PRIVACY NOTICE
Epical Global understands that your privacy is important to you and that you care about how your personal data is used. We are committed to protecting and respecting the privacy of our users and will only collect and use personal data in ways that are described here and in a way that is consistent with our obligations and your rights under the law.
This Privacy Notice explains how we collect information from you, what we do with it and what controls you have over the process.
It is important that you read this carefully - please contact us if you have any questions relating to this notice.
If you do not agree with the terms of this Privacy Notice you should not use our services or products.
1. Introduction
Our Midwives Live Chat service and digital content is operated by Epical Global Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales under number 12065790 (“Epical”, “we”, “us”, “our”). For the purposes of the Data Protection Act 1998, we are the data controller.
By using our services and/or digital content, you consent to the collection and use of information in accordance with this Privacy notice.
We reserve the right to change and amend this privacy notice from time to time. The updated version will apply to any transaction or use and it is your responsibility to ensure that you understand and agree to the current privacy notice before you make use of our services or information.
This privacy notice was updated May 2023.
2. What is Personal Data/Information?
Personal data is defined by the UK GDPR and Data Protection Act 2018 (collectively, “the Data Protection Legislation”) as ‘any information relating to an identifiable person who can be directly or indirectly identified in particular by reference to an identifier’.
Personal data is, in simpler terms, any information about you that enables you to be identified. Personal data covers obvious information such as your name and contact details but it also covers less obvious information such as identification numbers, electronic location data and other online identifiers.
3. Information which we may collect
· Information (such as name, email address and telephone number) that you provide when you register for our services or products, upload or submit any material via the website or request any information.
· Data or information provided in or as a result of using our midwife live chat service, which may include sensitive information about you including your health, test results, physical or mental conditions, characteristics, ailments or symptoms, diseases, disabilities, your race, gender, age and other sensitive information.
· Your name, email address, phone number.
· Any communications you initiate or send to us, for example to report a problem or to submit a query or concern.
· Information from surveys that we may, from time to time, run for data analysis purposes, if you choose to respond to them.
· Details of your visits to the website, including our live chat service (which you access on a third party website), the resources you access (such as digital content) and any data you download.
You are under no obligation to provide any such information. However, if you should choose to withhold requested information, we may not be able to provide you with certain services.
If you use our services or products, you consent to us and our partners, transmission, collection, maintenance, processing and use of your location data and queries to provide and improve location-based products and services. You may withdraw this consent at any time by turning off the location services settings on your device or by using a VPN software specifically designed to hide your IP address.
4. How we use your information
We will use the information you provide:
· To enable us to provide you with the services and information offered through the live chat service and which you request.
· To provide such information to our partners where reasonable or necessary in connection with your use of our Services.
· To review and enhance the quality of our services and digital content, including monitoring compliance with our clinical care standards.
· To make disclosures as required by or in compliance with reasonable requests by regulatory bodies, such as the Care Quality Commission, or as otherwise required by law or regulation.
· To administer your account with us
· To audit the downloading of data from the live chat.
· To improve the layout and/or content of our app and customise them to meet the needs of our partners and customers.
· To identify visitors to the live chat.
· To carry out analysis on our users demographics.
· To allow with your consent, carefully selected third parties (our partners) to send you information directly which you may find useful regarding their own products and services.
You may at any time instruct us not to contact you with marketing information regarding our services and products or those of our partners or to share your details with our partners, so they can send you information regarding their own products and services, either at the point such information is collected on the website or by following the unsubscribe instructions on any communications sent to you. You can also exercise this right at any time by contacting us at Epical Global Ltd, 14 Grafton, Montford Bridge, Shrewsbury, SY4 1HF or by email to admin@epicalglobal.co.uk
5. Additional Information
When you visit the live chat service, we may automatically collect technical information, including, but not limited to, the address used to connect your mobile phone or other device to the internet, your login information, system and operating system type and version, time zone setting, operating system and platform, your location and information about your visit, including the pages you viewed, website and live chat response times and interaction information. You cannot be identified from this information and it is only used to assist us in providing an effective service and to collect broad demographic information for aggregate use.
Cookies
The websites of our Partners (where the live chat is located) will also use cookies or similar technology to collect information about your access to the website.
Cookies are pieces of information that include a unique reference code that a website transfers to your device to store and sometimes track information about you. A number of cookies they use last only for the duration of your web session and expire when you close your browser. Other cookies are used to remember you when you return to the website and will last for longer.
Cookies will be used to:
· Remember that you have used the website, and/or live chat, before (this means we can identify the number of unique visitors we receive and allows us to make sure that we have enough capacity for the number of visitors we expect).
· Allows you to navigate the website more quickly and easily.
· Recognise when a visitor to the website is a registered user.
· Remember your login session so you can move from one page to another within the website.
· Store your preferences.
· Customise elements of the layout and/or content of the website for you.
· Collect statistical information about how you use the website or live chat so that we may improve the functionality
Most computer and some mobile web browsers automatically accept cookies but, if you prefer, you can change your browser to prevent that or to notify you each time a cookie is set. You can also learn more about cookies by visiting www.allaboutcookies.org which you may find useful and provides more information on how to block cookies. Please note: by blocking or deleting cookies you may not be able to take full advantage of the website or live chat features.
6. Information Sharing
We may share basic identification data (such as your name, email address and phone number) with our partners to provide you with an effective service or to inform you of any services, products or other activities. We will take all reasonable steps to protect your personal information and will only share sensitive information with relevant authorities as required.
We may disclose aggregate statistics or data about visitors to the website or from information on our live chat in order to describe our services to prospective partners, investors or other reputable third parties but these statistics or data will include no personally identifiable information.
If we carry out any reorganisation or are sold to a third party, you agree that any personal information we hold about you may be transferred to that re-organised entity or third party.
We may disclose your personal information if required to do so by law or if we believe that such action is necessary to prevent fraud or cyber crime or to protect the website or the rights, property or personal safety of any person.
7. Consent
In order to comply with data protection legislation and health professionals code of conduct and regulations, we expressly require consent of the user.
Please note: by accepting these notices and related policies, and by participating in using our services and products we will assume implied consent and that you are consenting to authorise us to process your personal data with the purposes outlined in this notice, that is fundamentally to provide you with safe, evidenced based advice and information.
When you use our services, including the live chat services, you are freely and unequivocally giving implied consent by opting into the use of these services and products but you have the right to withdraw consent at any time. You can do this simply by discontinuing use of our services or by emailing us at: admin@epicalglobal.co.uk with your request under your rights defined in section 13 of this notice.
8. Patient Data
All information supplied to Epical Global will be treated as confidential.
We do not store your personal health data on your mobile device. We store all your personal health data on secure servers located in the EU. Where you have chosen a password that enables you to access certain parts of the app you are responsible for keeping this password confidential and we request that you do not share this password with anyone.
Records of the transcripts of the live chats will be maintained and stored for clinical governance purposes, in accordance with data processing requirements. These records and any personal identifiable information you give us will be treated as strictly confidential and will not be disclosed without your express permission, except under special circumstances, for example to comply with a legal obligation.
We may encourage you to inform your primary or secondary care provider(s) of any health concerns you may have but we will not share information without your express permission unless there is an overriding public interest in disclosing the information without your consent.
We encrypt data that is required to be transferred, including health data. However, secure transmission of information via the internet cannot be guaranteed due to security threats outside of our control and you acknowledge that transmission is at your own risk. Once we have received your information and data we will use strict procedures and security features to try to prevent unauthorised access. You are responsible for ensuring that any computer or mobile device that you use to access your online data is suitably protected from potential interception.
In order to ensure that we can provide you with quality, safe, evidenced based care and advice, information will be shared with Epical Global health care team and other employees, such as administrative or other staff who support the operating of the live chat service. If you object to particular information being shared among the wider healthcare team or support team you must let us know. We are obliged to a make disclosures if failure to do so would expose you or others to risk of death or serious harm. In addition, we may be unable to continue to provide you with safe care and advice where you object to disclosure of information.
9. External Links
The website may contain links to other independent third-party websites or our live chat may be embedded on our partners websites or in app. These sites/apps are not under our control, and we are not responsible for and do not endorse their content or their privacy policies (if any). You will need to make your own independent judgment regarding your interaction with any of these sites/apps, including the purchase and use of any products or services accessible through them.
10. Security
We place great importance on the security of all personally identifiable information that is shared with us. We have security measures in place to attempt to protect against the loss, misuse and alteration of personal information under our control. For example, only authorised personnel have access to personal information. Whilst we cannot ensure or guarantee that loss, misuse or alteration of information will never occur, we use all reasonable efforts to prevent it.
You should bear in mind that submission of information over the internet is never entirely secure. We cannot guarantee the security of information you submit whilst it is in transit over the internet and any such submission is at your own risk.
It is advisable to close your browser when you have finished your user session to help ensure that others do not access your personal information if you use a shared computer or a computer in a public/work environment.
11. Storage of your Information
Information that you provide to us is sent to and stored on secure servers located in the EU. This is necessary in order to enable us to process the information.
12. Your Rights
Under the Data Protection Legislation, you have the following rights, which we will always work to uphold:
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The right to be informed about our collection and use of your personal data.
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The right to access the personal data we hold about you.
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The right to have your personal data rectified if any of your personal data held by us is inaccurate or incomplete.
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The right to be forgotten, i.e. the right to ask us to delete or otherwise dispose of any of your personal data that we hold.
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The right to restrict (i.e. prevent) the processing of your personal data.
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The right to object to us using your personal data for a particular purpose or purposes.
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The right to withdraw consent. This means that, if we are relying on your consent as the legal basis for using your personal data, you are free to withdraw that consent at any time.
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The right to data portability. This means that, if you have provided personal data to us directly, we are using it with your consent or for the performance of a contract, and that data is processed using automated means, you can ask us for a copy of that personal data to re-use with another service or business in many cases.
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Rights relating to automated decision-making and profiling. We do not use your personal data in this way
Further information about your rights can also be obtained from the Information Commissioner’s Office or your local Citizens Advice Bureau.
If you have any cause for complaint about our use of your personal data, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office. We would welcome the opportunity to resolve your concerns ourselves, however, so please contact us first, using the contacts details provided at the end of this notice.
You have a legal right under the Data Protection Act 1998 to a copy of all the personal information about you held by us. On request, we will provide you with a copy of this information subject to a fee not exceeding £10. You also have the right to correct any errors in that information. As mentioned above, you have a right to prevent the use of your personal information for direct marketing purposes.
13. Appropriate use of Automation
At the time of writing this policy, Epical Global believes that AI and other forms of automation should only be used to support and complement the role of health professionals, rather than to replace them. We are committed to only introducing data driven features that make our services and products safer, evidenced based and as up to date as possible (for example, consistency in advice and information provided) and that make our team of health professionals and staff more efficient in how we can deliver this care to our users.
We may in some cases apply automations to give recommendations of answers to commonly asked questions and clinical issues and to assist in administrative tasks.
User data may be used to train models for algorithm powered tools.
14. Contacting Us
Please submit any questions, concerns or comments you have about this privacy notice or any requests concerning your personal data by email to: admin@epicalglobal.co.uk