Privacy

Chambers and Partners Privacy Notice

Last Updated:  7th May 2019

WHO WE ARE

We, Orbach and Chambers Limited, incorporated in England (registered number 0969186) with its registered office at No.3 Waterhouse Square, 138 Holborn, London, UK, EC1N 2SW, trading under the name 'Chambers and Partners' ('we', 'us' or 'our' being interpreted accordingly) are committed to processing any personal information or data that we collect fairly and transparently in accordance with the law, in particular, the EU General Data Protection Regulation (2016/679); the UK Data Protection Act 2018 and other applicable laws, from time to time, that regulate the collection, handling and privacy of personal data (together, 'Data Protection Law').

This Privacy Notice provides information about how we collect and handle personal data in the course of our research and other business activities. It also provides information about an individual's rights in respect of such personal data under Data Protection Law.

We may sometimes amend this Privacy Notice from time to time, so please make sure that you have seen the latest version.

WHAT WE DO

The following activities involve us collecting and processing personal information relating to identifiable individuals (called 'personal data' under Data Protection Law):

1. - Research activities: Personal data is primarily processed in connection with our research business. Chambers and Partners conducts independent research into the world’s leading lawyers, law firms and professional advisers to business clients. We rank individuals and their firms or organisations based on several factors and considerations, all of which are investigated by our team of researchers.
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3. We receive information from law firms or organisations and lawyers themselves about their practices and their achievements, with a view to being ranked in our directories and other publications.
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5. We may select for interview private practice lawyers, in-house counsel, legal professionals and other third party experts and professional advisers. These interviews form the basis of our research. This is not an automated process; our aim is to conduct detailed telephone interviews in order to provide an accurate assessment of the professional legal services market.
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7. Our researchers are based in our central London office and work throughout the year contacting lawyers and their firms or organisations, other professional advisers and clients by telephone and email, following up on submissions made by law firms as well as seeking information from identified referees.
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9. Through this research, our team will collect, review and organise personal information relating to individual private practice lawyers, in-house counsel, legal professionals and other professional services providers, including their contact details, biographical information and other professional details of third-parties who have dealings with those individuals (such as referees or named research contacts) (together 'Professional Contacts').
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11. At the end of the research process, we send research participants a plain text email, containing a link to our website where the new Chambers Guide is available free of charge.
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13. - Sales & Marketing: Our sales and marketing team also provide advertising opportunities both on our website and in our print publications. 
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15. Our ranked law firms, ranked lawyers and their business development professionals may be contacted by our sales team with marketing opportunities we think may be of interest to them. We will also use the personal data that we collect in relation to any others who sign up as users or customers for our products or services for marketing purposes.

16. Anyone can object to receive direct marketing from us at any time, by contacting us using the email address below. Any emails or other electronic communications that we send for direct marketing purposes will also have an 'unsubscribe' facility.

17. - Publishing, Customer Services & Business Administration: we also use personal data for the following purposes:
18. - To conduct our activities as researchers, writers and publishers of the Chambers Guides, website and other publications;
19. - To provide users of publications and other customers with the services or information that they have requested from us;
20. - To promote, manage and administer our publishing and other business activities;
21. - To deal with requests or enquiries we receive from individuals or organisations, firms and companies they work for;
22. - To provide information about us or our services when requested;
23. - To perform contracts and keep a record of any communications and agreements with individuals;
24. - For any other purpose in relation to an individual making contact with us.
25. - We use cookies - and services such as Hotjar - to ensure an enhanced user experience on our website
26. - To provide relevant marketing email communications, we track open rates and click throughs on our marketing emails

 

Cookies

Some features that are designed to give you a better online experience only work if we use cookies.

You can change your mind at any time but, for now, are you happy for us to store and access cookies on your device for the purposes described?

You can find more information about cookies, and how to block or delete them in our cookie declaration

 

INFORMATION WE HOLD AND HOW WE KEEP IT UPDATED

We have a secure database which holds the Professional Contact data, as well as the sales and marketing contact information we collect. This includes a person’s name, their firm, company or organisation, telephone number, business email address.

We do not sell or share the details held on this Professional Contact database with any third parties.

We build and keep our Professional Contact database up-to-date and accurate through the following means:

• 1. Leads and updates are obtained through our research activities as described above.
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• 2. Information available in the public domain (primarily websites and public materials issued by firms, companies or organisations themselves, by industry bodies or information from news media) 
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• 3. Information sent in by firms about their staff members (such as press releases about new joiners and leavers or as disclosed through the legal media

  4. Research contacts or ‘referees’ provided as sources of research information.

CHAMBERS DATA RETENTION POLICY

We retain the personal data that we collect as follows:

1. Chambers and Partners lets its users compare law firm departments and individuals ranked in Chambers and see how their rankings have changed over the past five years.
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3. The results of a ‘Chambers Compare’ search shows past ranking positions and all editorial commentary. We therefore retain all research-related personal data for this period. Any information collected regarding prior to this period is either deleted or – in the case of our published material – archived and held on a limited basis for historical or statistical research purposes.
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5. The period for which we keep other personal data for depends on the purpose(s) for which that information was collected.  We will not keep personal data for longer than necessary for that/those purpose(s) unless we need to keep data for a longer period to comply with any legal requirements (for example, transaction details for tax law purposes).
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7. Chambers and Partner has a data retention policy that sets out the different periods we retain personal data for in accordance with our duties under Data Protection Law. The criteria we use for determining relevant data retention periods are based on:
8. -   various legislative requirements (for example, duties to hold transaction details for tax/accounting purposes);
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10. -   the purpose for which we collected that personal data and where we have identified a continued legitimate need to hold that personal data to serve such purpose, for example, to deal with contract claims; and
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12. -   guidance issued by relevant regulatory authorities including, but not limited to, the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). 

Personal data that we no longer need to hold is securely disposed of and/or anonymised so individuals can no longer be identified from it.

CHAMBERS DATA SECURITY

Chambers and Partners protects its data using data loss prevention software that protects against malware, ransomware and viruses. We provide all staff members with training on our data protection and privacy policies and take other appropriate technical and organisations measure to maintain data security. 

Please note however that there are always inherent risks in sending information by public networks or using public computers and we cannot 100% guarantee the security of all data sent to us (including personal data).

INTERNATIONAL

Chambers and Partners is a global research operation based wholly in the UK. 

We do not transfer any personal data that we collect or hold outside of the UK.

THE LAWFUL GROUNDS ON WHICH WE COLLECT AND PROCESS PERSONAL DATA

When we process personal data for the above purposes, we rely on one or more of the following lawful grounds under Data Protection Law:

1. - we need to collect and use personal data in connection with our legitimate interests of being able to carry out research and conduct our other business activities as outlined above. We will always seek to pursue these legitimate interests in a way that does not unduly infringe on any individual legal rights and freedoms and, in particular, any legal rights of privacy;
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3. - where individual Professional Contacts themselves or customers have freely provided specific, informed and unambiguous consent to use their details for particular purposes;
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5. - where we agree to provide products and/or services to a customer, in order to take any pre-contract steps at the customer's request and/or to perform contractual obligations; or
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7. - where we need to collect, process or hold personal data to comply with a legal obligation or deal with legal claims.

We do not hold or use any personal data which falls within the 'special categories' (as defined under Data Protection Law) meaning data relating to racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, genetic data/biometric data to identify a person, data concerning someone's health or a person’s sex life or orientation, unless we have the individual's explicit consent to do so, or where that data has been manifestly made public by the individual themselves.

DISCLOSING DATA

We may disclose personal data to third parties in the following situations:

1. - to companies and/or organisations who are our service providers handling data on our behalf and in accordance with our instructions (called "data processors"). These include IT suppliers, data hosting providers or payment processors;
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3. - if we are under a duty to disclose personal data to comply with a legal obligation (e.g. where we have a duty to provide data to the police or courts);
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5. - to enforce or comply with any agreements with an individual, for example, where we have to pass personal data to a party to supply or provide a product or service to that person;
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7. - if we are subject to a corporate sale, merger or acquisition, although we will ensure personal data is only ever used for the same purpose(s) for which it was originally collected by any acquirer.

We will only ever share personal data with third parties to use for their own purposes in other circumstances with prior knowledge of the individual and, if necessary under Data Protection Law, where we have their required consent to do so.

DATA SUBJECT RIGHTS

Data Protection Law gives individuals certain rights in relation to their personal data. These rights are exercisable by making a request to us using the contact details below. In summary, individuals can:

1. - request information about the personal data that we hold about them, what we use that personal data for and who it may be disclosed to, as well as certain other information (called a "subject access request").  Usually we will have one month to respond to such a request, although in the case of complex requests, we may require a two month extension. We may also ask for further information to locate the specific information being sought and certain legal restrictions or exemptions may apply to some of the information we can disclose. In particular, Chambers and Partners provides factual information, such as contact details, communication history, published ranking and editorial commentary in response to a subject access request. We do not provide the results of any research activities, particularly the details of confidential references taken by our researchers as part of the Chambers and Partners research process, where this may reveal personal data relating to another individual;
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3. - request that we correct personal data that we hold about them which is inaccurate or incomplete;
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5. - object to our continued use of their personal data for direct marketing;
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7. - request we erase personal data without undue delay and/or to object to and/or to restrict the use of their personal data for any purpose unless we have a legitimate reason for continuing to hold or process that data; or
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9. - ask that we transfer their personal data to another party only where the personal data has been collected with consent or is being used to perform contract and is processed by automated means (i.e. on computer).

Please note that (where necessary) we reserve the right to ask for evidence to verify an individual's identity before we can act on or respond to their request.

CONTACT US

Anyone can contact Chambers and Partners to exercise their data protection rights or get in touch with any other data related queries by phoning us at +44 (0)20 7606 8844; by email at [email protected] or by post at Chambers and Partners, 39-41 Parker Street, London, WC2B 5PQ .

If any individual is dissatisfied with how we handle his or her request or believes that we are unlawfully processing their personal data, they can lodge a complaint with the relevant UK data protection regulator, the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).

For more information on how to contact the ICO, see: https://ico.org.uk/concerns/.