Privacy policy

We take protecting the privacy of our Clients and visitors to our Company seriously. This privacy statement is intended to set out the basis upon which any personal data and information that we compile, or that you provide to us, may be collected and processed by (or on behalf of) us.

Who are we?
Advocates Smith Taubitz Unsworth Limited
Kensington House

77-79 Bucks Road

Douglas

Isle of Man

IM1 3EF
Telephone No: +44(0)1624 677888
Email: reception@advocates.co.im

What personal information is held about you?
We collect personal information from you in the course of our business, including when you contact us or request information from us, when you engage our professional services or as a result of your relationship with one or more of our Clients.

The categories of personal information that we may hold about you include:-

• Information establishing your identity (for example your name, residential and work addresses, phone number, email addresses, date of birth and copies of identification documents) and other publicly available information, such as social media, newspaper articles etc;

• Where you are a corporate entity or where relevant to your organisation and structure, details about persons with an interest in or connection to you, including shareholders, partners, trustees, settlors, protectors, enforcers, beneficiaries, staff and corporate contacts along with any other information relating to you, which you may provide to us upon our request;

• Sensitive personal information is only collected where it is necessary to provide you with a specific service or you have consented to that collection. For example, where we have been appointed to look after your affairs, or in possession of Power of Attorney or where we would gather dietary requirements when inviting to hospitality events. Further examples include where we hold medical records on your behalf where we need to instruct an expert to provide an opinion in relation to your case or a copy of your criminal convictions;

• Information is required to be provided under our contractual terms and also to fulfil our statutory and regulatory obligations or otherwise progress a case.

Where you decide not to provide any data requested or ask us to cease processing your data we may need to cease provision of our services to you. If you are on the other side of a case we are dealing with, however, you may not be able to prevent us from processing your personal data. In any event, we are likely to be required to hold your data in accordance with our retention periods after you request we stop processing the same.

How will we use information about you?
We use your personal data only for the following purposes. To fulfil a contract or takes steps linked to a contract with your organisation and/or in the context of legal proceedings in relation to which you are a party or witness or otherwise involved, this includes;

• To register you as a Client of Advocates Smith Taubitz Unsworth Ltd, a witness in a case or an expert or other professional advisor;

• To provide and administer legal services as instructed by you and your organisation;

• To provide legal advice and legal services to our Clients;

• When you call us and elect to leave a voicemail, we will obtain this voicemail on our systems in accordance with our data retention procedures;

• Any emails sent to us, including any attachments, as checked for reasons of security and monitoring purposes. Email monitoring and/or blocking software is also used;

• Providing third parties with your information where we identify a need to engage or liaise with a third party in order to deliver the services requested (for example, external legal Counsel or experts);

• Fulfilling our legal and/or regulatory and/or financial and/or reporting obligations, including in relation to Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism;

• As required by Advocates Smith Taubitz Unsworth Ltd to conduct our business and pursue our legitimate interests;

• To process payments, billing and collection;

• To process applications for employment;

• To manage access to our premises and for security purposes;

• To protect the security of our communications and other systems, prevent and detect security threats, frauds or other criminal or malicious activities;

• For insurance purposes;

• To exercise and defend our legal rights or to comply with Court Orders;

• If you make a complaint to us, your contact details, the nature of your complaint and sufficient information to enable us to confirm your identity and will be retained on our systems in line with our data retention procedures.

Who will we share your information with?
The information we collect about you will not be transferred to or stored outside the European economic area or a prescribed jurisdiction with equivalent data protection requirements unless it is to support provision of legal services you have requested.

We share personal data with other legal or professional advisors used by us to provide you with legal services.

We may only disclose or transfer your information for the purposes set out in this privacy statement to:-

• Our employees, agents and service providers, who are required to maintain the confidentiality of this information;

• Companies and organisations that assist us to provide the services which you have engaged us;

• Regulatory, Police or law enforcement authorities and fraud prevention agencies, where we are compelled or permitted or required to do so by Order of a Court or Governmental or Administrative Tribunal or by law, regulation or any other legal requirement;

• The Court, other professionals and your opponent in legal proceedings;

• Any other person where disclosure is made at your request or with your consent.

How will we protect and store your personal data?
We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. We have also put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of the breach where we are legally required to do so.

How can you update your personal data?
If any of the personal data that you provided to us changes, for example if you change your email address or if you wish to cancel any requests you have made to us, or you become aware we have inaccurate personal data about you, please let us know by sending an email to reception@advocates.co.im. We will not be responsible for any losses arising from any inaccurate, inauthentic, deficient or incomplete personal data that you provide to us.

What are your rights?
You have various rights with respect to our use of your personal data:-

• Access: you have the right to request a copy of your personal data that we hold about you. There are exceptions to this right, so that access may be denied if, for example, making the information available to you would reveal personal data about another person, or if we are legally prevented from disclosing such information. If you do wish to do this, please contact us by email to vicki@advocates.co.im

• Accuracy: we aim to keep your personal data accurate, current, and complete. We encourage you to contact us at reception@advocates.co.im to let us know if any of your personal data is not accurate or changes, so that we can keep your personal data up to date.

• Objecting: in certain circumstances, you also have the right to object to processing your personal data and to ask us to block, erase and restrict your personal data. If you would like us to stop using your personal data, please contact us at vicki@advocates.co.im however that will not always be possible.

• Porting: you have the right to request that some of your personal data is provided to you, or to another data controller, in a commonly used, machine readable format.

• Erasure: you have the right to ask us to erase your personal data when the personal data is no longer necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, or when, amongst other things, your personal data have been unlawfully processed.

• Complaints: if you believe that your data protection rights have been breached, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Isle of Man Data Protection Authority, or to seek a remedy through the Court. You also have the right to lodge a complaint to the Isle of Man Information Commissioner whose information can be found at www.inforights.im

You may, at any time, exercise any of the above rights, by contacting vicki@advocates.co.im You will be required to produce proof of your identity, ie a copy of your ID card, Passport or any valid identifying document.

Can you withdraw consent?
If you provided your consent to the collection, processing and transferring of your personal data, you have the right to fully or partly withdraw your consent. Once we have received notification that you have withdrawn your consent, we will no longer process your information for the purposes to which you originally consented unless there is another legal ground for the processing.

How long will we keep your personal data?
We will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting or reporting requirements and, where required by Advocates Smith Taubitz Unsworth Ltd to assert or defend any legal claims, until the end of the relevant retention period or until the claims in question have been settled. Upon expiry of the applicable retention period, we will securely destroy your personal data in accordance with applicable laws and regulations.

Our standard retention period is six years from the conclusion of our relationship, however, in some circumstances a different period may apply.

Any changes to our privacy notice?
We reserve the right to update and change this Notice from time to time in order to reflect any changes to the way in which we process your personal data or change in legal requirements. Any changes we make to our notice in the future will be posted on this page and, where appropriate, notified to you by email. Please check back frequently to see any updates or changes to our notice.

What are cookies?

For almost any modern website to work properly, it needs to collect certain basic information on its users. To do this, a site will create files known as cookies – which are small text files – on its users’ computers. These cookies are designed to allow the website to recognise its users on subsequent visits, or to authorise other designated websites to recognise these users for a particular purpose.

Cookies do a lot of different jobs which make your experience of the Internet much smoother and more interactive. For instance, they are used to remember your preferences on sites you visit often, to remember your user ID and the contents of your shopping baskets, and to help you navigate between pages more efficiently. They also help ensure that the advertisements that you see online are more relevant to you and your interests. Much, though not all, of the data that they collect is anonymous, though some of it is designed to detect browsing patterns and approximate geographical location to improve user experience.

Some of our pages may also contain images called ‘web beacons’ (also known as ‘clear gifs’), which allow us to count visitors. Web beacons only collect limited information, including a cookie number, a timestamp, and a record of the page on which they are placed. We may also carry web beacons placed by third party advertisers. These beacons do not carry any personally identifiable information and are only used to track the effectiveness of a particular campaign.

Information collected by cookies and web beacons is not personally identifiable.

What types of cookie are there?

Broadly speaking, there are four types of cookie: strictly necessary cookies, performance cookies, functionality cookies and targeting or advertising cookies.

• Strictly necessary cookies are essential to navigate around a website and use its features. Without them, you wouldn’t be able to use basic services like shopping baskets and e-billing.
• Performance cookies collect anonymous data on how visitors use a website; they can’t track users, and are only used to improve how a website works.
• Functionality cookies allow users to customise how a website looks for them: they can remember usernames, language preferences and regions, and can be used to provide more personal services like local weather reports and traffic news.
• Advertising and targeting cookies are used to deliver advertisements more relevant to you, but can also limit the number of times you see an advertisement, and be used to chart the effectiveness of an ad campaign by tracking users’ clicks. They can also provide security in transactions. They are usually placed by third-party advertising networks with a website operator’s permission, but can be placed by the operator themselves. They can remember that you have visited a website, and this information can be shared with other organisations, including other advertisers.

Additionally, these cookies break down into two further sub-types.

• Persistent cookies remain on a user’s device for a set period of time specified in the cookie. They are activated each time that the user visits the website that created that particular cookie.
• Session cookies are temporary. They allow website operators to link the actions of a user during a browser session. A browser session starts when a user opens the browser window and finishes when they close the browser window. Once you close the browser, all session cookies are deleted.

What’s the law?

Recently, the law on cookies has changed. Now sites that try to place performance, functionality, and targeting and advertising cookies need your permission for before they can place them onto your computer. To find out more about the law, click here.

How do I turn cookies off?

Most browsers accept cookies automatically, but you can alter the settings of your browser to erase cookies or prevent automatic acceptance if you prefer. Generally you have the option to accept all cookies, to be notified when a cookie is issued or reject all cookies. Visit the ‘options’ or ‘preferences’ menu on your browser to change settings, and check the following links for more browser-specific information.

Cookie settings in Internet Explorer
Cookie settings in Firefox
Cookie settings in Chrome
Cookie settings in Safari

To switch off third-party advertising cookies, you can turn these off by visiting the Internet Advertising Bureau’s consumer advice site here.

For more information on cookies, click here

User agreement

By continuing to use our site, you agree to the placement of cookies on your device. If you choose not to receive our cookies, we cannot guarantee that your experience will be as fulfilling as it would otherwise be.