Founded in 1951 and based in London, The Pakistan Society aims to increase public knowledge in Britain of the arts, history, geography, economic life and institutions of Pakistan. It does this through a series of lectures, meetings and social events, usually held at the Pakistan High Commission.

This policy explains how, and for what purpose, The Pakistan Society collects and stores a small amount of your personal information, with your consent, in compliance with the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), effective from 25th May 2018.

We are committed to respecting and protecting your privacy.

For the purposes of data protection legislation (i.e. whichever applies of the UK Data Protection Act 1998; the General Data Protection Regulations (EU) as implemented and amended/updated in the UK, and any successor legislation to either the GDPR or DPA), The Pakistan Society is the “data controller” of your personal information. It is a registered Charity in England and Wales number 249020, and its address is:

The Pakistan Society, 8 Harriet Walk,  London SW1X 9JH.

The Chairman of The Pakistan Society and the Committee member with responsibility for communications, who will act as data protection officer, are responsible for overseeing questions in relation to our Privacy Policy.

The personal information we collect

Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. We collect the minimum personal information needed to communicate with you on the future activities of the Society.

The personal data which we may collect, store and use, fall into two main categories:

  • Identity data includes your first name and family name.
  • Contact data includes your postal address, your email address and telephone numbers.

How your personal information is collected

Identity and contact information is provided by members who give their consent directly to The Pakistan Society by post, telephone, email or in person.

How we use personal information

Processing of minimal personal information is necessary in order for us to provide the services members expect in return for their annual subscription. We rely on that contract as a legal basis on which we process your personal information.

Providing you consent, we process personal information about you for these purposes and in two ways:

  • to communicate with you to keep you informed about Society events, the AGM and the Annual Dinner;
  • to maintaining the list of members of The Pakistan Society

Disclosures of your personal data

We do not disclose your personal data to third parties other than agencies which assist us in managing the membership.

Rare exceptions to this, which we would notify to you, would include:

  • police or other lawful agencies for the purposes of detection or prosecution of crime;
  • to the extent that disclosure is required by law or any regulatory authority.

Where and how we store your personal information

The information we collect from you is held on servers located within the UK. We will use appropriate measures to protect against unauthorised or unlawful processing and against accidental loss or destruction of your personal information. Your contact details are stored electronically on a database file which is password-protected and stored offline, behind up-to-date firewall and antivirus protection.

Access to personal information is limited to certain elected members of the Committee. These individuals have access to the contact details supplied by members to enable them to perform their elected duties.

In the unlikely event that your personal information became accessible to third parties through a data breach, we would inform you as soon as we become aware of it, and notify the regulator if legally required.

Data retention

We will only retain your personal information for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for. Personal information stored on our database will be reviewed annually, and where appropriate will be delete it.

Withdrawal of consent

You can withdraw your consent to any use we make of your personal information at any time by contacting us in the manner set out at the end of this Privacy Policy. The Pakistan Society will maintain an audit trail of consent given and withdrawn.

Access to information

Data Protection Legislation gives you the right to access the information we hold about you. We will respond to any valid access request within 45 days (if it is expected to take longer, we will notify you and keep you updated as to likely timescale) and we will make available your information in a format to be agreed. To obtain a copy of the personal information we hold about you please contact us as set out at the end of this Privacy Policy.

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights contained in this Privacy Policy). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if requests are clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with a request in these circumstances. In such instances, we would notify you.

Erasure or correction of information

Data Protection Legislation gives you the right to ask us to erase information held about you if it is no longer necessary in relation to the purposes for which it was collected or processed. You also have the right to ask us to correct inaccurate information we hold about you, or to complete incomplete information about you. If you make such a request we will take reasonable steps to comply as per the Data Protection Legislation.

However, the legislation allows us to retain your information in certain circumstances. If those circumstances apply we may continue to hold your information (in accordance with this Policy) despite your request for us to erase it. Such circumstances include (but may not be limited to) where our continued holding of your information is necessary:

  • for exercising the right of freedom of expression and information;
  • for compliance with a legal obligation that requires processing of personal data by EU or member state law; or for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest; or in the exercise of official authority vested in the data controller;
  • for reasons of public interest, in the area of public health.

Personal information of minors

We do not knowingly collect or store any personal information about children under 16 years of age.

Changes to our Privacy Policy, and your duty to inform us of changes

This version of our Policy was last updated on 2 May 2018. We will communicate to you any material changes to our Privacy Policy by email or in hard copy to the addresses provided. This will ensure that you are always aware of the information we hold, how we use it and the circumstances under which we may disclose it.

It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your membership of The Pakistan Society, especially regarding changes to email addresses or telephone numbers.

Right to complain

If you consider that we have failed to comply with this Privacy Policy and/or Data Protection Legislation in relation to the information about you which we hold or process, you have the right to make a complaint to the relevant UK supervisory authority for data protection issues, which in the UK is the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO): https://ico.org.uk. We would appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO, so please contact us in the first instance in the manner below.

Contact

If you have any requests or queries concerning your personal information, please contact us by emailing info@thepakistansociety.org.uk,  or by writing to The Pakistan Society, 8 Harriet Walk, London SW1X 9JH.

Please send any questions about this Privacy Policy to: info@thepakistansociety.org.uk