Privacy policy

The European Society for Paediatric Endocrinology (ESPE) and our membership management provider, MCI UK Ltd (hereafter referred to as ‘we’, ‘us’, and ‘our’) are dedicated to ensuring that your privacy is protected in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018, the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (EU GDPR) as applicable. This privacy policy tells you what to expect when we collect information from you via this website. 

Personal data is any information relating to an identified or identifiable living person. When collecting and using personal data, our policy is to be transparent about why and how we process personal data.

ESPE is committed to ensuring that your privacy is protected. Should we ask you to provide certain information by which you can be identified, then you can be assured that it will only be used in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

What data do we collect? 

Data you supply via online forms

You may choose to submit your personal information to us by filling in an online form in the membership portal hosted in YourMembership. Examples of when we may collect personal information from you in this way include:

• When you apply for, or renew, your ESPE membership
• When you apply for an ESPE grant
• When you vote for an ESPE award.

The list is not exhaustive.

We may collect the following information:

• First name, last name, form of address, job title
• Contact information (including postal and email address)
• Demographic information such as nationality, postcode country, preferences and interests
• Other information relevant to customer surveys and/or offers
• Credit/debit card information provided to us other than online.

For an event, meeting, conference or congress (“Event”), this may also include the following information:

• Participant type (membership status, membership number)
• Declaration of professional capacity (e.g., as health care professional or as working in a professional capacity with such health care professionals as a routine part of their employment)
• Interaction (electronic commentaries, questions or answers, surveys, polls).
• Media (photo, video, audio, webcast)
• Other content (abstract, presentation)
• Networking (profile picture, chat messages, chat-comments and emoticons, areas of interest, group membership, 1:1 messages)
• Speaker details (biographies, conflict of interest)
• Programme details (personal programme on mobile website and app)
• Account information (log-in data, contact data, business information).

Tracking data (usage data such as search activity, pages viewed and date and time of visit, browser type, type of computer or mobile device, browser language, IP address, mobile operator, unique device identifier, location information, and requested and referring URLs).

We will only ever use your personal data for marketing purposes if you have consented to this.

Information we collect at receipt and opening of emails

We use a third-party provider, YourMembership, to deliver our marketing emails. If you have opted-in to receive marketing communications from us, we will collect the following information on your email consumption:

• How you interacted with each email: e.g. whether you opened, deleted or forwarded the email, and details of any links you clicked
• The type of device you used to open the email
• Your browser type and operating system
• Your geographic location.

 For more information, please see https://www.yourmembership.com/privacy-policy/.

Inclusion in the ESPE membership directory

Members of the European Society for Paediatric Endocrinology have the opportunity to include their details in the Society's membership directory to maximise opportunities for networking and collaboration. If you consent to this, the following personal information will be displayed in the membership directory.

• Your name
• Your geographic location

This information is only ever available to other members of ESPE, and will never be made available to the wider public. You can give or withdraw consent to be included in the membership directory at any time by changing your preferences in the ‘my profile’ section of the members’ area.

Subscribing to email communications and newsletters

Individuals and members of ESPE have the opportunity to subscribe to email communications and newsletters. If you subscribe to these, the following information may be collected: 

• Your name
• Your contact details (postal and/or email)
• How long you have been a member
• Your telephone number and email address.

You can withdraw your subscription at any time by following the ‘unsubscribing’ link contained within the communication you have received.

How is my information stored?

The information you provide to us via this website is stored within the YourMembership Portal on a secure remote server. MCI UK and YourMembership have implemented stringent security policies and technical measures to protect your information from unauthorised use, or accidental loss. Any personal information held by MCI UK and YourMembership is stored securely, and is only accessible by authorised personnel.

Why we need the information and what we do with it

We require this information to understand your needs and provide you with a better service, and for the following reasons: 

• Internal record keeping
• Delivery of our products and services
• For statutory or contractual requirements
• Improvement of our products and services
• With your consent, we may periodically send emails which we think you may find interesting, using the email address which you have provided. Such communications may include information in relation to our activities and services, including approved occasional communications from Corporate members (where you have opted in to receive these), and any other activity related to our status as a professional membership association and medical charity
• From time to time, we may also use your information to contact you. We may contact you by email, phone, fax or mail. We may use the information to customise the website according to your interests
• If you sign up to a network, your contact details (among other information) can be seen by other members of the same network.

How long do we keep the information?

We retain the personal data processed by us in a live environment for as long as is considered necessary for the purpose(s) for which it was collected (including as required by applicable law or regulation, typically 5 years).  

In addition, personal data may be securely archived with restricted access and other appropriate safeguards where there is a need to continue to retain it. 

Security

We are committed to ensuring that your information is secure. In order to prevent unauthorised access or disclosure, we have put in place suitable physical and electronic procedures to safeguard and secure the information we collect online.  

If you pay your fees by credit or debit card, we will not retain your card details after processing your payment. You will need to resubmit this information for future transactions.  

We will do our best to protect your personal data, we cannot guarantee the security of your data transmitted to our site; any transmission is at your own risk. Once we have received your information, we will use strict procedures and security features to try to prevent unauthorised access.

Our legal basis for processing your data

We rely on the following lawful bases to process your personal data: 

• Consent (for example, to send you direct marketing by email).
• Contractual relationship (for example, to provide you with goods or services that you have bought from us, or when you agree to participate in user experience research).
• Legal obligation (for example, carrying out due diligence on agreements).
• Legitimate interests (see below).

Personal data may be legally collected and used if it is necessary for a legitimate interest of the organisation using the data, as long as its use is fair and doesn’t adversely impact the rights of the individual concerned.

We will always assess if our processing of your personal information is fair and balanced and if, in our opinion, it is within your reasonable expectations. We will balance your rights and our legitimate interests to make sure that we use your personal information in ways that are not unduly intrusive or unfair.

Our legitimate interests

• Achieving our charitable aims – to promote for the public benefit research, education and clinical practice in endocrinology by the organisation of conferences, training courses and publications, by raising public awareness, liaison with national and international legislators, and by any other appropriate means.
• Administration and operational management - this includes running the charity, legal and financial reporting and meeting legal requirements, responding to your enquiries, providing information and our support, research, surveys, events management, the administration of volunteers and employment and recruitment requirements.
  

Disclosure

We do not disclose your personal data to other organisations other than as necessary for the purposes for which you have supplied your information, to comply with our legal obligations, or to ensure data integrity.

For the purpose of data integrity, your information may be made available to other societies managed by MCI UK Ltd. For example, if you provide an address change to one society, this will be used to update your address for any other MCI-managed society of which you are a member.

Payment will be handled by YourMembership which is a PCI compliant system.

Links to third-party websites

This website may contain links to other websites. Any third party websites are not covered by this privacy policy, and we encourage our users to refer to the privacy policies on these websites.

Your rights

You have the right to access any personal information that MCI UK Ltd on behalf of ESPE holds about you. If we do hold information about you we will, upon your request:

• Give you a description of the information we hold about you
• Tell you why we are holding this information
• Tell you who this information could be disclosed to
• Allow you to have a copy of the information in an intelligible form.

If you would like access to your personal information, please contact:
Tel: +44 (0)1730 821969
Email: privacy@mci-group.com

Changes to this privacy policy

If we make any changes to this privacy policy, we will make the updated version available via this website. We will not make changes to the way that we use your personal data without first obtaining your consent to do so.