Privacy Policy

This website contains links to other websites, including social media. City, University of London Students’ Union is not responsible for the privacy practices and/or the content of such websites. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question.

A ‘cookie’ is a small piece of information that is placed on your computer when you visit certain websites. When we refer to “cookies” we include other technologies with similar purposes.

We use the following types of cookies:

1. Analytics cookies that anonymously remember your computer or mobile device when you visit our website. They keep track of browsing patterns and help us to build up a profile of how our members use the website. We might use that information to improve the user experience of those visiting citystudents.co.uk.
2. Service Cookies that help us make our website work as efficiently as possible; remember your registration and login details; remember your settings preferences; and monitor the number of pages you view and for how long they are viewed for – with the purpose improving your access to information you are trying to find and improving your visitor experience to citystudents.co.uk.
3. Third party advertising and analytics cookies, which are placed by or on behalf of independent advertisers who are advertising on our site. These cookies may be placed within the advertisement and elsewhere on our site. They are anonymous – they cannot identify individuals. They are used for statistical analysis by allowing the advertiser to count how many people have seen their advertisement or have seen it more than once. They might also allow the advertiser to tailor advertising to you when you visit other websites.

We have no access to third party cookies and third-party organisations have no access to ours. The third-party organisations that place cookies have their own strict privacy policies.

Please see our cookies page for more information about our cookie use and how you can restrict or block cookies.

We hold data for our legitimate interests to fulfil our service with you as a student at City, University of London.

We have a Data Sharing Agreement in place with City, University of London which allows us to use your data to administer your membership of City Students’ Union.

We are provided this data when you enrol at City, University of London and you become a member of City, Students’ Union, unless you decide to ‘opt-out’ during the enrolment process. When you update any of your data with your institution (for example your home address) we receive the update in an overnight data feed.

You may give us your information in order to sign up to a student group, for one of our events, undertake research activities, use our advice service, purchase our products or communicate with us. When you give us this information we take responsibility for looking after it and we will cross reference this data against our register of members.

You would also give us your information when accessing the Union Advice service. Under the General Data Protection Regulations 2018 Article 6(1)(f), Union Advice record ("process") the following information relevant to your case/enquiry in order to create a case file:

• Name
• Student number
• Contact details
• Academic details (eg. course, year of study etc.)
• Information and correspondence regarding your issue (your case file) including special category data provided by you in your request for advice (i.e, medical information, criminal convictions etc).

This is because we have a legitimate interest to do so in order to provide you with a service.

The Union Advice service also processes special category data with your consent as per Article 7 of the General Data Protection Regulations 2018. This means we only process this data with your explicit consent in line with our Data Protection Policy.

We gain your consent by asking you to provide the following categories of data voluntarily. You do not have to provide it in order for us to provide a service to you.

The categories are:

• Date of birth (age)
• Gender
• Nationality
• Health and disability
• Sexuality
• Ethnicity

In the course of the provision of advice you may let us know information or send correspondence regarding your issue (your case file) including special category data provided by you in your request for advice (i.e, medical information, criminal convictions etc).

We use your data to communicate with you via email and the City Students’ Union website. This includes direct mailing for marketing purposes, invitations to events, news and updates from City Students’ Union, information about how you can get involved with the activities we offer. If you would like to update your mailing preferences you can do so by emailing studentsunion@city.ac.uk or you can log into your online account and visit your profile. We aim to keep email communications to a minimum and that we ensure that you are receiving communications that are important or of interest to you.

The Union Advice service uses your data to create a case file. This case file will be confidential and enables us to assist you with your case or enquiry and to ensure that we are providing the best advice, information and support based on an accurate understanding of your circumstances. It also enables us to provide you with follow up advice should you need to contact the service again.

Further, the processing of this data ensures we are able to monitor the quality of advice provided to you and ensure that we are complying with our service policies and this includes the auditing of case files.

In some circumstances Union Advice may need to retain data for the establishment, exercise, or defence of legal claims against City, University of London Students' Union.

The Union Advice service uses special category data anonymously for statistical purposes to help us identify trends and to assess and improve the performance of our service.

Union Advice naturally receive data (information, correspondence) about your issues in the course of the provision of advice.

Your membership data is held in a secure database operated by a third-party membership service, MSL Ltd with controls in place to limit who has access to it.

If you open a case file with the Union Advice service this is held in databases operated by a third-party service called AdvicePro. Only Union Advice members of staff have access to this, save for auditing purposes from time to time. AdvicePro stores its data with BrightSolid Online Innovation Ltd., a data centre in Scotland, UK and is compliant with the Information Security Code of Practice ISO27001. Data is transferred over an encrypted connection with an SSL Certificate using a SHA-2 (SHA384) hash function and RSA encryption.

Information stored in AdvicePro is not in any way linked to your student profile.

Union Advice will ensure that that any information you share will remain confidential and will not be shared with any 3^rd parties (including the University) without your consent unless we are required to do so by law. You can read our Confidentiality Policy here.

Your information including any correspondence will be confidentially stored within our Union Advice service and on our secure case management system AdvicePro, as well as secure email facilities.

Your case file will be erased automatically from our case management system AdvicePro after remaining inactive for seven years, and will become irretrievable by Union Advice.

You can update your data at any time by updating your preferences or emailing us at studentsunion@city.ac.uk or writing to us at City Students' Union, Northampton Square, London, EC1V 0HB or calling us on 020 040 5600.

To opt out of membership of City Students’ Union at any time, you need to visit your student account on the University’s systems (www.city.ac.uk/student-administration).

If you are a user of the Union Advice service you have the right to request the erasure of your data which will not be withheld save for our right under Article 17(3)(e) where the service has a need to retain the data for the establishment, exercise, or defence of legal claims against City, University of London Students' Union.

As a Union Advice user you also have the right to object (General Data Protection Regulations 2018, Article 21) to us continuing to process your data. We will cease processing your data upon your objection, save for our right under Article 17(3)(e) where the service has a need to retain the data for the establishment, exercise, or defence of legal claims against City, University of London Students' Union.
With regard to any case file with Union Advice you can ask us to remove your data or object to the processing of data at any time by contacting us by email at unionadvice@city.ac.uk.

To view the Privacy Notice of City, University of London visit: www.city.ac.uk/about/city-information/legal/data-protection