Privacy Notice
This notice explains how The Ear Clinic North Wales looks after your personal information, including your health information.
1. Who we are
The Ear Clinic North Wales is a trading name of Lois Hughes-Jones, a sole trader. Lois Hughes-Jones is the data controller for the information described in this notice.
Address: Y Shed, Pen Y Maes, Meliden, Prestatyn LL19 8PY
Email: theearclinicnorthwales@gmail.com
Phone: 01745 299942
2. What information we collect
- Booking and contact details: your name, phone number, email address and appointment details.
- Health information: your ear and hearing history, symptoms, relevant medical conditions and medicines, what we find at examination, the result of your hearing check, and before and after photographs of your ear canal and eardrum. This is “special category” data and we treat it with extra care.
- Payment details: payments are handled by our booking provider. We do not see or store your full card number.
- Messages: emails, calls, texts or WhatsApp messages you send us.
- Website data: when you visit our website, our hosting provider automatically receives technical information such as your IP address and browser type (see section 8).
3. Why we use your information and our legal basis
| Purpose | Legal basis (UK GDPR) |
|---|---|
| Booking you in, sending appointment confirmations and reminders, and taking payment | Contract (Article 6(1)(b)) |
| Examining you, providing treatment, keeping clinical records and photographs, and giving aftercare advice | Contract (Article 6(1)(b)). For health information, the provision of health care by a professional under a duty of confidentiality (Article 9(2)(h) and Schedule 1 of the Data Protection Act 2018) |
| Replying to enquiries | Legitimate interests (Article 6(1)(f)), or contract if you are a client |
| Keeping accounting and tax records | Legal obligation (Article 6(1)(c)) |
| Protecting our website and systems, and handling complaints or legal claims | Legitimate interests (Article 6(1)(f)) |
We do not send marketing messages unless you have asked us to, and you can ask us to stop at any time.
4. Who we share your information with
We never sell your information. We share it only where needed:
- Fresha, our online booking, reminders and client records provider.
- Cloudflare, which hosts and protects our website.
- Google, which provides our email (Gmail) and, only if you choose to load it, the map on our website.
- Your GP or another health professional, if we refer you and you agree, or where the law allows or requires it, for example to protect someone’s life.
- Professional advisers and insurers, such as our accountant or insurer, where necessary.
These providers act on our instructions or under their own data protection terms. Some may process information outside the UK. Where they do, we rely on safeguards such as UK adequacy regulations or approved contract terms.
5. How long we keep your information
- Clinical records and photographs: eight years after your last appointment.
- Accounting records: six years.
- Enquiries that do not lead to an appointment: up to 12 months.
After this we delete or anonymise the information.
6. Children and how we keep information safe
Our services are for people aged 18 and over. We do not knowingly collect information about anyone under 18. If you think we have, please contact us and we will delete it.
We use password-protected systems, limit access to those who need it, and use reputable providers. Our website is served over an encrypted (HTTPS) connection. No system is completely secure, but we take reasonable steps to protect your information.
7. Your rights
You have the right to:
- ask for a copy of the information we hold about you;
- ask us to correct anything that is wrong;
- ask us to erase your information (we may need to keep clinical records for the periods above);
- ask us to restrict how we use it, or object to how we use it;
- ask for your information in a portable format, where this applies.
To use any of these rights, contact us using the details in section 1. We will reply within one month and will not charge a fee in normal circumstances.
If you are unhappy with how we have handled your information, please tell us first so we can put it right. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint or on 0303 123 1113.
8. Our website
Our website does not use analytics, advertising or tracking cookies. Our hosting provider, Cloudflare, records technical data such as IP addresses in server logs to deliver the site and protect it from attack. We use fonts hosted on our own site, so your browser does not contact Google for them.
The map in the “Find us” section only loads if you click “Load map”. When you do, Google receives your IP address and may set cookies. See Google’s privacy policy.
Links to Fresha, Facebook and Instagram take you to other websites with their own privacy policies and cookies. See our Cookie Policy for details.
9. Changes to this notice
We may update this notice from time to time. The date at the top shows when it was last changed.