London Gardeners Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy explains how London Gardeners collects, uses, stores and protects personal data relating to our customers and prospective customers across London. It also explains your rights under the UK General Data Protection Regulation and the Data Protection Act 2018.

This Privacy Policy applies to all London Gardeners customers and enquirers within our London service area, regardless of the specific service you use or the method you use to contact us.

Who we are and scope of this policy

London Gardeners provides gardening, landscaping and related maintenance services to residential and commercial customers in London. In doing so, we act as the data controller for the personal data described in this Privacy Policy. This means we decide how and why your personal data is processed.

This policy applies whenever you interact with London Gardeners as a customer or potential customer, including when you request a quote, make a booking, receive services on site, or correspond with us for customer service or complaints handling.

Personal data we collect

We collect and process different types of personal data depending on how you interact with us. This may include:

Contact details such as your name, address, property location, billing address and any alternative contact address provided for access or correspondence.

Communication details such as your preferred contact method and the content of emails or messages you send to us, together with any notes we make about our communications with you.

Service information such as details about the type of garden, access instructions, photographs you choose to provide of your outdoor space, and records of the services we have carried out for you.

Booking and transaction details such as dates and times of appointments, records of quotations, work orders, invoices, payment status and any discounts or offers applied.

Technical and usage information collected when you visit our website, such as IP address, approximate location, device and browser type, pages visited and the date and time of your visit. This may be collected using cookies or similar technologies where legally permitted.

Feedback and review information such as ratings, testimonials or comments you choose to provide about our services.

How we collect personal data

We collect personal data directly from you when you contact us to request a quote, make a booking, ask a question, provide feedback or otherwise communicate with us. This can be done in person at your property, on the telephone or through our online channels.

We may also generate personal data as part of delivering our services, for example by creating internal records of completed work, recording notes on your preferences, or confirming access arrangements.

In some cases we may receive personal data about you from third parties, for example if another person refers you to us or makes a booking on your behalf. Where appropriate, we will inform you when we receive your details from another source.

Lawful bases for processing

We only process your personal data where we have a lawful basis to do so. Depending on the situation, the lawful basis will usually be one or more of the following:

Contract: We process your personal data where it is necessary to enter into or perform a contract with you, such as when we provide gardening or landscaping services you have requested, manage bookings, issue invoices or handle any related queries.

Legal obligation: We may process your data where this is necessary to comply with legal or regulatory obligations, including tax and accounting rules, record-keeping requirements and responding to lawful requests from authorities.

Legitimate interests: We process certain personal data to pursue our legitimate business interests, provided these are not overridden by your rights and interests. This includes managing our relationship with you, improving our services, maintaining security, preventing fraud and defending legal claims.

Consent: In limited circumstances, we may rely on your consent, for example for certain types of direct marketing or the optional use of non-essential cookies. Where we rely on consent, you can withdraw it at any time.

How we use your personal data

We use the personal data we collect for the following purposes:

To provide our services, including arranging visits, carrying out gardening and landscaping work, and following up on service outcomes.

To respond to enquiries, provide quotes, and give you information about our services where you have requested it.

To manage our customer relationship with you, including administration, billing, payments, and dealing with questions, feedback or complaints.

To improve and develop our services, for example by analysing common enquiries, reviewing service performance and enhancing our customer experience.

To keep appropriate internal records and documentation for business management, accounting and audit purposes.

To protect our business, rights and property, including by preventing and detecting fraud or misuse of our services and by defending or bringing legal claims where necessary.

To send you service-related communications, such as appointment confirmations, reminders, important updates or changes to this Privacy Policy.

Data sharing and processors

We may share your personal data with carefully selected third parties who act as data processors on our behalf. These processors are only permitted to handle your data in accordance with our instructions and must implement appropriate security measures. Such processors may include:

IT and cloud service providers that host our data, manage our customer records, or support our website and business systems.

Payment and accounting service providers that help us process transactions and maintain financial records.

Customer relationship and communication tools used to manage bookings, reminders and customer messages.

Professional advisers, such as accountants, auditors or legal advisers, where this is necessary to obtain professional services.

We may also share personal data where required by law, where necessary to protect our rights, or in connection with the sale, merger or restructuring of our business. We do not sell your personal data to third parties.

International transfers

Where any of our service providers or systems are located outside the United Kingdom or the European Economic Area, we will ensure that appropriate safeguards are in place to protect your personal data in line with applicable data protection laws. These safeguards may include the use of standard contractual clauses or reliance on an adequacy decision by the relevant authorities.

Data retention

We retain your personal data only for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes described in this Privacy Policy, including satisfying legal, accounting or reporting requirements. The length of time we keep your data will depend on the type of information and the context in which it is processed.

Customer and service records are generally retained for a period that allows us to respond to queries, manage any potential disputes or claims and comply with statutory retention periods. After this period, personal data will either be securely deleted, anonymised or, where this is not possible, appropriately restricted in line with legal obligations.

Your data protection rights

As an individual in London whose personal data we process, you have a number of rights under data protection law. These include:

The right of access to obtain confirmation of whether we process your personal data and to receive a copy of that data, together with certain additional information.

The right to rectification to request that inaccurate or incomplete personal data is corrected or updated.

The right to erasure in certain circumstances, sometimes known as the right to be forgotten, where there is no compelling reason for us to continue processing your data.

The right to restriction of processing in certain situations, for example where you contest the accuracy of your data or object to our use of it.

The right to data portability, which allows you, in specific circumstances, to receive personal data you have provided to us in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format and to transmit it to another controller.

The right to object to processing based on our legitimate interests and to object at any time to the use of your personal data for direct marketing.

Where processing is based on your consent, the right to withdraw that consent at any time, without affecting the lawfulness of processing carried out before withdrawal.

Exercising your rights

You can exercise your data protection rights by contacting us and clearly stating which right you wish to exercise and, where relevant, providing any necessary details to help us process your request. We may need to verify your identity before responding in order to protect your personal data.

We will respond to your request without undue delay and in any event within the time limits set by applicable data protection laws. In most cases, you will not have to pay a fee to exercise your rights, although we may charge a reasonable fee or refuse a request that is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive.

Security of your personal data

We take appropriate technical and organisational measures to protect your personal data against unauthorised access, accidental loss, destruction or damage. These measures include restricting access to personal data to staff and service providers who need it for legitimate business purposes and requiring them to follow strict confidentiality obligations.

Although we take reasonable steps to safeguard your data, no system can be completely secure. You should also take care when sharing personal information with us and notify us promptly if you suspect any misuse of your data.

Updates to this Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our services, how we handle personal data, or legal requirements. Any updates will be made available through our usual communication channels and will apply from the date they are published. We encourage you to review this Privacy Policy periodically so that you remain informed about how we use and protect your personal data.