GDPR
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) came into force on 25th May 2018. The Regulation governs the relationships we all have as individuals with every organisation we choose to belong to or do business with and who keep any kind of records about us, including Gravesend, Northfleet and District u3a (GN&D u3a).
The principle is that the individual ‘owns’ the information that each such organisation holds about them. Every individual has the right to know what sort of information is being held about them, what use is made of it and who has access to it. We, as u3a members, must be told how the data is held, have the right to inspect the entry relating to ourselves and challenge / correct anything that has been mis-recorded, or ask that particular details be deleted.
GN&D u3a records only the information that each member supplies about themselves when they join or renew membership and pay their subscription. Nobody cross-checks with any other organisation. Neither are the records shared with, let alone sold to, anyone outside of the u3a organisation. Paying your subscription constitutes a contract - GN&D u3a asks for, and records, your chosen name, a postal address you can pick up mail from and a landline phone number it might reach you on. Additionally, it asks for a single mobile number and email address, if you wish to give them. Finally, it asks whether you are a UK tax payer and wish to 'Gift Aid' this and all future subscriptions to GN&D u3a. These, along with your issued membership number, constitute all the details that GN&D u3a records, and their primary purpose is to enable GN&D u3a to keep in touch with you and advise you of forthcoming events. Unlike so many organisations nowadays, we do not ask for your date of birth or age, or any details of your health, income or assets, ethnicity, politics or religion etc.
At present, GN&D u3a holds email addresses for 95% of its members. This means that these lucky majority receive their monthly newsletters up to three days earlier than 2nd class post could manage, as well as saving GN&D u3a over £2,000 a year in postage and extra printing. Your subs would have to be at least £8 a year higher without email distribution. Holding a mobile number for members is particularly useful on our day excursions. Imagine sitting in a stuffy coach on Brighton Sea Front, engine running, driver chafing to start the return journey, the last two of our members lost somewhere in the Lanes… If you are a UK tax payer and you consent to 'Gift Aid' this and all future subscriptions to GN&D u3a then we are able to reclaim 25% of your membership fees back from His Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC).
Your data is held in a secure, cloud based database called Beacon. This was written by The Third Age Trust for u3as. Five times a year, an abstract (names and postal address only, one record covers couples at the same address) of our members’ details who wish to receive the 'Third Age Matters' magazine is sent to the ‘parent’ national u3a in order to keep their records up to date. Members have the right to ask to be omitted from this exercise.
You have the right to inspect and change the details recorded about you, which you can do using the MEMBERS LOGIN.
All new and renewing members have been asked to positively confirm their assent as they paid their membership subscription.
Peter Buttle (Data Protection Officer) October 2022.