Pickering Electronics Ltd recognizes the importance of protecting user’s rights to privacy. We encourage you to take the time to read this policy and those of any website you choose to visit.

Pickering Electronics gather and process your personal information in accordance with this privacy notice and in compliance with the relevant data protection regulation and laws. This notice provides you with the necessary information regarding your rights and our obligations, and explains how, why and when we process your personal data.

Pickering Electronics registered office is at Stephenson Road, Clacton-on-Sea, Essex, CO15 4NL and we are a company registered in England and Wales under company number 857509 and act as the data controller when processing your data.

If you have any questions regarding this policy please contact us by telephone on +44 (0) 1255-428141 or by writing to Pickering Electronics Ltd, Stephenson Road, Clacton-on-Sea, Essex, CO15 4NL, UK.

Information That We Collect

By using Pickering Electronics’ website, you are agreeing to the collection, storage and processing of your information in the manner set out in this policy.

Pickering Electronics processes your personal information to provide you with our products and services. We will never collect any unnecessary personal data from you and do not process your information in any way, other than as specified in this notice.

When you visit our websites, we collect data to provide you with access to our websites, applications, services, and solutions, and to help us personalize and improve your experience.

Automatically collected information: Our web servers automatically collect the following information from visitors to our websites: data about the pages accessed, computer IP address, device ID or unique identifier, device type, geo-location information, computer and connection information, mobile network information, statistics on page views, traffic to and from the sites, referral URL, ad data, and standard web log data and other information. We may also collect anonymous information through our use of cookies.  To view our cookie policy, click here >>

Manually collected information: There are parts of this website where we may need to collect personal information from you for a specific purpose, such as to provide you with certain information you request, such as our Concise Tech Guide, Reed Relay Mate book, or if you contact us about our products and services. The types of personal information collected may include your name, address, telephone number, e-mail address, IP address, and information regarding what pages are accessed and when. We may also ask you to provide us with demographic information such as your job function. 

Other methods of collection: We may also collect information from or about you in other ways, such as through your contact with our sales team and your interactions with members of the Pickering Group.

Information about children: Our websites are not intended for or targeted at children under 16, and we do not knowingly or intentionally collect information about children. If you believe that we have collected information about a child under 16, please contact us, so that we can delete the information.

How We Use Your Personal Data

Pickering Electronics takes your privacy very seriously and will only retain your data for as long as is necessary and for the purpose(s) specified in this notice. Such information will be non-intrusive and is processed on the grounds of legitimate interests.

The purposes and reasons for processing your personal data are detailed below: –

• Respond to free sample or quote requests as well as other enquires that you have made about our products and services.
• Send you communications which you have requested and that may be of interest to you. These may include new and existing products and services, upcoming events, as well as literature and datasheets.
• Measure viewer statistics to improve the content of our websites.
• Information may be shared with Pickering’s official representatives/agents, but only if necessary to fulfil your requests.
• Share relevant information with third party service providers such as customer relationship management (CRM) software providers.

Electronic newsletters: Users that have signed up for Pickering’s free electronic newsletter will not be spammed, nor will their details be sold or rented to any third parties. Users can easily unsubscribe with a simple click on any email received, alternatively users may remove themselves from our mailing list by clicking here >>

Direct mail: We may send you direct mail if you have requested to receive physical copies of Pickering Electronics marketing materials. We will only send such materials if you have provided us with your postal address via our website forms or literature download requests for physical copy.

When requesting a piece of direct mail, we will ask you to provide the following personal information: First Name, Last Name, Email, Phone Number, Company Number, Street Address, City, State/Region, Postal Code and Country. If you have already registered on our website and request a direct mail piece from us, we will remember your past registration information and simply request street address and postal code, so we can mail your requested information. You can opt-out of receiving direct mail/have your physical address removed from our database or request to have your address updated at any time. by emailing privacy@pickeringrelay.com

Sharing and Disclosing Your Personal Information

Pickering Electronics will not share, sell or rent your personal information for promotional purposes and will not disclose your personal information to outside organizations unless they are affiliated with us as a third-party vendor. Distributors, partners, affiliates, or other business partners of Pickering Electronics who have access to your personal information use the information about your customer relationship with us and our products. We maintain strict precautions to prevent the misuse of your personal information.

Third Party Service Providers working on our behalf: We may pass your information to our third-party service providers, agents, subcontractors and other associated organisations for the purposes of completing tasks and providing services to you on our behalf (for example to process a postal mailshot or email blast). However, when we use third party service providers, we disclose only the personal information that is necessary to deliver the service and we have a contract in place that requires them to keep your information secure and not to use it for their own direct marketing purposes. Please be reassured that we will not release your information to third parties beyond the Pickering Electronics network for them to use for their own direct marketing purposes, unless you have requested us to do so, or we are required to do so by law, for example, by a court order or for the purposes of prevention of fraud or other crime.

Any information submitted by you through our website, provided to our Sales Offices or contact made directly to our UK Head Office may result in transferring your personal data across international borders.  Where applicable, there is either an adequacy decision by the European Commission in respect of those countries or appropriate safeguards have been put in place as per guidance under UK GDPR.  This means that the countries to which we transfer your personal data are deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for your personal data or have other data protection mechanisms in place. 

Third Party Payment Processors: When you purchase products from Pickering Electronics, your payment is processed by secure PCI Service Providers (Level 1) This is the most stringent level of certification available in the payments industry. Payments are processed direct through PayPal Holdings Inc. or Stripe, who both specialise in the secure online capture and processing of credit/debit card transactions. (We do not hold any credit/debit card details at Pickering Electronics) Any information that is transmitted to either payment processor is encrypted using secure socket layer technology (SSL). When using any third-party payment processor, we encourage you to take the time to read their privacy policies:

PayPal: https://www.paypal.com/en/webapps/mpp/ua/privacy-full

Stripe: https://stripe.com/en-gb/privacy

Google Analytics and Adwords: Our website uses Google Analytics and Google Adwords which are web analytics services provided by Google, Inc. Google Analytics uses “cookies”, which are text files placed on your computer, to help the website analyze and track how users navigate the site. The information generated by the cookie about your use of the website (including your IP address) will be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States.

We will use this information to evaluate your use of the website, compiling reports on website activity for website operators and providing other services relating to website activity and internet usage. Google may transfer this information to third parties where required to do so by law, or where such third parties process the information on Google’s behalf.

We will not (and will not allow any third party to) use Google Analytics or Google Adwords to track, collect or upload any data that personally identifies an individual (such as a name, email address or billing information), or other data which can be reasonably linked to such information by Google. Since August 2020 they have been updating their current processing terms and adding the relevant Standard Contractual Clauses as adopted by the European Commission. For more information, please refer to Google Privacy Policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy

For remarketing purpose’s, we use Google Analytics’ 3rd-party audience which uses data such as age, gender, and interests to better understand the behavior of our customers.  They work with companies that collect information about your online activities to provide advertising targeted to suit your interests and preferences. For example, you may see certain ads on this website or other websites because we contract with Google and other similar companies to target our ads based on information we or they have collected, including information that was collected through automated means (such as cookies and web beacons). These companies also use automated technologies to collect information when you click on our ads, which helps track and manage the effectiveness of our marketing efforts.

You may opt out of the automated collection of information by third-party ad networks, for the purposes of delivering advertisements tailored to your interests.  Please visit Google’s Display Network ads’ preferences page where you can edit or opt out:  http://www.google.com/ads/preferences/

Hubspot: We use HubSpot for building marketing webpages, this can include for downloading forms, eBooks, and datasheets.  Creating social media posts and email deployments.

All these sources of marketing content are used to inform our customers about Pickering and our offerings. When requesting to register to our website, download a datasheet, flyer, map, or eBook you may be required to provide personal information such as First Name, Last Name, Company Name, Email, Phone Number, State/Region, Country, Zip and Address.  This enables us visitors to be contacted about their interest in the company’s goods or services and interact with the company.

Your information, which is stored and managed on HubSpot servers in the United States and other jurisdictions where HubSpot affiliates with sub-processors.  To which HubSpot ensure such transfers are made in compliance with the requirements of Data Protection Laws and abide by and process European Data in compliance with the Standard Contractual Clauses. 

For more information, please refer to Hubspot Privacy Policy: https://legal.hubspot.com/privacy-policy 

Salesforce: We also use a Customer Relationship Management system for collating all our customer details and dealing with service requests.  This information can then be accessed by other Pickering Offices/Agents to enable us to deal with any customer requirements, quickly and efficiently. This data is hosted and stored on a server based in Europe, governed by EU GDPR.  For more information, please refer to the Salesforce Privacy Policy: https://www.salesforce.com/company/privacy/full_privacy/

Safeguarding Measures

Pickering Electronics takes your privacy seriously and takes every reasonable measure and precaution to protect and secure your personal data. We work hard to protect you and your information from unauthorised access, alteration, disclosure or destruction and have several layers of security measures in place, including: –

• SSL website encryptions
• Enterprise Firewall with SPI
• Centralized user authentication with dual-factor
• Authentication for all external access
• Full anti-virus/malware and anti-ransomware scanning
• BSI Certification ISO9001:2015 Standard

Legitimate Interests

Pickering Electronics will occasionally send you marketing information regarding our products, services or promotions by email and post. These have been identified as being beneficial to our customers and in our interests. Such information will be relevant to you as a customer and is non-intrusive and you will always have the option to opt-out/unsubscribe at any time.

How Long We Keep Your Data

Pickering Electronics will only retain your personal data for as long as is necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected and processed.  This includes the purposes of satisfying any legal, tax, reporting, regulatory or accounting requirements.  Our standard data retention period in respect of paper correspondence is 6 years plus the current year.  This data is then destroyed by a professional data shredding company.

Where your personal data is held electronically in an archive containing data that cannot easily be separated and may contain other data requiring to be held for longer period, we may, at our discretion retain for longer than six years in reflection of this.  For clarity, it should be noted that such personal data may be held by us or Data Processors, in electronic or paper format.

In event that we collect your personal data but, you do not become a Customer, or you are no longer a Customer, your data is retained in our archiving system for the purposes of quote/product history and customer support.  You do, however, have the right to ask removal of your personal data, within reason, which can be securely and effectively destroyed or permanently erased from our IT systems as far as practically possible.

Other Global Data Privacy Regulations

Pickering Group periodically keeps up to date with all relevant global privacy regulations and will update this Privacy Notice in accordance with any additional information which may need to be disclosed.

Here is a list of privacy regulations that have been amended or will be coming into force since EU GDPR on 25^th May 2018, in the UK known as ‘UK-GDPR’ on 1^st January 2021: –

CCPA/CPRA – California Consumer Privacy Act effective from 1^st January 2020 and 2023

LGPD – Brazilian General Data Protection Law effective from 16^th August 2020

PIPL – China Personal Information Protection Law effective from 1^st November 2021

APPI – Japan’s Act on the Protection of Personal Information amended 1^st April 2022

CDPA – Virginia’s Consumer Data Protection Act effective from 1^st January 2023

CPA – Colorado Privacy Act effective from 1^st July 2023

The purpose of our processing activity is to provide goods or services to business individuals. Any shared use of data which is necessary for the performance of contracts, agreements, or similar instructions, are subject to the provisions in law relevant to its jurisdiction. We do not sell your data to any other organisations.

Where data may be transferred or stored, the use of appropriate technical and administrative measures, such as, the specified country having equivalent data protection regime, are used to protect personal data from unauthorized access, accidental loss, alteration, disclosure, or destruction.

Where necessary, we use legitimate interests to fulfil our controller obligations and would only pass to a third-party under pre-contractual agreements. We keep records of our personal data processing operations conducted, especially when based on legitimate interest.

We have implemented internal processes and policies that ensure broad compliance with rules and good practices regarding the protection of personal data. Please read all sections of this Privacy Statement for further details. We will continually review all relevant legislations and will update this statement where required.

Managing your personal information and preferences

By accessing your Pickering Account, you may at any time update your contact preferences, amend your personal data, or unsubscribe by clicking the link in the footer of any electronic newsletter.  You can also unsubscribe at any time by clicking on this link. https://info.pickeringrelay.com/hs/manage-preferences/unsubscribe

You do have the right to request erasure of your personal data or to restrict processing (where applicable) in accordance with the data protection laws.  If you wish to stop receiving any communication from us or delete your account, please email: privacy@pickeringrelay.com

Links to Other Websites

Our site may, from time to time, contain links to and from the websites of our partner networks, advertisers and affiliates. If you follow a link to any of these websites, please note that these websites have their own privacy policies. Our Cookie and Privacy Policy only applies to this website, therefore please check their policies before you submit any personal information to these websites.

Your Rights

You have the right to access any personal information that Pickering Electronics processes about you and to request information about: –

• What personal data we hold about you
• The purposes of the processing
• The categories of personal data concerned
• The recipients to whom the personal data has/will be disclosed
• How long we intend to store your personal data for
• If we did not collect the data directly from you, information about the source

If you believe that we hold any incomplete or inaccurate data about you, you have the right to ask us to correct and/or complete the information and we will strive to do so as quickly as possible; unless there is a valid reason for not doing so, at which point you will be notified.  If you wish to request a ‘Subject Access Request’ form, please email dataprotection@pickeringrelay.com

Lodging A Complaint

Pickering Electronics only processes your personal information in compliance with this privacy notice and in accordance with the relevant data protection laws.  If you have any concerns on the personal data we hold, please contact us on: –

Address: Pickering Electronics Limited, Stephenson Road, Clacton-on-Sea, Essex, CO15 4NL
Telephone: +44 (0)1255 428141
Email: dataprotection@pickeringrelay.com

If, however you wish to raise a complaint regarding the processing of your personal data or are unsatisfied with how we have handled your information, you have the right to lodge a complaint with our lead supervisory authority: –

Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF
T. 0303 123 1113
www.ico.org.uk

Updates to this Privacy Policy

Pickering Electronics will occasionally update this Privacy Policy to reflect company and customer feedback. Pickering Electronics encourages you to periodically review this Policy to be informed of how we are protecting your information.  If you wish to contact us in respect of this Privacy Policy, please email dataprotection@pickeringrelay.com

Last modified: February, 2021.