Privacy

This document sets out how York Community Energy CBS Ltd processes personal data, as well as what the data will be used for, who the data will be shared with, how data security will be ensured, and how to opt out. 

We are registered with the ICO as a Data Controller (registration number ZB142291). We hold the following types of personal data:

  • Membership records
  • Donation records
  • Our newsletter list
  • Contact details and records of communication with members, service users, interested parties, and potential commercial partners.

We only use data for our established purposes of promoting and developing community owned renewable energy in York and providing advice and support regarding energy and related issues, including improving the energy efficiency of buildings. We do not raise money from advertising or commercial marketing, though we may circulate information that we believe to be of interest to our members.

When we record and use your personal information we:

  • only access it when we have a good reason
  • only share what is necessary and relevant
  • don’t sell it to anyone

We handle and store your personal information in line with data protection law. Personal data held by YCE is available to all directors, but it may also be shared with other YCE members for the purposes of organising our activities (excluding the York Energy Advice project, where data will only be available to project staff). We will not share your personal data with any third parties without your prior consent. All data that we store and process will be done securely, using up-to-date software and tools. Access to all data will be password protected.

How we deal with personal data

Membership

YCE offers lifetime membership and as such we will retain your membership records until such time as you notify us that you no longer wish to be a member (or that we are informed of your death). Our constitution requires us to communicate notices of AGMs and EGMs to all members. If we find that we have no valid means of making contact with you then we will remove your membership after one year.

Newsletter

Our newsletter list is managed by Mailchimp. If you are not a YCE member then in order to subscribe to it you will need to respond to a confirmation email to receive updates.

Every email we send carries an unsubscribe link, but if you wish to unsubscribe you can also email info@yorkcommunityenergy.org.uk at any time.

Donation and other financial records

We keep financial records for seven years.

Other contact information and communication records

We retain details, including records of email exchanges of other organisations and interested parties for the purposes of developing a community energy project, promoting community energy projects and renewable energy, and providing advice and support regarding energy and related issues.

Energy advice service users

We collect information about you when:

  • You contact us, whether by phone, email or in person
  • You provide your information to us via self-referral, at events/stalls, through advice sessions, or through other means
  • Someone else refers you to us, but only if they have your consent to do so
  • You complete surveys or provide feedback

This information may include:

  • Your name
  • Your role and organisation (where relevant)
  • Contact details including email address, postal address and phone number 
  • Information about your home, energy bills and wellbeing in the context of providing energy advice and support
  • Information about diversity, such as gender, race and disability

Your information is collected and processed on the basis of consent.

Information is used for the purpose of providing and promoting an advice and support service for energy-related issues to households in York. We may keep financial information for seven years due to legal requirements, and we delete all other personal information from our database and customer relationship management system if we have had no contact with you for three years. In some cases we may, however, anonymise the data for future reference such as for reporting to our funders.

If you wish to access or amend any of your information that we hold, or if you wish to withdraw your consent for data processing, you can do this by contacting us at info@yorkcommunityenergy.org.uk 

Cookies

Our website does not use any cookies, unless you log in to view member-only content in which case a session cookie is used. However embedded third-party content (e.g. videos) may send cookies to your browser upon activation. The compliance of third parties with GDPR and other privacy rules is not the responsibility of YCE.