Privacy Policy

Introduction

Welcome to Meat and Livestock Commercial Services Ltd (MLCSL)' Privacy Policy. This policy explains how we, as part of the Vorenta Ltd group, handle your personal data: from the types of data, we collect and how we use it, to how we ensure its security. Understanding your privacy rights is important to us, and we are committed to protecting your data in compliance with applicable laws and regulations.

Our Commitments To You

We recognise the trust you place in us when sharing your personal data. We are committed to processing your data in a lawful and respectful manner, ensuring its confidentiality and integrity.

Data Collection and Use

We collect a variety of personal data to provide and enhance the services we offer. This includes, but is not limited to:

  • Personal Identification Information: Such as your name, email address, postal address, and telephone number.

  • Usage Data: This encompasses data collected automatically when using our website or services. Examples include the pages of our website that you visit, the time spent on those pages, unique device identifiers, and other diagnostic data. We may also collect information about how the service is accessed and used, including information such as your computer's Internet Protocol address (e.g., IP address), browser type, browser version, and the dates and times of your visits.

  • Service-Related Data: Information relevant to customer surveys, offers, and the services we provide.

  • The data we collect is used for various purposes:

  • To Provide and Maintain our Service: Including monitoring the usage of our service.

  • Customer Support: To provide customer care and support, ensuring that your interactions with us are efficient and helpful.

  • For Business Analysis: To perform analysis or valuable data aggregation that helps us improve our services and understand our customer base better.

  • Marketing and Communications: To provide you with news, special offers, and general information about other goods, services, and events we offer (subject to your preferences).

  • To Ensure Compliance: Complying with legal obligations or enforceable governmental requests.

  • By using our services, you agree to the collection and use of information in accordance with this policy. We are committed to respecting your privacy and ensuring the secure and confidential handling of your data.

Cookie Policy

  • What are Cookies?: Cookies are small text files stored on your device (computer, tablet, or mobile phone) when you visit a website. They are widely used to make websites work more efficiently, as well as to provide information to the site owners. Cookies help us to remember things about your visit to our site, such as your preferred language and other choices/settings and to generally make the site easier for you to use.

  • Why We Use Cookies: Our website, hosted on Squarespace, uses cookies for various purposes:

    • Functional Cookies: These are essential for the operation of our website, enabling basic functions like page navigation and access to secure areas of the website. The website cannot function properly without these cookies.

    • Performance Cookies: These cookies help us understand how visitors interact with our website by collecting and reporting information anonymously. This assists us in improving the way our website works, for example, by ensuring that users are finding what they are looking for easily.

    • Advertising Cookies: These cookies are used to track visitors across websites. The intention is to display ads that are relevant and engaging for the individual user and thereby more valuable for publishers and third-party advertisers.

  • User Consent: In regions where explicit consent is required for cookie usage (such as the European Union), we actively seek your consent before placing cookies on your device. When you visit our website, a Cookie Banner will be displayed, informing you about the use of cookies and asking for your consent to place them on your device.

  • How to Give Consent: You can give your consent by clicking on the appropriate button in the Cookie Banner. This action will allow us to set cookies on your device according to your preferences.

  • Withdrawing Consent: You have the right to withdraw your consent at any time. To do this, you can change your cookie preferences through your browser settings. Here, you can choose to block or delete cookies. However, please be aware that blocking or deleting cookies may impact your user experience, as some parts of our site may no longer function as intended.

  • Adjusting Browser Settings: Most web browsers allow some control of most cookies through the browser settings. To find out more about how to manage and delete cookies, visit allaboutcookies.org. Here, you can find information on how to adjust the settings on a wide variety of browsers.

  • Revisiting Consent Choices: We understand that your preferences may change over time. Therefore, we will periodically prompt you to revisit your consent choices and update them as necessary.

  • Third-Party Cookies: We use third-party services like Google Analytics, which may also use cookies. These cookies are used to collect information about how visitors use our site. We use the information to compile reports and to help us improve the site. The cookies collect information in an anonymous form, including the number of visitors to the site, where visitors have come to the site from, and the pages they visited.

  • Updates to Our Cookie Policy: We regularly update our cookie policy and encourage users to review it periodically for the latest information on our cookie practices.

Data Storage and Security

  • Robust Security Measures: At MLCSL, we prioritise the security of your personal data. We employ a variety of robust security measures to ensure the protection and confidentiality of your information.

  • Cyber Essentials Plus Certification: We are proud to hold the Cyber Essentials Plus certification, a UK government-backed scheme that demonstrates our commitment to cybersecurity. This certification means we adhere to stringent security protocols, including advanced protection against cyber threats and regular security audits.

  • Secure Data Storage: Your personal data is stored on secure servers, safeguarded against unauthorised access, use, alteration, or destruction. Access to your data is strictly limited to authorised personnel who have a legitimate business need to access it.

  • Secure Transmission: We take steps to ensure the secure transmission of your data. While no method of transmission over the Internet or electronic storage is 100% secure, we follow all PCI-DSS requirements and implement additional generally accepted industry standards.

  • Continuous Monitoring and Improvement: Our security policies and systems are regularly reviewed and updated to keep up with evolving threats and technological advancements. We are committed to continuously improving our data security practices to ensure the highest level of protection for your personal information.

Sharing Your Data

  • Internal Sharing within Vorenta Ltd Group: We may share your data within the Vorenta Ltd group, including Meat & Livestock Commercial Services Ltd. (MLCSL), for internal administrative purposes. This sharing is essential for efficient business operations and to provide you with seamless services.

  • Sharing with Trusted Partners: Your data may be shared with trusted partners who assist us in providing services. These partners are carefully selected and bound by confidentiality agreements to ensure the secure and lawful handling of your data.

  • Legal and Regulatory Requirements: We may be required to share your data with legal and regulatory authorities to comply with legal obligations. This includes responding to lawful requests by public authorities, including to meet national security or law enforcement requirements.

  • Operational Needs: In certain circumstances, we may share your data to facilitate business transactions or operational needs. This includes instances such as mergers, acquisitions, or restructuring, where data sharing is necessary for the continuation of services.

  • Explicit Consent: We will also share your data in situations where we have obtained your explicit consent. This may include sharing for marketing purposes or with third parties offering complementary services, subject to your approval.

  • Data Protection: In all instances of data sharing, we ensure that the privacy and security of your data are upheld. We only share the necessary data and take steps to ensure that the receiving parties maintain confidentiality and data protection standards in line with our policies.

Data Retention

We retain your data only for as long as necessary for the purposes for which it was collected. Our data retention policy reflects legal and regulatory requirements, and we will anonymise or securely delete data that is no longer needed.

Your Rights

As a user, you have several rights under data protection legislation, which we are committed to upholding. These rights include, but are not limited to:

  • Right to Access: You have the right to request access to the personal data we hold about you. This allows you to receive a copy of the personal data we have and to check that we are lawfully processing it.

  • Right to Correction: You have the right to request correction of any incomplete or inaccurate data we hold about you. We will promptly correct any information found to be incorrect.

  • Right to Erasure: Also known as the 'right to be forgotten', this enables you to request the deletion or removal of personal data where there is no compelling reason for its continued processing.

  • Right to Restrict Processing: You have the right to request the suspension of the processing of your personal data, for example, if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.

  • Right to Data Portability: This right allows you to obtain and reuse your personal data for your own purposes across different services. It applies to data you have provided to us where the processing is based on your consent or for the performance of a contract, and when processing is carried out by automated means.

  • Right to Object: You have the right to object to processing based on legitimate interests, direct marketing (including profiling), and processing for research or statistical purposes.

  • Right to Withdraw Consent: Where the processing of your data is based on consent, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time. Withdrawal of consent does not affect the lawfulness of processing based on consent before its withdrawal.

  • Right to Complain: You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). We would, however, appreciate the opportunity to address your concerns before you approach the ICO, so please contact us in the first instance.

Exercising Your Rights

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us using the details provided in the 'Contact Us' section of this policy. We may need to verify your identity for security purposes before we can act on your request.

Changes to the Privacy Policy

We reserve the right to update this privacy policy at any time, and we will notify you of any changes by posting the new policy on this page.

Contact Us

If you have any questions, comments, or requests regarding this privacy policy or our processing of your data, please contact us at our registered office or via email at info@hallmarkvcs.com.

Complaints

We take your privacy concerns seriously and are committed to ensuring that your personal data is protected and processed lawfully. If you have any concerns or complaints about the way we handle your personal data, we encourage you to contact us first. Our dedicated team is ready to assist you and address any issues you may have. Reaching out to us directly can often lead to a faster and more satisfactory resolution.

To lodge a complaint or raise a concern, please contact us using the details provided in the 'Contact Us' section of this policy. We will thoroughly investigate your complaint and strive to resolve it to your satisfaction.

If, after contacting us, you feel that your concerns have not been adequately addressed, you have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). However, we would appreciate the opportunity to address your concerns before you approach the ICO.

Additional Information

  • We do not engage in profiling or automated decision-making with your data.

  • We take complaints regarding data processing seriously and welcome suggestions for improving our procedures.

  • You have the right to data portability for data processed with your consent or for contractual purposes.

  • We may use your data for direct marketing purposes, subject to your consent.

  • Our website may include links to third-party websites, which are not covered by this policy. We encourage you to review their privacy policies.

  • This policy is subject to change, and the most up-to-date version is available on our website. For further information about data protection legislation, please visit the ICO website.