Privacy Policy

Scottish Funding Council is providing you with this information to comply with data protection law and to ensure that you are fully informed, and we are transparent in how we collect and use your (personal) data. 

Scottish Funding Council is the Data Controller. We have an appointed Data Protection Officer (DPO), Emma Pantel who can be contacted by emailing: info@sfc.ac.uk. 

We have contracted with Pinpoint Inc. as our data processor to provide our application portal.

We use personal information you give to us, via our application portal (‘Pinpoint’) to facilitate the job application and recruitment process, including:

·       to process your application

·       to invite you to interview (if relevant)

·       in relation to any reasonable adjustments that may need to be made; 

·       to comply with our legal obligations, such as checking a successful applicant's eligibility to work in the UK before employment starts; and 

·       where an applicant is successful, to enter into a contract with you. 

We may also use your information to monitor the effectiveness of our recruitment processes – this could include statistical analysis of system usage, or research into the experience of the recruitment process undertaken by SFC.

We collect a range of information about you including:

Application Stage:

·       your name, address and contact details, including email address and telephone number;

·       details of your qualifications, skills, experience, and employment history; and

·       information about your entitlement to work in the UK

Your name and contact details are only made available to the hiring manager if you are invited for an interview.

Interview Stage

·       whether or not you have a disability for which the organisation needs to make reasonable adjustments during the recruitment process

Offer Stage

·       information about your current level of remuneration, including benefit entitlements;

·       identity documents, e.g. passport or right to work employment verification;

·       employer references; and

·       bank details

 

We also collect equal opportunities monitoring information, including information about your ethnic origin, sexual orientation, health and religious or philosophical beliefs.  This is not mandatory – if you don’t provide it, it won’t affect your application and we only use it for reporting purposes per our statutory requirements. 

Equal opportunities data will not be forwarded to members of the selection panel and available only to our HR team for the above purpose(s). 

In most cases we collect your personal data directly from you via our application portal (‘Pinpoint’). 

At times, certain roles will be facilitated by a third-party recruitment agency who will also upload your application data to our application portal. Their privacy notice can be found here: 

·       Reed

·       Harvey Nash 

The lawful basis we rely on for processing your personal data are article 6(1)(b) of the UK GDPR, which relates to processing necessary to perform a contract or to take steps at your request, before entering a contract and article 6(1)(f) for the purpose of our legitimate interests.

If you provide us with any information about reasonable adjustments you require under the Equality Act 2010, the lawful basis we rely on for processing this information is article 6(1)(c) to comply with our legal obligations under the Act.

The lawful basis we rely on to process any information you provide as part of your application which is special category data, such as health, religious, sexual orientation or ethnicity information are article 9(2)(b) of the UK GDPR, which relates to our obligations in employment and the safeguarding of your fundamental rights or article 9(2)(g) - necessary for reasons of substantial public interest.

The additional DPA 2018 processing conditions we rely on are Schedule 1 part 1(1) which again relates to processing for employment purposes and Schedule 1, part 2 paragraph 6 – statutory etc and government purposes.

If you choose to provide us with equality and diversity data e.g., ethnicity, gender, disability the lawful basis we rely on is article 9(2)(a)- explicit consent.

Your information may be shared internally for the purposes of the recruitment process. This includes: members of the HR team; interviewers involved in the recruitment process; managers in the business area with a vacancy; and IT staff if access to the data is necessary for the performance of their roles.

In the event that we make you an offer of employment, we will share your data with former employers to obtain references for you.

We will also share your name, address, and contact information with our IT delivery service to facilitate delivery of IT equipment. 

For unsuccessful applicants we will retain your data for a period of 12 months at which point your data will be deleted. 

Successful candidates’ data will be kept for the duration of your employment with SFC and in line with our statutory retention duties as set out in our Staff Privacy Notice. 

Under data protection law, individuals have rights in relation to the processing of their personal data. These rights are as follows:

·     Right to be informed; 

·     Right of access – this means individuals have the right to access and have copies of all personal data held;

·     Right to rectification – this means individuals have the right to correct/update inaccurate or incomplete information about them;

·     Right to erasure, also known as ‘the right to be forgotten’ – this means individuals can request that all their personal data held by an organisation is destroyed;

·     Right of restriction – this means individuals can restrict how their personal data is processed. This only applies in certain circumstances;

·     Right to data portability – this means individuals can request their personal data in a machine readable format to transfer to another organisation;

·     Right to object – this means an individual can object to how their personal data is processed;

·     Automated individual decision-making including profiling – this means individuals have the right not to be subjected to a decision made solely by automated means. 

Some of these rights may only apply in certain circumstances and are not absolute. Requests will be assessed on a case by case basis. 

To exercise these rights, please contact SFC via info@sfc.ac.uk

If you are concerned about how your personal data is being used by the Council, in the first instance please can you contact their Data Protection Officer at info@sfc.ac.uk. If you are not satisfied with the outcome then you can complain to the regulator of data protection, the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). The ICO has guidance on their website here: https://ico.org.uk/your-data-matters/raising-concerns/ 

 

You can email them at casework@ico.org.uk or call them on 0303-123-113 or you can send a letter to them at the following address:

Customer Contact

Information Commissioner's Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

SK9 5AF