Privacy Policy - Balham Cleaner

Balham Cleaner is committed to protecting the privacy and personal data of all customers in our service area. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, store, share, and protect personal data in accordance with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018. This policy applies to all Balham Cleaner customers in the area, including individuals who enquire about, book, receive, or pay for our cleaning services.

1. Who We Are

For the purposes of data protection law, Balham Cleaner acts as the data controller in relation to the personal data we collect and use to provide our services. This means we determine the purposes and means of processing your personal data. We are responsible for ensuring that your personal data is handled lawfully, fairly, and transparently.

2. Personal Data We Collect

We collect only the personal data that is necessary for delivering our services, managing bookings, handling payments, responding to enquiries, and meeting legal obligations. The types of data we may collect include:

Identity data such as your name, and where relevant, the name of a company or property manager.
Contact data such as telephone number, email address, and service address.
Booking and service data such as appointment times, service history, cleaning preferences, and instructions provided by you.
Payment data such as payment status, invoices, and transaction references. We do not store full card details unless expressly stated at the time of payment and only through secure payment processors.
Communication data such as emails, messages, call notes, complaints, and feedback.
Technical data such as limited information collected through our systems, including device or browser details if you interact with digital tools used for service administration.

We do not intentionally collect special category data unless you choose to provide it and it is necessary for a particular service request. If you do share such information, we will treat it with additional care and only process it where a valid lawful basis applies.

3. How We Use Your Data

We use personal data for the following purposes:

To provide cleaning services and manage bookings.
To communicate with you about appointments, service updates, changes, and follow-up matters.
To process payments, send invoices, and maintain financial records.
To respond to enquiries, feedback, complaints, and requests.
To improve the quality and efficiency of our services.
To comply with legal, tax, accounting, and regulatory obligations.
To protect our business, customers, staff, and systems from fraud, misuse, or security incidents.

We only use your personal data where it is relevant and proportionate to the service we provide. We will not use your data for purposes that are incompatible with the reasons it was originally collected, unless we have a lawful basis to do so.

4. Lawful Basis for Processing

Under data protection law, we must have a lawful basis to process personal data. Balham Cleaner relies on the following lawful bases:

Contract

We process your personal data where it is necessary to enter into or perform a contract with you. This includes arranging services, carrying out cleaning work, taking payment, and managing bookings.

Legitimate Interests

We may process personal data where it is necessary for our legitimate business interests, provided that these interests are not overridden by your rights and freedoms. Examples include improving service quality, maintaining internal records, managing customer relationships, and protecting against fraud or misuse.

Legal Obligation

We may process and retain personal data where this is required to comply with legal duties such as tax rules, accounting requirements, record-keeping obligations, or lawful requests from authorities.

Consent

In limited circumstances, we may rely on your consent, for example where you voluntarily agree to receive certain types of communication that are not necessary for the service. Where consent is used, you may withdraw it at any time. Withdrawing consent will not affect processing that took place before withdrawal.

5. Sharing Your Data and Processors

We may share personal data with trusted third parties where necessary to operate our business and provide our services. These third parties act either as independent controllers or as processors acting on our instructions. We require processors to handle personal data securely and only for the purposes we specify.

Examples of processors or service providers may include:

Payment processors used to handle card or electronic payments.
Booking and scheduling systems used to organise appointments and service records.
IT and cloud storage providers used to store business data securely.
Email or communication service providers used to send messages relating to bookings and customer service.
Professional advisers such as accountants or legal advisers, where necessary for compliance and business administration.

We may also disclose data where required by law, including to law enforcement bodies, regulators, courts, or government authorities. We do not sell your personal data.

6. International Transfers

Where a processor or service provider stores or accesses data outside the UK, we will ensure appropriate safeguards are in place. These may include adequacy regulations, standard contractual clauses, or other lawful transfer mechanisms designed to protect your personal data to an equivalent standard.

7. Data Retention

We keep personal data only for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected, including any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements. Retention periods depend on the type of data and the reason it is held.

Customer and booking records are generally retained for the duration of the customer relationship and for a reasonable period afterwards to deal with queries, disputes, or service history.
Financial and tax records are retained for the period required by applicable law.
Communication records may be retained for a period needed to manage customer service, evidence agreements, or resolve complaints.

When data is no longer required, we will delete it securely or anonymise it so that it can no longer identify you. In some cases, we may keep limited records for a longer period where necessary to establish, exercise, or defend legal claims.

8. Data Security

We use appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect personal data against unauthorised access, accidental loss, destruction, or alteration. These measures may include access controls, secure storage, staff confidentiality obligations, and careful selection of trusted processors. While no system can be completely secure, we work to keep your data protected and to respond promptly if any issue occurs.

9. Your Rights

Under UK data protection law, you have a number of rights in relation to your personal data. These rights include:

Right of access – you can request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
Right to rectification – you can ask us to correct inaccurate or incomplete information.
Right to erasure – in some circumstances, you can request deletion of your data.
Right to restrict processing – you can ask us to limit how we use your data in certain situations.
Right to object – you can object to processing based on legitimate interests, including direct marketing where applicable.
Right to data portability – in some cases, you can request that data you provided to us be transferred to you or another controller in a structured format.
Right to withdraw consent – where processing is based on consent, you can withdraw it at any time.

To exercise your rights, you should make a clear request and provide enough information for us to identify you and respond properly. We may need to verify your identity before taking action. We will respond within the legal time limits, and we may decline requests where the law permits us to do so.

10. Children’s Data

Our services are generally intended for adults. We do not knowingly collect personal data from children unless it is necessary in connection with a household service and only to the extent permitted by law. If we become aware that we have collected such data improperly, we will take appropriate steps to delete it.

11. Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our services, legal requirements, or data handling practices. Any revised version will apply from the date it is published or otherwise communicated. We encourage customers to review this policy periodically so they remain informed about how their data is handled.

12. Complaints and Supervisory Authority

If you have concerns about how we handle personal data, you should contact us through the appropriate business channel so we can review and address the issue. You also have the right to raise a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection matters.

This Privacy Policy is designed to explain our data practices in clear terms and to support transparency, accountability, and respect for your rights. Balham Cleaner is committed to processing personal data fairly, securely, and only when necessary for legitimate business and legal purposes. All Balham Cleaner customers in the area are covered by this policy.