Trading Standards privacy notice

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The Trading Standards team advises businesses on and enforces many laws to help businesses ensure fair trading in Barnet.

The personal information we collect

The type of information we collect and process relating to personal data includes:

  • Personal identifiers such as names (including previous known names or aliases), date of birth, contact information (address, contact number, personal email address) and preferred contact methods
  • Complaints information about goods, services, or businesses and can include financial data, associates, victims, and witnesses
  • Criminal offence data which includes alleged offences
  • Photographs, audio, and visual recordings

Some of the personal data we process is data about you that we have been given by other external partners and enforcement agencies such as Citizen Advice Consumer Service, Food Standards Agency, Police etc. Whilst we do not seek to collect it, we do recognise that we could be provided with special category data from, or about, a data subject. This data can include but is not limited to:

  • details of medical conditions and health
  • racial or ethnic origin
  • political opinions
  • religious or philosophical beliefs
  • sexual orientation

We may also collect information concerning criminal convictions, warnings and offences.

Most of the personal data we process is data provided directly to us from consumers, individuals, witnesses, victims, businesses, external partners (as above) and enforcement agencies. We process this information in order to carry out our statutory duties and to prevent or detect crime.

If we have data about you from others, we may let you know how we are processing it unless processing it would be prejudicial to our work or require disproportionate effort.

Our legal basis for processing your data is that: 

  • we need to process it to perform a public task, namely to enforce the above-mentioned legislation (6(1)(e) of the GDPR). 
  • we need to process it to comply with the law:  The above legislation particularly Consumer Rights Act, Consumer Protection Act, Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations and Weights and Measures Act are amongst many that place a duty of this council to enforce it. (6(1)(c) of the GDPR)
  • special category personal data e.g., health - where processing is necessary for the reasons of substantial public interest (UK GDPR Article 9(2)(g) and DPA 2018, Schedule 1, para.6(1) & (2)(a)).  For example, injury caused by an unsafe product
  • criminal convictions and offences - where processing is necessary for reasons of substantial public interest (UK GDPR Article 10 as supplemented by DPA 2018 section 10(5) & Schedule 1, Part 2, paras. 6(1) and (2)(a))

Whilst undertaking an investigation, we process personal information under Part III of the Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA) for law enforcement purposes.  

We also need your data because we use it to protect and promote environmental and public health in our community, and to encourage a fairer, safer trading environment.

Who we share the information with

We share your data within the Council where it is necessary to deliver a service or comply with our statutory obligations. We may share your data with:

  • External enforcement agencies such as Metropolitan Police, City of London Police, Fire Brigade and Rescue services, Environment Agency, Action Fraud, Insolvency service and other Local Authorities’ Trading Standards and regulatory services, National Trading Standards and Trading Standards Regional Investigations Team
  • Internal Council Departments and Elected Members
  • Central government departments such as Office of Product Safety and Standards (OPSS), Defra, Environment agency, HMRC, Border Force, National Crime Agency, to assist with service delivery
  • Other organisations including voluntary services, where the disclosure is necessary for the purposes of the prevention and / or detection of crime
  • Other parties - where the law requires us to pass on information under special circumstances, for crime prevention or the detection of fraud, and as part of the National Fraud Initiative
  • Other parties where the information is required for legal action or protection of intellectual property, and we assess the disclosure as appropriate.

If you require an interpreter or document translation, your data may be shared with our translation and interpretation service to provide this service. Data shared with our translation and interpretation service will be only for the explicit purpose of completing the translation/interpretation and will not be shared for any other purpose.

Legislation that applies

Our statutory provisions include, but are not limited to, those listed below:

  • Consumer Rights Act 2015
  • Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008
  • Enterprise Act 2002
  • Estate Agents Act 1979
  • General Product Safety Regulations 2005
  • Tennant Fees Act 2019
  • Trade Marks Act 1994
  • Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
  •  Weights and Measures Act 1985

How long do we keep your information

We retain your data in accordance with the council retention schedule, which is based on statutory retention requirements and recognised best practice.

The Retention Schedule is published on our Open Data Portal: Barnet Council Retention Schedule | Barnet Open Data