Job Applicant Privacy Notice

 

This Job Applicant Privacy Notice sets out what personal data we, EEF, hold about you and how we collect and use it during and after the recruitment process. It applies to anyone who is applying to work for us; whether as an employee, worker, contractor, consultant, intern, volunteer, partner or director, together, referred to as ‘Job Applicant’ or ‘you’. 

Please note that we will not necessarily hold, use or share all of the types of personal data described in this Privacy Notice in relation to you. The specific types of data about you that we will hold, use and share will depend on the role for which you are applying, the nature of the recruitment process, how far you progress in the recruitment process and your individual circumstances.

 

Please note that in acknowledging an application we are not verifying the content, accepting the application or making any offer of employment or engagement. We are not obliged to accept any applications.

We are required by data protection law to give you the information in this Privacy Notice. It is important that you read the Privacy Notice carefully, together with any other similar or additional information that we might give you from time to time about how we collect and use your personal data.  Should your application be successful, when you start work for us, we will provide you with another privacy notice that explains how we deal with your personal data whilst you are working for us.

This Privacy Notice applies from 25 May 2018, when the General Data Protection Regulation comes into force. It does not give you any contractual rights. We may update this Privacy Notice at any time.

 

Who is the controller? EEF is the “controller” for the purposes of data protection law. This means that we are responsible for deciding how we hold and use personal data about you. 

 

What is personal data? Personal data means any information relating to a living individual who can be identified (directly or indirectly) in particular by reference to an identifier (e.g. name, NI number, employee number, email address, physical features). It can be factual (e.g. contact details or date of birth), an opinion about an individual’s actions or behaviour, or information that may otherwise impact that individual in a personal or business capacity.

Data protection law divides personal data into two categories: ordinary personal data and special category data. Any personal data that reveals racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, physical or mental health conditions, sexual life or sexual orientation, or biometric or genetic data that is used to identify an individual is known as special category data. (The rest is ordinary personal data).

 

 

What type of ordinary personal data do we hold about you and why? At the initial stages of recruitment, we collect, hold and use the following types of ordinary personal data about you:

·          Information contained in your application form/CV/covering letter, including your name, title, contact details, employment history, experience, skills, qualifications/training (including educational, vocational, driving licences where appropriate), referees’ names and contact details, etc.

·          Publicly available information about you, such as your business social media presence

·          Selection information, including correspondence, interview and notes, internal notes, the results of any written or online tests and assessments

We hold and use this personal data so that we can:

·          process your application and correspond with you about it;

·          assess whether you have the required skills, experience, qualifications and training for a role within the company;

·          make informed recruitment decisions;

·          keep appropriate records of our recruitment process and decisions;

 

What are our legal grounds for using your ordinary personal data? Data protection law specifies the legal grounds on which we can hold and use personal data.

We rely on one or more of the following legal grounds when we process your ordinary personal data:

·          We need it to take steps at your request in order to possibly enter into a contract with you, because by applying for a job with us you are effectively asking us to possibly enter into a contract with you at a later date [whether this is an employment contract, a contract for services or another type of contract].

·          We need it to comply with a legal obligation, e.g. the obligation not to discriminate during our recruitment process.

·          It is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests. For example, it is in our legitimate interests to review and consider your personal data (as listed above) so that we can select the most appropriate candidate for the job.

 

What type of special category personal data do we hold about you, why, and on what legal grounds? We will only collect, hold and use limited types of special category data about you during the recruitment process, as described below.

Since special category data is usually more sensitive than ordinary personal data, we need to have an additional legal ground (as well as the legal grounds set out in the section on ordinary personal data, above) to collect, hold and use it. The additional legal grounds that we rely on to collect, hold and use your special category data are explained below for each type of special category data.

At the initial stages of recruitment, we collect, hold and use the following special category data about you:

 

Equal opportunities monitoring Equal opportunities monitoring data which could include information about your race or ethnicity, religious beliefs, sexual orientation or health. We use this information to monitor equality of opportunity and diversity in our recruitment process. Our additional legal ground for using this information is that it is necessary in the public interest for the purposes of equal opportunities monitoring and is in line with our Data Protection Policy.

We are an equal opportunity employer (in accordance with applicable legislation) and do not discriminate on the grounds of gender, ethnic origin, age, religion, sexual orientation, non-disqualifying physical or mental disability or any other basis covered by local legislation. All employment related decisions are made entirely on merit.

 

Adjustments for disability/medical conditions Information relevant to any request by you for adjustments to the recruitment process as a result of an underlying medical condition or disability. We use this information to enable us to carry out a fair, non-discriminatory recruitment process by considering/making reasonable adjustments to our process as appropriate. Our additional legal ground for using this information is that we need it to comply with a legal obligation/exercise a legal right in relation to employment – namely, the obligations not to discriminate, and to make reasonable adjustments to accommodate a disability – and such use is in line with our Data Protection Policy.

 

How do we collect your personal data?  You provide us with most of the personal data about you that we hold and use, for example in your written/ online application, by completing any assessments and during any interviews. 

The provision of the services of WebSAF (WebSAF functionality allows candidates to upload commonly asked personal details into an online application form. This information is only uploaded to EEF’s online form at the candidate's request. The candidate then has the opportunity to edit any of this information and then decide to submit it). We may monitor your use of this website and record your email address for our internal purposes. This may be done via "cookies". For more information about "cookies", please see the Information Commissioner's website at http://www.dataprotection.gov.uk/privacy.htm#cookies. If you do not agree you can choose not to receive a cookie file by enabling your Web browser to refuse cookies or to prompt you before you accept a cookie.

Some of the personal data we hold and use about you is generated from internal sources during the recruitment process. For example, the person interviewing you may score your suitability for the role and we record the reasons for decisions made about whether or not your application is successful.

Some of the personal data about you that we hold and use may come from external sources. For example, a recruitment agency provides us with a shortlist of candidates. For some roles, we may also obtain information about you from publicly available sources, such as your LinkedIn profile or other media sources. 

 

How we will use your personal data

We may use your application data and contact details solely for the purposes of recruitment or marketing or provision of WebSAF services, respectively, as more fully described above. We may use information obtained about you from monitoring your use of this website solely for internal purposes including site performance, evaluation site use and creating of marketing reports to aid future marketing of information about us and our products. Personal data collected by monitoring will be aggregate, no personal data will be used other than for the purpose for which it was originally obtained.

Your information may be controlled and processed by any of our offices. You acknowledge and agree that the location of our offices may change from time to time and that we may acquire other offices in any number of other countries or territories at any time, any one or more of which may act as a controller of and/or process your information. We will not disclose your data to any other third party unless for recruitment purposes or required to do so by law or regulators.

You acknowledge and agree that we may from time to time transfer any of your contact details and/or application data overseas to any of our offices or of any of our affiliates, agents or appointed representatives. Some of our offices and those of our affiliates, agents or representatives are located in countries outside the European Economic Area which do not have well developed data protection legislation when compared to European law.

Note: Wilson HCG, our third party recruiter may store your records. Wilson HCG, as a supplier is required to enter into a Privacy Agreement with EEF Ltd on no less stringent terms than found in this privacy statement and to process your data solely in accordance those terms.

 

Recruitment agencies We engage recruitment agencies to provide us with the details of suitable candidates for our available vacancies, to communicate with those candidates, and to handle administration in connection with the recruitment process. If we have received your initial application details from a recruitment agency, we will share with them any of your personal data that is necessary to enable them to fulfil their functions for us. Our legal grounds for doing so are that: it is necessary for entry into a contract; and it is in our legitimate interest to engage service providers to assist us with the recruitment process.

 

Medical/occupational health professionals We may share information relevant to any request by you for adjustments to the recruitment process as a result of an underlying medical condition or disability with medical/occupational health professionals to enable us to identify what, if any, adjustments are needed in the recruitment process. This information may also be used by the medical/occupational health professionals to carry out assessments required by health and safety legislation. Our legal grounds for sharing this personal data are that: it is necessary for entry into a contract; it is in our legitimate interests to consider adjustments to enable Job Applicants to participate fully in the recruitment process, and it is necessary to comply with our legal obligations/exercise legal rights in the field of employment, (obligations not to discriminate, to make reasonable adjustments, to comply with health and safety requirements).

 

Legal/professional advisers We share any of your personal data that is relevant, where appropriate, with our legal and other professional advisers, in order to obtain legal or other professional advice about matters related to you or in the course of dealing with legal disputes with you or other Job Applicants. Our legal grounds for sharing this personal data are that: it is in our legitimate interests to seek advice to clarify our rights/obligations and appropriately defend ourselves from potential claims; it is necessary to comply with our legal obligations/exercise legal rights in the field of employment; and it is necessary to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.

 

Consequences of not providing personal data We only ask you to provide personal data that we need to enable us to make a decision about whether or not to offer you a role. If you do not provide particular information to us, then we will have to make a decision on whether or not to offer you a role without that information, which in some cases could result in us deciding not to recruit you. [For example, if we ask you to provide an example of previous written work/ a certificate verifying a qualification and you do not, we will have to decide whether to recruit you without that information.]  If you choose not to provide us with personal data requested, we will tell you about the implications of any such decision at the relevant time.

 

How long will we keep your personal data? We will keep your personal data throughout the recruitment process.

If your application is successful, when you start work for us you will be issued with an Employee Privacy Notice which will include information about what personal data we keep from the recruitment process and how long we keep your personal data whilst you are working for us and after you have left.

If your application is unsuccessful, we will keep your personal data for up to 6 months from the date we notify you of our decision. There may, however, be circumstances in which it is appropriate for us to keep particular items of your personal data for longer. We will base these decisions on relevant circumstances, taking into account the following criteria:

·          the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal data

·          the risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure

·          the purposes for which we process your personal data and how long we need the particular data to achieve these purposes

·          how long the personal data is likely to remain accurate and up to date

·          for how long the personal data might be relevant to possible future legal claims

·          any applicable legal, accounting, reporting or regulatory requirements that specify how long certain records must be kept    

In all cases, we will not keep your personal data for longer than we need it for our legitimate purposes.

 

Your rights you have a number of legal rights relating to your personal data, which are outlined here:

 

 The right to make a subject access request. This enables you to receive certain information about how we use your data, as well as to receive a copy of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.

 

       The right to request that we correct incomplete or inaccurate personal data that we hold about you.

       The right to request that we delete or remove personal data that we hold about you where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have exercised your right to object to processing (see below).

       The right to object to our processing your personal data where we are relying on our legitimate interest (or those of a third party), where we cannot show a compelling reason to continue the processing

       The right to request that we restrict our processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal data about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.

       The right to withdraw your consent to us using your personal data. As described above, we do not normally rely on your consent as the legal ground for using your personal data. However, if we are relying on your consent as the legal ground for using any of your personal data and you withdraw your consent, you also have the right to request that we delete or remove that data, if we do not have another good reason to continue using it.

       The right to request that we transfer your personal data to another party, in respect of data that you have provided where our legal ground for using the data is that it is necessary for the performance of a contract or that you have consented to us using it (this is known as the right to “data portability”).

 

If you would like to exercise any of the above rights, please contact eef.gdpr@eef.org.uk . Note that these rights are not absolute and in some circumstances we may be entitled to refuse some or all of your request.

 

Note too that you have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues. Details of how to contact the ICO can be found on their website: https://ico.org.uk