Advice & Support Services – Coffee Mornings/Family Adventures/Rainbow Group

This notice informs you of what we do with the personal information you provide us when you contact us, complete our online forms and access our services.

Who we are?

Autism Together provides day services, supported living and residential care for autistic adults. We also offer support and activities for families and carers, helping them and their autistic children to connect, learn and thrive.

What information do we collect?

We collect and process the information about you and the child or children accessing our services. Depending on the service you and your child/or children access, the information may include and is not exclusive to the following:

• Parent or person with parental responsibility or Carer’s Name.
• Contact email address and phone number.
• Name of child/names of children attending.
• If the child is in education, details of where and SENCO contact.

We may also process special category information e.g. health that requires more protection due to its confidential or sensitive nature:

• Details about the child’s diagnosis/pathway.
• Details of e.g. communication and sensory needs of the child.

Why we use your personal information?

• To communicate with you about the enquiries you have submitted.
• To provide you with the services and/or information you have requested.
• For administration purposes.
• To notify you of the latest updates of the service/s you requested.

Our lawful basis for processing personal information

• To process the information to carry out our agreement/contract with you.
• Processing is necessary to protect the vital interests of the individual or of another individual where they are physically or legally incapable of giving consent.
• Legitimate business reason i.e. management of enquiries, provision of services.
• Legal obligations e.g. health and safety requirements, safeguarding.
• Recognised legitimate interests, where processing is necessary for one of the specific public interest purposes recognised in law, such as safeguarding, emergencies, crime prevention or responding to requests from organisations carrying out public tasks.

Who do we share personal information with?

The type of service you receive will inform who we share your information with; recipients such as healthcare, social and welfare organisations and professionals or providers of goods and services.

Where necessary we may disclose your personal information to law enforcement agencies to comply with any legal obligations, or to protect the rights, property or safety of our staff, our organisation or others.

Soft opt-in for marketing purposes (changes under the Data Use and Access Act 2025)

Where permitted by data protection law, we may rely on the ‘soft opt-in’ to send you electronic communications about our charitable purposes, activities, and ways you can support our work. This applies where you have previously provided your contact details in connection with our activities, and we believe the information we send is relevant to your relationship with us.

If we collected your contact details before these legal changes took effect, your existing contact preferences will remain unchanged. We will only rely on the soft opt-in for you if you subsequently re-engage with us after the new rules come into force, for example by submitting your details again.

Whenever we collect your contact details, you will be given the opportunity to opt out of receiving direct marketing. All marketing communications sent under the soft opt-in will include a simple way to unsubscribe. You can also change your preferences at any time by contacting us using the form below.

We will never share your personal data with other organisations for their own marketing purposes.

Linked website

Our online registration form for Family Adventures is linked to Trybooking, a site operated by a third party. A link to their Privacy Policy is available on their website.

How long do we keep your personal information for?

We will only retain your information for as long as we need to support the purposes for which it was collected. Records are maintained in line with Autism Together’s retention schedule which determines the length of time records should be kept. Information held is then confidentially destroyed and/or deleted.

How we keep your information secure?

We have internal policies and controls in place to ensure that your data is not lost, accidentally destroyed, misused or disclosed, and is not accessed except by our employees in proper performance of their duties.

Your rights in relation to your personal information

• The right to be informed about how your personal information is being used.
• The right to access your personal information that we hold about you.
• The right to request the correction of inaccurate or incomplete personal information.
• To request the erasure of your personal information where there is no compelling reason for its continued processing.
• The right to restrict the processing of your personal information where certain requirements are met.
• To object to certain processing of your personal information.
• The right to raise a complaint about how your personal data is collected, used, or handled.

Transfer of personal information abroad

Information will not be transferred outside the UK.

Automated decision making

Information will not be used for automated decision-making.

Contact details of data controller:

Autism Together

Wirral Centre for Autism, Oak House, 6 Tebay Road, Bromborough, Wirral, CH62 3PA

Tel: 0151 334 7510

If you have any concerns or complaints about the way we handle your personal data, or if you want to exercise your rights, please contact our Data Protection Officer in the first instance using the Data Protection Enquiries Form below or alternatively by post or by telephone using the details provided above. We aim to acknowledge receipt of your complaint within 30 days.

If your concern or complaint is not resolved to your satisfaction, you can raise a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF, England, or via this link: Contact us – public | ICO