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Privacy Policy

PRIVACY POLICY


The Society of Garden Designers is committed to protecting personal data.  This privacy statement describes why and how we collect and use personal data and provides information about your rights.  This privacy statement applies to personal data provided to us, both by you and by third parties. 

When collecting and using personal data, our policy is to be transparent about why and how we process personal data.

WHO WE ARE

The Society of Garden Designers, Katepwa House, Ashfield Park Avenue, Ross-on-Wye, HR9 5AX is a not for profit organisation and a limited company registered in England and Wales (05283373).  The SGD is the ‘data controller’ of the personal data we collect about you and is subject to the Data Protection Act 2018, and the UK General Data Protection Regulation (the UK GDPR).  The SGD is registered with the UK Information Commissioner’s Office, with registration number Z9353632.

OUR PROCESSING ACTIVITIES

To find out more about our specific processing activities, please go to the relevant sections of this statement.  Please note that more than one of the sections listed below may apply to each individual.  We therefore would encourage you to read all relevant sections.

Members and Friends:

  • Membership Administration and Relationship Management
  • Awards
  • Accreditation
  • Mentoring
  • Cluster Groups

Members and Non- Members

  • Attendees at our events

Non-Members:

  • Trade Sponsors, Exhibitors and Advertisers (‘Trade Suppliers’)
  • Speakers at SGD events
  • College Contacts
  • Non-members entering our Awards
  • Business Suppliers
  • Others who get in touch with us
  • Visitors to our Website

UPDATING AND AMENDING YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

We will always try to keep your data as up to date as possible.  If at any time you want to update or amend your personal data or marketing preferences, you can do so by contacting the SGD office at info@sgd.org.uk, or by calling 01989 551 083, or by writing to us at  Katepwa House, Ashfield Park Avenue, Ross-on-Wye, HR9 5AX  

WHY DO WE USE YOUR INFORMATION?

We have set out in each of the processing sections common uses of your information.  We will only use your personal information when the law allows us to do so.  Although in limited circumstances we may use your information because you have specifically consented to it, we generally use your information in the ways set out in this notice because:

  • We need to perform a contract we have entered into with you.
  • We need to comply with a legal obligation.
  • It is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and rights do not override those interests.
  • We need to protect your interests (or someone else’s interests) or where it is needed in the public interest (although these circumstances are likely to be rare).

We will only use your personal information for the purposes for which we collected it as set out in this privacy statement, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose.  If we need to use your personal information for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis that allows us to do so.

HOW LONG WILL WE KEEP YOUR INFORMATION?

We have set out in each of the processing sections, details of how long we generally keep your information.  In some circumstances, it may be necessary to keep your information for longer than that in order to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements.

To determine the appropriate retention period for personal information, we consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal information, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal information, the purposes for which we process your personal information and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal requirements.

Where we consider there to be a risk that we may need to defend or bring legal claims, we may retain your personal information as necessary for our legitimate interests in ensuring that we can properly bring or defend legal claims.  We may also need to share this information with our insurers or legal advisers.  How long we keep this information for will depend on the nature of the claim and on how long we consider there to be a risk that we will need to defend or bring a claim.

In some circumstances we may anonymise your personal information so that it can no longer be associated with you, in which case we may use such information without further notice to you.

YOUR RIGHTS

Data protection law gives you a number of rights when it comes to personal information we hold about you.  The key rights are set out below.  More information about your rights can be obtained from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) https://ico.org.uk/.  

Under certain circumstances, by law you have the right to:

  • Be informed in a clear, transparent and easily understandable way about how we use your personal information and about your rights.  This is why we are providing you with the information in this notice.  If you require any further information about how we use your personal information, please let us know. 
  • Request access to your personal information (commonly known as a “data subject access request”).  This enables you to receive a copy of the personal information we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.
  • Request correction of the personal information we hold about you.  This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate information we hold about you corrected.
  • Request erasure of your personal information.  This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal information unless there is good reason for us continuing to process it (for instance, we may need to continue using your personal data to comply with our legal obligations).  You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal information where you have exercised your right to object to processing (see below).
  • Object to processing of your personal information where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to us using your information on this basis and we do not have a compelling legitimate basis for doing so which overrides your rights, interests and freedoms (for instance, we may need it to defend a legal claim).  You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal information for direct marketing purposes.
  • Request the restriction of processing of your personal information.  This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal information about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.
  • Request the transfer of your personal information to another party where you provided it to us and where we are using it based on your consent, or to carry out a contract with you, and we process it using automated means.
  • Withdraw consent. In the limited circumstances where we are relying on your consent (as opposed to the other bases set out above) to the collection, processing and transfer of your personal information for a specific purpose, you have the right to withdraw your consent for that specific processing at any time.  Once we have received notification that you have withdrawn your consent, we will no longer process your information for the purpose or purposes you originally agreed to, unless we have another legitimate interest in doing so.
  • Lodge a complaint.  If you think that we are using your information in a way that breaches data protection law, you have the right to lodge a complaint with your national data protection supervisory authority (if you are in the UK, this will be the ICO).

If you want to review, verify, correct or request erasure of your personal information, object to the processing of your personal information, withdraw your consent to the processing of your personal information or request that we transfer a copy of your personal information to another party, please contact us.  Our contact details are set out below.

No fee is usually required. You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal information (or to exercise any of the other rights).  However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request for access is clearly unfounded or excessive.  Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with the request in such circumstances.

What we may need from you. We may need to request specific information from you to help us understand the nature of your request, to confirm your identity and ensure your right to access the information (or to exercise any of your other rights).  This is another appropriate security measure to ensure that personal information is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it.

Timescale. Please consider your request responsibly before submitting it.  We will respond to your request as soon as we can.  Generally, this will be within one month from when we receive your request but, if the request is going to take longer to deal with, we will let you know.

WHERE WE STORE YOUR INFORMATION

We will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that your personal information is treated securely and in accordance with this privacy statement.

Our office headquarters are based in Ross-on-Wye and our main data centre is located in the UK. However, where required to perform our contract with you or for our wider business purposes, the information that we hold about you may be transferred to, and stored at, a destination outside the UK and the EEA.  It may also be processed by staff operating outside the UK and EEA who work for us or for one of our service providers.  

Where we transfer data to countries or organisations outside the UK and the EEA, we carry out a risk assessment as to whether protections provided are essentially equivalent to the protections in the UK data protection regime and, if neccesary, put in place additional measures. To obtain more details of these safeguards, please contact us.

SHARING YOUR INFORMATION

As part of the administration of our relationship with you, and to you provide you with the associated benefits and services, personal data collected about you may be shared with the following groups:

  • SGD employees, volunteers and others under our direct authority, all of whom will be required to use your personal data only in accordance with our instructions. 
  • Our contractors, who are also required to use your data only in accordance with our instructions and, as relevant, with other appropriate contractual protections and to keep that data secure:  These include our secretariat services contractor and our website and database provider. 

Additionally, if you:

  • enter our Awards we will share your entry details with our Awards administrator, Awards Judges and our PR and media partners.   The names of all Awards finalists and their shortlisted projects are placed on the website, together with Judges’ comments on the winning entries.
  • are a member of a Mentoring Group, or Cluster group we will only share your contact details with other members of the Mentoring /Cluster Group if you have given us your consent to do so.  Group contact information on Cluster Groups will not be shared outside the SGD.
  • sponsor our Awards we will share your details with our Awards administrator for the delivery of sponsorship benefits and our PR and media representatives for Awards publicity. 
  • are a Conference sponsor, exhibitor or speaker, we may share your details with our PR and media representatives for Conference publicity.   

We may need to share your personal information with other third-party service providers (including contractors and designated agents) so that they can deliver services to you on our behalf.  For example, if you subscribe to the Garden Design Journal, your name and address will be shared with the magazine’s distribution house, or, if you are attending a catered for event your dietary needs and name may be shared with the venue provider for catering purposes.

We may also share your personal information with other third parties if we are under a duty to disclose or share your personal information in order to comply with any legal obligation, or in order to enforce or apply our agreements with you, or to protect the rights, property, or safety of us, our customers, or others or where we have another legitimate interest in doing so.  This may include exchanging information with other companies and organisations for the purposes of fraud protection and credit risk reduction.

All our third-party service providers are required to take appropriate security measures to protect your personal information.  Where third parties process your personal information on our behalf as “data processors” they must do so only on our instructions and where they have agreed to treat the information confidentially and to keep it secure.

We may also share your personal information with other third parties, for example in the context of the possible sale or restructuring of the business where necessary in connection with the purposes for which your information was collected.

DATA SECURITY

We have put in place appropriate internal security measures to prevent your personal information from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed.  In addition, we limit access to your personal information to those employees, SGD volunteers, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know.  They will only process your personal information on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.  We have also put in place procedures to deal with any suspected data security breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected breach where necessary.

CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY STATEMENT

Any changes we make to our privacy statement will be posted on the privacy statement page of our website and, where appropriate, notified to you by e-mail or otherwise.  Please check back to see any updates or changes to our privacy statement. This privacy statement was last updated on 3 December 2021. 

CONTACTING US

If you have any queries about this Privacy Statement or how we process your personal information or if you wish to exercise any of your rights under applicable law, please contact the SGD Office:

  • by email: info @sgd.org.uk
  • by phone: 01989 551 083
  • or by post: Society of Garden Designers  Katepwa House, Ashfield Park Avenue, Ross-on-Wye, HR9 5AX. 

OUR SPECIFIC PROCESSING ACTIVITIES

Our policy is to collect only the personal data necessary for agreed purposes and we only ask for personal data where it is needed for those purposes.

We do not sell your personal data.

Personal data will be retained by the Society for as long as it is necessary for the purposes set out below.

MEMBERS AND FRIENDS

Membership Administration and Relationship Management

How we collect your information

We collect your personal data in various ways:

  • Directly from you when you make an initial application for membership or on renewal or when you change your membership category, for example on progression from Student to Pre-registered member or from Pre-registered Member to Registered Member. 
  • When you take part in SGD organised events or activities, such as Conferences and CPD Events or attend an Awards dinner. 

If you enter the Awards, or take part in Accreditation, Mentoring, or Cluster Groups we will collect additional information relevant to your participation in these activities.  Please see the relevant sections of this Privacy Statement for these areas of processing for details of the personal data we collect in these circumstances and how long we keep it. 

The types of information we collect

We collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact details (name, postal addresses, telephone numbers and email address);
  • Login details;
  • Whether you are receiving the Garden Design Journal;
  • Information to confirm your eligibility to your membership category (for example: college information for those applying for Student membership, evidence of qualification for those applying for Pre-registered Membership as a graduate; evidence of successful completion of Accreditation for those applying for Registered Membership and for Registered Practice membership, details of Practice Personnel);
  • Membership History;
  • Event records.  When you take part in Conferences or CPD Events or attend an Awards dinner.  Where appropriate, we may also collect other information about your attendance, this may include dietary needs and any feedback you have provided on the event; 
  • Your CPD (Continuing Professional Development) Log;
  • Information about your engagement with the Society for example your purchases or if you make an enquiry about membership benefits or services; and
  • Your communication and contact preferences, including cluster groups;
  • Financial information - We do not store your bank details (for your membership direct debit), or credit card details for payments of bookings made via the website as we use third party payment providers.   For transactions which are not processed via our website, we will collect payment card details, but we shred or delete the card information once the payment has been processed.

How we use personal information

Your personal data collected and processed by us is used for the following purposes:

  • Administration of our membership records and our relationship with you, in line with our legitimate interests which include to:
  1. support and promote the status and interests of the Society and of our membership;
  2. encourage and promote the professional skills of the members;
  3. communicate to membership information as may be deemed useful;
  4. encourage and facilitate networking between members and friends of the Society.
  • Fulfilling contracts you enter into with us for the supply of goods or services, for example attending a Conference or a CPD Event. 
  • Where we have your consent to do so, sending you marketing communications by email, about membership benefits, events and activities organised by the Society or by others which we think may be of interest to you, including tailoring our messages to you to ensure our marketing messages are relevant to your membership category.

Communicating with you

You have the opportunity unsubscribe from email marketing communications every time we contact you.  We will always act upon your wishes about the marketing communications you want to receive from us.  If you exercise your right to unsubscribe, you can choose to re-join our email communications list at any time by contacting the SGD office at info@sgd.org.uk, or by calling 01989 551 083. 

There are, however, some communications that we need to send to you regardless of your marketing preferences.  These administrative communications are necessary as part of our legitimate interests as a membership body, or to fulfil our contract obligations to you.  Examples of these types of communication include sending you: 

  • membership mailings such as your renewal notification;
  • the Garden Design Journal where this forms part of your membership benefits;
  • transaction notifications and payment receipts;
  • AGM notices to our members.

Where you have elected not to receive email communications, we may send you administrative communications by post.

How long we keep your information

In the absence of other specific legal, regulatory, or contractual requirements, we retain your membership records and other documentary information created during your membership for a period of up to 7 years after your membership ends, or your last interaction with us, if later, for accounting, tax, and record keeping purposes.   

After this time, except as noted below, data on your membership record is deleted or, if the data is required for statistical purposes, we will anonymise your personal information so that it can no longer be associated with you. 

We continue to hold Members’ names, addresses and membership type for a period of ten years after membership ends to comply with Companies Act requirements relating to the Register of Members.  

Awards

How we collect your information

We collect your personal data in various ways:

  • Directly from you when you complete the application to enter an Award and from your subsequent submission. 
  • As part of the Judging process for Awards, if you are shortlisted, Judges’ comments about your entry will be recorded.

The types of information we collect

We collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact details (name, postal addresses, telephone numbers and email address);
  • Social media and website details
  • If you attend the Awards Dinner, we will also collect the names of any guests, your postal address for sending out your ticket(s) and any dietary needs. 

We also collect details you provide in support of your entry of the garden owner, and contributing contractor and photographer.  As part of your application form you are required to confirm to us you have consent for this information to be submitted to us as part of your application.  The garden owner’s name and email and phone details are deleted after each Awards Event. 

We do not store credit card details where payments are made via the website, as we use third party payment providers.  For transactions which are not processed via our website, we will collect payment card details, but we shred or delete the card information once the payment has been processed.

How we use personal information

Your personal data collected and processed by us is used for the following purposes:

  • Administration of your entry and our relationship with you, in line with our legitimate interests which include to:
  1. support and promote the status and interests of the Society and of our members; and
  2. encourage and promote the professional skills of the members.
  • Confirming your eligibility to enter the Awards category you have submitted an entry for;
  • Fulfilling contracts you have entered into with us, including, if applicable, your attendance at the Awards Dinner.

Communicating with you

We communicate with you by email to acknowledge your entry / dinner booking  and to keep you informed about the progress of your entry /dinner booking. 

How long we keep your information

With the exception of the garden owner’s name and contact email and phone details, we retain all Awards application form details, indefinitely for the purpose of confirming compliance with Awards entry rules.  For winners and finalists we also retain the outcome, including Judges’ comments.

We retain details of Awards Dinner bookings indefinitely for relationship management purposes. 

Accreditation

How we collect your information

We collect your personal data in various ways:

  • Directly from you when you make an initial application for accreditation and on subsequent submissions, where you are applying for staged submissions, or following a referral.  
  • As part of the accreditation process, from the accreditors’ reports. 

The types of information we collect

We collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact details (name, membership reference number postal addresses, telephone numbers and email address);
  • Details of the projects you are submitting;
  • If you are a practicing Landscape Architect, your Chartered Member Number;
  • Confirmation you hold Professional Indemnity Insurance;
  • The accreditors feedback reports;
  • Accreditation outcomes.
  • Financial information for payment of fees.  We do not store your payment card details as we use third party payment processor.

How we use personal information

The personal data we collect and process about you for accreditation is used for administration of your accreditation application and our relationship with you, in line with our legitimate interests which include to:

  1. support and promote the status and interests of the Society and of our membership;

  2. encourage and promote the professional skills of the members.

Communicating with you

We communicate with you by email to acknowledge your application, send you administration information about the accreditation process, to keep you informed about the progress of your application and notify you of the accreditation outcome. 

How long we keep your information

The work you submit in hard copy for accreditation will be returned to you if you have requested this or destroyed 60 days after the accreditation has taken place.  If a project has a referral element, your submission records will be retained until the referral is submitted or until the 6 month time limit for re-submission expires.

After your accreditation, your electronic submission will be retained for a period of up to 50 years to allow for consistency of standards to be monitored overtime.  Access to such records will be restricted to the Chair of accreditation and our Secretariat services contractor. 

The outcome of accreditation will be held on your membership record and retained in line with the detail set out under our processing activities for Membership Administration and Relationship Management.

Mentoring

How we collect your information

We collect information about your involvement in Mentoring when you respond to our email seeking expressions of interest in joining a Mentoring Group and during your engagement with the group. 

The types of information we collect

We may collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact and communication information including your name, membership details and email address.
  • Your preference about the mentor you wished to be matched with
  • Records of communications between your Mentor and the group about organising the mentoring sessions. 

Discussions between members of the group are confidential to the group and are not stored. 

How we use personal information

In line with our legitimate interests, your personal data may be used within the Mentoring Group for the following purposes:

  1. To encourage and promote the professional skills of the members;
  2. To support and promote the status and interests of the Society and of our membership.

Communicating with you

We will communicate with you via email to tell you about arrangements for mentoring sessions.

How long we keep your information

We will only hold your personal contact details at Mentoring Group level for as long as you are a member of the Mentoring Group. 

The administrative records about your participation in the group and communications between you and you mentor about organising the sessions may be retained for up to a year after the Group disbands. 

Cluster Groups

How we collect your information

We collect your personal data about your Cluster Group membership when you join a Cluster Group. 

The types of information we collect

We may collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact and communication information including your name, membership details and email address.
  • Records of communications and interactions you have with the Cluster Group

How we use personal information.

In line with our legitimate interests, your personal data may be used within the Cluster Group for the following purposes:

  1. To encourage and facilitate networking between members and friends of the Society and
  2. To encourage and promote the professional skills of the members;
  3. To support and promote the status and interests of the Society and of our membership.

Communicating with you

We will communicate with you via email, and/or via a closed Facebook and/or WhatsApp group if you have agreed to join such a group. 

How long we keep your information

We will only hold your personal contact details at Cluster Group level for as long as you are a member of the Cluster Group. 

The administrative records about your participation in the group and communications between you and the Cluster Group may be retained for up to a year after you leave the Group. 

MEMBERS AND NON MEMBERS

Attendees at our events

How we collect your information

We collect your personal information relating to your attendance at an SGD event either:

  • via the Events or Awards pages of the SGD website; or 
  • when you contact our Secretariat services team to book a Conference or CPD Event or our Awards Administration team to book a ticket for the Awards Dinner or attend the Symposium. 

The types of information we collect

We will collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact and communication information including your name and business name and job title and your personal or business contact details (postal address, email address and telephone number).
  • Information about your engagement with the Society including transaction records and any communications with the Society. 
  • If you attend the Awards Dinner, we will also collect the names of any guests and your postal address for sending out your tickets and any dietary needs.
  • Financial information - We do not store credit card details where payments are made via the website, as we use third party payment providers.  For transactions which are not processed via our website, we will collect payment card details, but we shred or delete the card information once the payment has been processed

How we use personal information

We use the information we collect and process about you in order to manage our relationship and our contract with you.

Communicating with you

We will communicate with you via email for administrative purposes.  We will not send you marketing emails unless you have given us your consent to do so. 

How long we keep your information

In the absence of other specific legal, regulatory or contractual requirements, we will retain your our records and other documentary information created during our relationship with you for a period of up to 7 years after your last interaction with us, for accounting, tax and the Society’s record keeping purposes. 

Filming and Recording of SGD Symposiums, Conferences, and CPD events

We may live stream and record presentations for our members and customers. 

We will store recordings for as long as we see fit, and as part of the streaming and availability of presentations, recordings may be available to viewers outside of the UK. Recordings are kept, used and made available as necessary for our legitimate interests in providing content and for promotional purposes.

Awards, Conferences and Symposium: As an incidental part of our live stream, or as part of our roving coverage, delegates may be recorded or interviewed on a voluntary basis. If delegates do not want to be in any recording, they can ask one of our staff who can give them more information on where and when recording will be taking place so they can avoid it.

CPD Digital events: As appropriate, joining instructions for CPD Digital which are recorded include guidance on protecting your privacy and how to opt out of being recorded or preserve your anonymity when being recorded. 

NON MEMBERS

Trade sponsors, exhibitors and advertisers ('Trade Suppliers')

How we collect your information

We collect your personal data in various ways:

  • when you contact our office or when you attend an event organised by us
  • if you ask to be added to the databases maintained by our Secretariat services contractor or our Awards Administrator in order to be kept informed of SGD activities or opportunities.
  • when you agree to sponsor or exhibit at an event or advertise in our Supplier’s Directory.  

The types of information we collect

We may collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact and communication information including your name, employer name, contact title, phone, email and postal address and other business contact details; and where appropriate your communication preferences.
  • Records of communications and interactions we have had with you
  • Certain other information which you provide for example when you take part in one of our events, this may include dietary needs and any feedback you have provided on the event. 
  • If you host a table at the Awards Dinner, we will also collect the names of your guests with their company name, your postal address for sending out your tickets and any dietary needs.
  • Financial information - We do not store credit card details where payments are made via the website, as we use third party payment providers.  For transactions which are not processed via our website, we will collect payment card details, but we shred or delete the card information once the payment has been processed;

How we use personal information

Your personal data collected and processed by us may be used for the following purposes

  • Fulfilment of our sponsorship, exhibitor or advertising agreements with you
  • Administration of our relationship with you, in line with our legitimate interests which include to:
  1. support and promote the status and interests of the Society and of our membership;
  2. encourage and promote the professional skills of the members;
  3. communicate to our membership information as may be deemed useful.
  • Administering, managing, and developing our business and services to our members

         and,

  • Unless you have asked us not to, providing you with information about SGD events (such as our Conferences, and our annual Awards), and other opportunities, services or products that we consider will be of interest to you. 

Communicating with you

You have the opportunity unsubscribe from email marketing communications whenever we contact you.  We will always act upon your wishes about the marketing communications you want to receive from us.  If you exercise your right to unsubscribe, you can choose to re-join our email communications list at any time by contacting the SGD office at info@sgd.org.uk, or by calling 01989 551 083 or the SGD Awards office at awards@assocmanagement.co.uk, as appropriate. 

There are, however, some communications that we need to send to you regardless of your marketing preferences.  These administrative communications are necessary as part of our legitimate interests or to fulfil our contract obligations to you.  Examples of these types of communication include sending you: 

  • Communications about any current sponsorship, exhibitor, advertising or other agreement we have with you, including transaction notifications and payment receipts.
  • Renewal notification for the Suppliers’ Directory.
  • If you are attending a catered for event, for example the Awards Dinner, your dietary needs and name may be shared with the venue provider for catering purposes.

How long we keep your information

In the absence of other specific legal, regulatory or contractual requirements, we will retain your our records and other documentary information created during our relationship with you for a period of up to 10 years after your last interaction with us, for accounting, tax and the Society’s record keeping purposes. 

Speakers at SGD Events

How we collect your information

We collect your personal data as part of our arrangements with you to speak at one of our Conferences, at a Symposium, or one of our CPD Events.  

The types of information we collect

We may collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact and communication information including your name, employer name, job title, phone, email and postal address and other business contact details;
  • Records of communications and interactions we have had with you.
  • Financial details for payment processing purposes.   
  • Your profile for our event publicity.
  • Where applicable we will also collect details of any guests accompanying you, and if you are attending a dinner, dietary needs for you and any guests.  

How we use personal information

Your personal data collected and processed by us may be used for the following purposes

  • Administering, managing, and developing our business and services to our members.
  • Administration of our relationship with you, in line with our legitimate interests which include to:
  1. support and promote the status and interests of the Society and of our membership;
  2. encourage and promote the professional skills of the members.
  • Fulfilment of our agreements with you.  

Communicating with you

We will normally communicate with you by email as part of our legitimate interests or to fulfil our contract obligations to you, for example communications about our current agreement with you.  We may send you  promotional emails about the event you are involved in as an event speaker.  

How long we keep your information

We may retain details of your name and profile for a period of up to 15 years for the purposes of administering, managing, and developing our business and services to our members.

In the absence of other specific legal, regulatory or contractual requirements, we will retain the records and other documentary information created during our relationship with you for a period of up to 7 years after your last interaction with us, for accounting, tax and the Society’s record keeping purposes. 

College Contacts

How we collect your information

We collect your personal data when you, or your employer, tell us you are the College contact for the Society of Garden Designers. 

The types of information we collect

We may collect the following types of personal data about you:

  • Contact and communication information including your name, job title, college details, email address and telephone number.
  • Records of communications and interactions you have with us, for example if you attend a meeting with us. 

How we use personal information

Your personal data may be used by the Society in line with our legitimate interests as the main professional association for garden designers in the UK, championing excellence in garden design and supporting the professional development of our members. 

Communicating with you

We will normally communicate with you via email, for example to advise you of forthcoming meetings of our Education Group.  We do not send you marketing emails in your role as a College Contact. 

How long we keep your information

We will delete your contact details from our College Contacts list when you notify us you no longer wish to be on the list. 

In the absence of other specific legal, regulatory, or contractual requirements, we may retain records of your communications and interactions with us for a period of up to 7 years after you cease to be on our college contacts list, or your last interaction with us, for record keeping purposes. 

Non-members entering our Awards 

For details of the data we collect when you enter the Awards and how we use this data, please see ‘Awards’ in the section for ‘Members and Friends’ above.

Business Suppliers

How we collect your information

We collect personal data about our suppliers directly from our suppliers.

The types of information we collect

We will collect the following types of personal data about our suppliers,

  • Contact and communication information, including any subcontractors and individuals associated with our suppliers and subcontractors.
  • Financial information for payment processing purposes.
  • Information about our engagement with you including transaction records and any communications with the Society. 

How we use personal information

We use the information we collect and process about you in order to manage our relationship and contract with you and as part of our legitimate interests for administering, managing, and developing our business and services to our members.

Communicating with you

We will communicate with you via email for administrative purposes.  We do not send you marketing emails in your role as one of our business suppliers. 

How long we keep your information

In the absence of other specific legal, regulatory or contractual requirements, we will retain your our records and other documentary information created during our relationship with our suppliers  for a period of up to 7 years after your last interaction with us, for accounting, tax and the Society’s record keeping purposes.

Others who get in touch with us

We may collect personal data when you contact us with an enquiry, comment or feedback.  This might be via our website, by contacting the SGD Office or our Awards Administrator, or in person at an event, for example at a Show.  We will collect personal details to enable us to process and respond to you, such as you name, contact details and contents of the communication.  In these cases, you are in control of the personal data shared with us and we will only use the data for the purpose of responding to the communication.

Visitors to our website

When you visit our websites, our web server will record technical information such as the IP address of the network you are connecting from, along with your web browser details, operating system and platform, pages visited.

We have implemented Google Analytics, which makes use of “cookies” in order to provide statistics on visitor numbers and interaction, so that we understand how our websites are being used and where we can make improvements.

Please see the Cookie Policy on our website for further details.

Please note that the Society of Garden Designers is not responsible for the content or privacy practices of non-Society of Garden Designers web sites to which the Society of Garden Designers web site may link.