Privacy policy & data protection

1.0 Overview

This privacy policy sets out how Vet Seekers uses and protects any information that you give us through this site.

You are not required to provide any personal information to use or view the public pages of our website. However, where you provide your personal information – such as to apply for a job, contact us generally, reach out to a named individual or register with us – this Privacy Policy will govern how we collect, use and process your provided information.

Each time you provide personal information you will be asked to confirm that you have read and understood this Privacy Policy, and give explicit consent via ticking an ‘opt in’ box.

Since it is not our intention to collect personal information from children, no child specific policy is described.

We are committed to ensuring that your privacy is protected. Should we ask you to provide certain information by which you can be identified, then you can be assured that it will only be used in accordance with this privacy policy.

1.1 Changes to our privacy policy

We may change this policy from time to time by updating this page. If we change our privacy policy, we will advise you of changes or updates through means of a notice on our website and we will update this privacy policy accordingly. Continued use of this website or our services after this time will constitute your acceptance of the new policy.

If you have any questions or concerns about our privacy commitment, please e-mail us at david@vetseekers.co.uk.

You should check this page from time to time to ensure that you are happy with any changes.

2.0 Relevant Legislation

Vet Seekers and its website is designed to comply with the following national and international legislation concerning user privacy and data protection:

• UK Data Protection Act 1988 (DPA)
• EU Data Protection Directive 1995 (DPD)
• EU General Data Protection Regulation 2018 (GDPR)

Vet Seekers ’s compliance with the above legislation (all of which are stringent in nature) means that this site is likely to be compliant with the data protection and user privacy legislation set out by many other countries and territories as well.

If you are unsure about whether this site is compliant with your own country of residences’ specific data protection and user privacy legislation, you should contact our data protection team (details of which can be found in section 8.1 at the end) for clarification.

3.0 Personal information that this site collects, how it uses it, how it stores it and how long it is kept

3.1 Candidates

We may collect, after gaining your consent, the following information:

• Name and job title
• Contact information including email address and telephone number
• Demographic information such as postcode, preferences, salary and interests
• Other information relevant helping you find job opportunities (your CV)

We require this information to understand your needs and provide you with a better service, and in particular for the following reasons:

• Finding you relevant job opportunities.
• Forwarding your CV (after discussing it with you and gaining your consent) to clients whom we both feel may be interested in your services.
• To inform you of job opportunities we believe will be of interest to you.
• Internal record keeping
• From time to time, we may also use your information to contact you to keep in touch with you. We may contact you by email, phone or mail
• We may also release information relating to you to regulatory or law enforcement authorities.

You can submit your CV to us via the website or by direct email. Your CV and the personal data you provide will be stored in our Customer Relationship Management (CRM) database. Only authorised personnel who work for Vet Seekers will have access to this CRM database.

If you take up contract work, you will need to input your timesheet data online, which we will process so we can invoice employers and pay you. We will store the timesheet data in our head office.

3.2 Employers

We may collect, after gaining your consent, the following information:

• name and job title
• contact information including email address and telephone number
• information about the company you work for (address, telephone number, customer base etc)
• demographic information such as postcode, preferences and interests
• other information relevant to providing you and your company with our recruitment services

We require this information to understand your needs and provide you with a better service, and in particular for the following reasons:

• Finding you relevant candidates.
• To inform you of good candidates we believe will be of interest to you and when they become available.
• Internal record keeping.
• From time to time, we may also use your information to contact you to keep in touch with you. We may contact you by email, phone or mail.
• We may also release information relating to you to regulatory or law enforcement authorities.

We will store this information in our CRM database, as discussed in section 3.1 above.

3.3 How long we will keep your data

We will store your data in our database securely for 3 years. The purpose for this will be to keep in touch with you and your situation, and update our records. If an individual’s relationship with Vet Seekers has become inactive their personal data will be retained electronically for 3 years. After this period, we will permanently and safely delete your data if we have not got an on-going relationship with you, or if you are no longer requiring our services. If you want us to delete your data before this period, you may request for us to do this and your data will be permanently deleted from our database. The removal of all personal data (including email contact details) will result in Vet Seekers no longer being able to carry out work on your behalf.

4.0 Job alerts/ Email Newsletter

To subscribe to job alerts and newsletter emails, you will be required to provide your email address. We will use your email address to keep you informed of the latest jobs relevant to your skills and/or provide you with industry news via job alerts. If you no longer wish to receive this information, you can email us directly to unsubscribe.

If you choose to join our email newsletter, the email address that you submit to us will be forwarded to MailChimp who provide us with email marketing services. We consider MailChimp to be a third party data processor. The email address that you submit will not be stored within this website’s own database or in any of our internal computer systems.

Your email address will remain within MailChimp’s database for as long as we continue to use MailChimp’s services for email marketing to yourself or until you specifically request removal from the list. You can do this by unsubscribing via directly emailing us and requesting removal. When requesting removal via email, please send your email to us using the email account that is subscribed to the mailing list.

While your email address remains within the MailChimp database, you will receive periodic (approximately three times a year) newsletter-style emails from us.

5.0 Curriculum vitae (‘CV’)

We provide you with the option of submitting your CV via our website or by sending your CV via email to one of our consultants. You can do this in order to apply for a certain advertised job or to be considered by our recruitment consultants for positions as they come up. Your CV will be stored in our database, and will be accessible by our recruitment consultants. You can update your CV at any time, simply by following the same procedure to submit a new CV.

6.0 Securing your data

We are committed to ensuring that your information is secure. In order to prevent the loss, misuse, alteration or unauthorised access of your personal information, we have put in place suitable technical and organisational precautions to safeguard and secure the information we collect. All the personal information you provide is stored on secure servers and our servers undergo regular Malware scanning. Our website is SSL certified. This means that when you upload your CV via our website, the personal data you provide is encrypted and can only be accessed by a limited number of Vet Seekers employees who have special rights to access such information.

7.0 How we use cookies

We use a number of different cookies on our site. If you do not know what cookies are, or how to control or delete them, then we recommend you visit www.aboutcookies.org for detailed guidance.

The list below describes the cookies we use on this site and what we use them for. Currently we operate an ‘explicit consent’ policy which means that you have the option to consent to cookie usage when you first visit our site, by ticking an ‘opt in’ box. If you are not happy, then you should either not use this site, or you should delete the cookies having visited the site, or you should browse the site using your browser’s anonymous usage setting (called “Incognito” in Chrome, “InPrivate” for Internet Explorer, “Private Browsing” in Firefox and Safari.)

7.1 How to disable Cookies/ Opt out

All modern browsers allow you to change your cookie settings. These settings will typically be found in the ‘options’ or ‘preferences’ menu of your browser. In order to understand these settings, the following links may be helpful, otherwise you should use the ‘Help’ option in your browser for more details.

• Cookie settings in Internet Explorer
• Cookie settings in Firefox
• Cookie settings in Chrome
• Cookie settings in Safari

7.2 First Party Cookies

These are cookies that are set by this website directly.

Google Analytics: We use Google Analytics to collect information about visitor behaviour on our website. Google Analytics stores information about what pages you visit whilst on our website, how long you are on the site, how you got here and what you click on. This Analytics data is collected via a JavaScript tag in the pages of our site and is not tied to personally identifiable information. We therefore do not collect or store your personal information (e.g. your name or address) so this information cannot be used to identify who you are.

You can find out more about Google’s position on privacy with regards to its analytics service at http://www.google.co.uk/intl/en/analytics/privacyoverview.html

Google are based in the USA and are EU-U.S Privacy Shield compliant.

7.3 Third Party Cookies

These are cookies set on your machine by external websites whose services are used on this site. Cookies of this type are the sharing buttons across the site which allow visitors to share content onto social networks. Cookies are currently set by LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Xing and Google+. In order to implement these buttons, and connect them to the relevant social networks and external sites, there are scripts from domains outside of our website. You should be aware that these sites are likely to be collecting information about what you are doing all around the internet, including on this website.

You should check the respective policies of each of these sites to see how exactly they use your information and to find out how to opt out, or delete, such information.

7.4 Session Cookies

We use a session cookie to remember your log-in details for you. These we deem strictly necessary to the working of the website. If these are disabled then various functionality on the site will be broken, including the ability to log-in.

7.5 Flash Cookies

Flash cookies may be used to store user preferences for media player functionality and without them some flash content (such as our homepage video) may not render correctly.

7.6 Links to other websites

Our website may contain links to enable you to visit other websites of interest easily. However, once you have used these links to leave our site, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting such sites and such sites are not governed by this privacy statement. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question.

8.0 Controlling and retaining your personal information

We will continue to hold your data for 3 years from the date that we store it, with the view to providing future services to you.

We will not sell, distribute, share or lease your personal data to anyone else unless we have your consent to do so or if we are required to do so by law.

8.1 Your rights

You have the right to ask for a copy of the personal information held about you by Vet Seekers , and the right to ask Vet Seekers to correct any inaccuracies in that information, as well as the right to deletion. You also have the right to withdraw your consent to your personal information being collected, as well as the right to object to Vet Seekers processing your data at the first point of our contact with you (usually via email).

To send a request in relation to any of these rights or lodge a complaint about the way in which we are handling your data, please submit a written request via david@vetseekers.co.uk or write to:

Vet Seekers
Vet Seekers Ltd, Conyngham Hall Business Centre, Conyngham Hall, Bond End, Knaresborough, North Yorkshire, HG5 9AY

Further details about these rights are outlined below.

8.2 Right to a Subject Access Request

You have the right to get a copy of the information which we hold about you, under the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) 2018. This is known as a subject access request (SAR).

If you would like a copy of the information we hold on you please email us at david@vetseekers.co.uk.

If you believe that any information we are holding on you is incorrect or incomplete, please write to or email us as soon as possible, at the above email address. We will promptly correct any information found to be incorrect.

8.3 Right to complain

If you feel that there is a problem with the way we are handling your data, and you cannot resolve this issue with us directly, then you have a right to contact and complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk.

9.0 Data Breaches

We will report any unlawful data breach of this website’s database or the database(s) of our third party data processor, i.e. Google Analytics, to any and all relevant persons and authorities within 72 hours of the breach if it is apparent that personal data stored in an identifiable manner has been stolen.

10.0 Equal opportunities

We are a company committed to diversity. As such, all job applicants and members of staff will receive equal treatment and we will not discriminate on grounds of gender, race, ethnic origin, colour, marital status, nationality, national origin, disability, sexual orientation, religion or age.

We may occasionally use information provided by you for the purposes of diversity monitoring as part of our commitment to equal opportunities. This information will be used on an entirely anonymous basis.