or research or training purposes.  

Before we enter a consultation situation I require a signed contract between you and I, in agreement of these topics.

HOW I USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA

I will only use your personal data when legally permitted. The most common uses of your personal data are:

• Where I need to perform the contract between us.
• Necessary for our legitimate interests.
• Where I need to comply with a legal or regulatory obligation.

Purposes for processing your personal data

Set out below is a description of the ways I intend to use your personal data and the legal grounds on which I will process such data. I have also explained what our legitimate interests are where relevant.

I may process your personal data for more than one lawful ground, depending on the specific purpose for which I am using your data.

For the purpose of fulfilling my contract with you i.e., when evaluating situation and proposing treatment plan, along with follow up care, payment processing I will use the following data Identity

• Contact details
• Financial details
• Medical details.

In order to ensure the best possible care, support and evidence-based information is given Polly Smith has regular supervision.  During supervision, your case may be discussed but Polly will ensure anonymity by not naming you unless there is a risk of serious harm. In addition, the Lactation Consultants and other practitioners who provide supervision also uphold current practice guidelines regarding confidentiality and will not disclose any information from the supervision session.

​ Comments

When visitors leave comments on the site, I collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.

An anonymised string created from your email address (also called a hash) may be provided to the Gravatar service to see if you are using it. The Gravatar service Privacy Policy is available here: https://automattic.com/privacy/. After approval of your comment, your profile picture is visible to the public in the context of your comment.

Media

If you upload images to the website, you should avoid uploading images with embedded location data (EXIF GPS) included. Visitors to the website can download and extract any location data from images on the website.

Contact forms

This site uses a contact form for you to contact us.  The information is used o trey back to your query and continue our communications.  It is not sold or passed on or used for advertising unless stated.

I will request information I need to provide my services effectively and safely. I retain email data shared over email for 3 months from our last contact, I consider a legitimate reason for keeping your data for that time frame being in case you come back to me weeks later so you do not have to repeat yourself. For consultations I will only request information that I need in order to provide my services effectively and safely. I will retain the record of the consult until your child is 28 years of age (10 years, post 18) as is required by my insurance providers.  At which time, the information will be destroyed securely. Your information will not be used for marketing purposes. The Data held about you will include name, age, address, email, your child’s name and date of birth, medical history, consultation notes, and may include a baby’s weight chart, care plan and a report to your GP. Information may be shared with your health professionals (see below).

I will not share any information with anyone except in the following circumstances

• With your consent I may contact your midwife, GP, HV or other healthcare professionals involved in your care and share relevant information to enhance the care of you and your baby. For example, I may write to your GP to request a prescription for a nipple infection or phone your health visitor to discuss extra support.
• Should I have a concern about the safety of your child then I have a legal and professional obligation to share relevant information with the relevant agencies and in this case your consent is not required.
• Anonymised data may be used and shared for the purpose of internal and external audits/research.
• In the event of a complaint or claim relevant information will be shared, with your consent, with my indemnity provider and legal team.
• Photographs may be used to form part of our consultation record, for educational and publicity purposes but only with your consent.
• Transaction and financial data may be shared with my accountant, bank, card payment machine provider and with HMRC in certain circumstances.

DATA SECURITY

• I have put in place what I believe are appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, access to your personal data will be limited to Polly Smith only. Access to consultation records and emails which may include medical data will be restricted to Polly Smith only except in the circumstances listed above.
• In the event of a personal data breach, I will notify you and any applicable regulator of the breach where I am legally required to do so.

 DATA RETENTION

• I will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes I collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements.
• To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, I consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which I process your personal data and whether I can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal requirements.
• By law I have to keep basic information about our customers (including Contact, Identity, Financial and Transaction Data) for six years after they cease being customers for tax purposes.

​

YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS

Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data. These include the right to:

• Request access to your personal data.
• Request correction of your personal data.
• Request erasure of your personal data.
• Object to processing of your personal data.
• Request restriction of processing your personal data.
• Request transfer of your personal data.
• Right to withdraw consent.
• You can see more about these rights at:
• If you wish to exercise any of the rights set out above, please email

​No fee required – with some exceptions

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, I may charge a reasonable admin fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, I may refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.

What I may need from you

I may need to request specific information from you to help me confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. I may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response.

Time limit to respond

I try to respond to all legitimate requests within one month. Occasionally it may take me longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, I will notify you and keep you updated.

10. Changes to this notice and your duty to inform me of changes

This version was last updated on 16/05/2021

Please keep me informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with me. It is important that the personal data I hold about you is accurate and current

DISCLAIMER

Polly Smith’s advice and information are NOT intended to be a substitute for medical advice or treatment. Always seek the advice of your doctor or other qualified health practitioner regarding any matters that may require medical attention or diagnosis, and before following the advice and recommendations from my services.

Reliance on any information provided by Polly Smith is solely at your own risk. Polly does not make any representations or warranties, express or implied, regarding consulting services provided. Polly Smith’s liability (if any) is limited to the consulting fee paid by you to Polly Smith and in no event will Polly Smith be liable to you for any other claim, losses or damages.

Industry regulatory disclosure requirements

I am an IBCLC which is a registered profession with IBLCE my current certification is L-302161 (valid until 31st December 2025) you can verify me here: https://iblce.useclarus.com/view/verify/

Cookie Policy for Polly Smith IBCLC

This is the Cookie Policy for Polly Smith IBCLC, accessible from www.pollysmithibclc.co.uk & www.pollysmithibclc.com

What Are Cookies

As is common practice with almost all professional websites this site uses cookies, which are tiny files that are downloaded to your computer, to improve your experience. This page describes what information they gather, how I use it and why I sometimes need to store these cookies. I will also share how you can prevent these cookies from being stored however this may downgrade or ‘break’ certain elements of the site’s functionality.

For more general information on cookies, please read “What Are Cookies”. Information regarding cookies from this Cookies Policy are from the Privacy Policy Generator.

How I Use Cookies

I use cookies for a variety of reasons detailed below. Unfortunately, in most cases there are no industry standard options for disabling cookies without completely disabling the functionality and features they add to this site. It is recommended that you leave on all cookies if you are not sure whether you need them or not in case, they are used to provide a service that you use.

Disabling Cookies

You can prevent the setting of cookies by adjusting the settings on your browser (see your browser Help for how to do this). Be aware that disabling cookies will affect the functionality of this and many other websites that you visit. Disabling cookies will usually result in also disabling certain functionality and features of this site. Therefore, it is recommended that you do not disable cookies. This Cookies Policy was created with the help of the Cookies Policy Generator from CookiePolicyGenerator.com.

The Cookies that are Set

• Surveys related cookies from time to time I offer user surveys and questionnaires to provide you with interesting insights, helpful tools, or to understand our user base more accurately. These surveys may use cookies to remember who has already taken part in a survey or to provide you with accurate results after you change pages.
• Forms related cookies When you submit data to through a form such as those found on contact pages or comment forms cookies may be set to remember your user details for future correspondence.
• Site preferences cookies in order to provide you with a great experience on this site I provide the functionality to set your preferences for how this site runs when you use it. In order to remember your preferences, I need to set cookies so that this information can be called whenever you interact with a page is affected by your preferences.

Third Party Cookies

In some special cases I also use cookies provided by trusted third parties. The following section details which third party cookies you might encounter through this site.

• This site uses Google Analytics which is one of the most widespread and trusted analytics solutions on the web for helping us to understand how you use the site and ways that I can improve your experience. These cookies may track things such as how long you spend on the site and the pages that you visit so I can continue to produce engaging content. For more information on Google Analytics cookies, see the official Google Analytics page.
• Third party analytics are used to track and measure usage of this site so that I can continue to produce engaging content. These cookies may track things such as how long you spend on the site or pages you visit which helps us to understand how I can improve the site for you.
• From time to time I test new features and make subtle changes to the way that the site is delivered. When I am still testing new features, these cookies may be used to ensure that you receive a consistent experience whilst on the site whilst ensuring I understand which optimisations our users appreciate the most.

More Information

Hopefully that has clarified things for you and as was previously mentioned if there is something that you aren’t sure whether you need or not it’s usually safer to leave cookies enabled in case it does interact with one of the features you use on our site.

However, if you are still looking for more information then you can contact me through one of my preferred contact methods:

• Email: polly@pollysmithibclc.co.uk
• Address: 30 Waterhouse Lane, Southampton SO15 8QD