The services process personal information in order to carry out the delivery and administration of business support and grant programmes that are funded by the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UK SPF) and Worcestershire County Council either directly or jointly with partners and commissioned private and third sector providers.

This includes:

• processing your grant or business support application
• monitoring and assessing the consultants’ delivery of the service
• conducting data analysis on the users of this service to support the development of new services
• maintaining fraud prevention
• contacting you in the delivery of project services
• providing progress reports to the funding organisation(s)

The service processes personal information which is relevant to individual cases which may include, but is not limited to, the following personal data:

• name
• address
• email address
• home phone number
• mobile phone number
• date of birth
• financial Information - provided when applying for a grant for example bank details, credit card statements

We may also process some special category (sensitive) information, which is relevant to individual cases and may include some of the following but is not limited to:

• gender
• age
• race
• ethnic origin
• health

The legal basis for processing this personal data is:

• necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller (UK GDPR article 6 (1)(e))

The special category condition for processing is:

• necessary for reasons of substantial public interest, on the basis of domestic law which shall be proportionate to the aim pursued (UK GDPR article 9 (2)(g)), and Statutory etc and government purposes (DPA 2018 Schedule 1 Part 2 Paragraph 6)

If you do not consent to WCC holding and processing your information, you will be unable to apply for the funded grant or business assist. The terms and conditions of the funding require that documents and electronic information relating to the delivery of the Programme must be retained until 31 March 2035. The Local Authority as Accountable Body for the Programme is required to comply with current UK law and contractual conditions for funding.

The information you provide will be used to process your grant or business assist application through the WCC's Business Support Customer Relationship Management system. The partners that the Business Support CRM database is shared with are:

• Worcestershire Business Central
• Worcester City Council
• Malvern Hills District Council
• Wychavon District Council
• Redditch Borough Council
• Bromsgrove District Council
• Wyre Forest District Council
• Worcestershire Local Enterprise Partnership
• Shropshire Council
• Telford & Wrekin Council
• Herefordshire Council
• The Marches Local Enterprise Partnership

WCC are required to monitor the performance of the business support programmes. Where relevant, this will require WCC to share the personal information you have given to us, or that we’ve collected about you, with funding partner organisations. These include but are not limited to:

• Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities
• The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
• The Programme Funding Bodies
• Worcestershire District Councils
• Shropshire Council
• Telford & Wrekin Council
• Herefordshire Council 
• The Marches Local Enterprise Partnership

Our consultants and contractors are required to collect information about you and your business on our behalf when you voluntarily complete business support applications and feedback forms.

Information will only ever be shared when it is strictly necessary to help us provide effective services and you may have the right to refuse. We will not pass it onto any other parties unless required to do so by law or in all reasonable circumstances the disclosure is fair and warranted for the purposes of processing or subject to a data protection exemption.

We have specific data sharing agreements in place with local agencies and sometimes the law requires that we may have to pass your details on to a third party, for example, to prevent crime.

The standard record retention for funded projects is until 31 March 2035.

More information about our retention periods can be found in our summary Disposal Schedule (Excel file).

Please note stated retention periods may be subject to any legal holds imposed under the Inquiries Act 2005 that may concern the information and override standard retention periods.

You are entitled to a copy, or a description, of the personal data we hold that relates to you, subject to lawful restrictions. Please go to our Make a Data Protection Request webpage to find out how to make a request.

You may be entitled to rectification, restriction, objection, and erasure of your personal information depending on the service and legal basis. Please in the first instance contact dataprotection@worcestershire.gov.uk to exercise these Information Rights or call the main Worcestershire County Council contact telephone number of 01905 765765.

Please see our overarching Privacy Notice for further contact details and if you have a complaint about your information rights.

We keep this Privacy Notice under regular review and we will place any updates on this web page. This Notice was last updated on 28 July 2023.