Privacy Policy

Introduction

AKG respects user privacy and seeks to protect personal data. We have a focus on best ensuring user rights and underlying AKG’s responsibilities to users, as well as meeting data protection standards, such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

This privacy policy, together with our Terms and Conditions of Use, and any other documents referred to in it, sets out the basis on which any personal data we collect from you, or that you provide to us, will be processed by us.

There are also links to further resources and more detail relating to your rights.

Please read the following carefully to understand AKG’s approach, responsibilities and practices regarding your personal data and how we treat it.

Data Controller

The data controller is: AKG Financial Analytics Ltd (AKG). Registered Office: Anderton House, 92 South Street, Dorking, Surrey RH4 2EW. Registered in England No: 3063359

Email: DataProtection@akg.co.uk

The Data Protection Officer can be contacted via our Contact Us page.

Information collected about you:

We will process your personal information to meet our legal, statutory and contractual obligations and to provide you with our products and services.

We will never collect any unnecessary personal data from you and do not process your information in any other way than already specified in this notice. AKG does not collect data classed as “sensitive”, such as health information or information related to political opinion or religious beliefs.

For example, in website registration the personal data that you may give us is:

  • First Name;
  • Surname;
  • Company;
  • Email Address;
  • Password;
  • Address and Country;
  • Whether you are a financial services professional.

We may also collect information from you if you:

  • contact us via post, email, fax or telephone and provide any personal data;
  • place an order for report products on our website;
  • complete our online contact form;
  • provide your contact details to us when registering to use an online account for accessing AKG online information such as the Rating Portal;
  • complete a survey.

Information may also collected by our use of Cookies and other technological means.

Regarding each of your visits to our site we may automatically collect the technical information that might include such things as login information, browser settings etc., so that we may understand browsing habits, review the performance of our website and ensure that your browsing experience is as good as possible.

Technical information specifically includes:

  • the Internet protocol (IP) address used to connect your computer to the Internet; your login information;
  • browser type and version;
  • time zone setting;
  • browser plug-in types and versions;
  • operating system and platform.

Information about your visit includes:

  • the full Uniform Resource Locators (URL) clickstream to, through and from our site (including date and time); page response times;
  • download errors;
  • length of visits to certain pages;
  • page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks, and mouse-overs);
  • methods used to browse away from the page.

More detail on the elements collected by Cookies may be found in our Cookie Policy.

Legal bases for the use and processing of personal data by AKG

For more background information on legal bases for the use and processing of personal data see https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/lawful-basis-for-processing/

Depending on the type of relationship entered into with AKG, identified legal bases applicable to AKG are:

  • Consent
  • Legitimate Interest
  • Contract

How we use your information

We use your information in a number of ways and when we use your personal information, we must do so lawfully.

Your information may be used:

  • to carry out lawful obligations arising from contracts entered into between you and us and to provide you with the information, products and services that you have requested from us;
  • to ensure that content from our site is presented in the most effective manner for you and for your computer; to administer our site and for internal operations, including troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, research, statistical and survey purposes;
  • to improve our site to ensure that content is presented in the most effective manner for you and for your computer;
  • as part of our efforts to keep our site safe and secure;
  • to provide you with our newsletters and similar resources where you have opted in to receive these. These will typically be relevant to AKG information or services that you might already be a user of;
  • to email you with marketing offers about AKG's products and services where you have opted in to receive these. These will typically be relevant to other AKG information or services that you might not already be a user of, and/or where some additional offer, such as an 'Early Bird' discount might be offered.

Disclosure and sharing of your information

We may share your personal information with any member of our group of companies (companies owned by AKG Group Limited).

We may share your information with third parties where there is a legal requirement or legitimate interest, for example with business partners, suppliers and sub-contractors for the performance of any contract we enter into with them or you to fulfil those contractual obligations. This may also be in the event that we are acquired by a third party or we are under a legal duty to disclose or share your personal information, or to enforce or apply our Terms and Conditions.

We currently use MailChimp as our bulk email automation platform and the registration information you provide will be transferred to MailChimp for processing in accordance with their Privacy Policy and Terms.

We may share your information with analytics and search engine providers that assist us in improving and optimising our site. Your information will be shared securely at all times. We currently use Matomo Analytics in accordance with their Privacy Policy

Where we store your personal data

The data that we collect from you may be transferred to, and stored at, a destination outside the European Economic Area (“EEA”). It may also be processed by staff operating outside the EEA who work for us or for one of our suppliers. Such staff may be engaged in, among other things, the fulfilment of your order, the processing of your payment details and the provision of support services. By submitting your personal data, you agree to this transfer, storing or processing.

We will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that your data is treated securely and in accordance with this privacy policy and no transfer of your personal data will take place to an organisation or a country unless there are adequate controls in place including the security of your payment details and other personal information.

We use appropriate technology to manage our online services and we will endeavour to do our utmost to ensure your personal data and other confidential information is kept safe and secure and is only used in accordance with the law.

Payment transactions, for which we currently use WorldPay, are encrypted using industry standard technology. Where we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password which enables you to access certain parts of our site, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share a password with anyone. Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure.

Although we will do our best to protect your personal data, we cannot guarantee the security of your data transmitted to our site; any transmission is at your own risk. However, we must comply with data protection laws including where there is a requirement to use appropriate technological and organisational measures to protect personal data. Data that is on our systems or transmitted using our website will be suitably protected at all times.

How long we keep your personal data

We will keep your data for as long as you have an account, contract or otherwise interact with our products or services.

If your account or details fall inactive we will retain your personal data for a reasonable period following the point at which your information ceased to be used, subject to any legal obligations requiring us to keep your personal data for longer.

Your Rights

You have rights under data protection law.

These are a right to know how your data is being used (transparency), a right to access your data, rights to rectification, erasure, restriction and portability and the right to object to processing. You also have a right to control your consent for marketing purposes (see below), and we will respect this choice at all times. These rights are covered in more detail below and there are also links to data protection resources which you may find useful if you require more information than is provided here.

Your rights are central to UK and European data protection legislation. Your rights are summarised below, and more detailed information is available within the GDPR itself. This link provides a guide to the Regulation.

A summary of your rights is as follows:

  • The right to transparency (Article 12, GDPR) – You have the right to know how your data are being collected, stored and used. This privacy policy provides these details. If anything should be unclear to you, then please Contact Us.
  • The right to access your data (Article 15, GDPR) – You have the right to access and see what information is held about you by us. You may request this information in writing using the contact details provided via Contact Us.
  • The right to rectification (Article 16, GDPR) – If you believe that some of the information we hold about you is incorrect, you have the right to have any errors corrected, please Contact Us to do this.
  • The right to erasure (Article 17, GDPR) – The right to be forgotten is laid down in data protection law. You have the right to have all your data removed from our systems subject to any contractual, legal or legitimate interest obligations we may have necessitating the keeping of your data. In which case we will cease using your information subject to contractual, legal or legitimate interest obligations.
  • The right to restrict processing (Article 18, GDPR) – You have the right to restrict how your personal data are used, subject to legal obligations.
  • The right to data portability (Article 20, GDPR) – Your personal data can be requested in a machine-readable format if you require it.
  • The right to object to processing (Article 21, GDPR) - You may object to having your personal data processed subject to any compelling legitimate grounds that may allow us to continue.
  • The right to stop automated profiling (Article 22, GDPR) – We will inform you if we are profiling you by automated means, via a change in this privacy policy. You have a right to stop this from happening on solely automated grounds.
  • The right to complain (Article 77, GDPR) – You have the right to complain to the Regulator in the EU country in which you reside if you believe that we have not dealt with your rights properly. The details of the UK Information Commissioner’s Office are given within this policy.
  • The right to judicial remedy and compensation (Articles 78 & 82) – You have the right to judicial remedy if you believe your rights and freedoms have been infringed and we have not acted appropriately. This may lead to compensation, awarded by a court.

Marketing

We will not share your personal data for marketing purposes with companies outside the AKG Group and we will only use your personal data for AKG marketing purposes when you have given us permission to do so.

Thereafter you also have the right to ask us not to process your personal data for marketing purposes.

You can exercise your right to prevent such processing at any time by changing your Communication Preferences in respect of your account, or by contacting us at akg@akg.co.uk.

Access to your information

You have the right to request access to the data; to know what we hold and obtain a copy. If you wish to do this, the request must be in writing to our Data Protection Officer, whose contact details are:

The Data Protection Officer, 
AKG Financial Analytics Ltd, 
Anderton House, 
92 South Street, 
Dorking, 
Surrey RH4 2EW
UK
Email: DataProtection@akg.co.uk

or via our online Contact Us form.

Complaints

If you have a complaint relating to your personal data, please contact the Data Protection Officer (details above) in the first instance.

If you believe that we have not dealt with your complaint appropriately, you have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office, which is the UK Regulator and the independent authority set up to uphold information rights in the public interest, promoting openness by public bodies and data privacy for individuals.

Contact and further details can be accessed online:

Data Breaches

A loss of personal data is known as a data breach. The GDPR imposes requirements on businesses to identify, assess and report breaches in a timely manner (within 72 hours).

We undertake to inform you if your personal data is compromised and there is a risk to your rights and freedoms as a result.

More information on data breaches may be found here - https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-the-general-data-protection-regulation-gdpr/personal-data-breaches/

Sensitive personal data

Sensitive personal data, also known as “special categories” is not collected by AKG. In the event that this information becomes relevant for us to collect, hold and use we will ensure that we collect it legally and that your rights are protected at all times.

Changes to our Privacy Policy and Questions

We may from time to time make changes to this Privacy Policy and we will make those changes here.

Please do check back to see any updates or changes to our Privacy Policy.

Please do contact us with any questions on this Privacy Policy, as with any other aspect of our relationship with you.