Privacy Policy

Who we are

Digitechnique ("Digitechnique", "we" or "us") designs and builds software, apps, websites, online shops and AI systems, and runs search and marketing programmes for businesses in the United Kingdom. For personal information collected through this website and through our own business relationships, we are the data controller. That means we decide how and why it is used, and we are responsible for it.

To contact us about privacy, use the contact form and start your message with "Privacy request", or call us on 07723 431000.

What we collect

What you tell us. When you call us, use our contact form, book a call or apply to the Co-Founder Programme, we collect your name, your company, the contact details you give us and anything else you tell us, such as your budget and project details. If you become a client, we also keep contract, billing and project records.

What your device tells us. When you visit the site, our servers record technical information such as your IP address, browser and device type, the pages you request and when. If you agree to analytics or marketing cookies, those tools also record how you use the site. Our Cookie Policy lists each one.

What others tell us. We may receive business contact details from people who refer you to us, from partners we work with, and from public professional sources such as company websites, Companies House and business networks.

We do not ask for special category information, such as details about health, religion or biometrics, and we ask you not to send it. Our services are for businesses. We do not knowingly collect information from children. If we learn that we have, we delete it.

Why we use it, and our lawful basis

UK GDPR requires us to tell you the lawful basis for each use. Here they are.

• To reply to your enquiry and prepare a proposal. Basis: taking steps you asked for before entering into a contract.
• To deliver work, send invoices and look after our relationship with clients. Basis: performing our contract with you or your employer, and our legitimate interest in running our business.
• To review Co-Founder Programme applications. Basis: taking steps you asked for before entering into a contract, and our legitimate interest in choosing founders we can help.
• To keep the website and our systems secure. Basis: legitimate interests, including the recognised legitimate interests in security that the law now names.
• To measure and improve the website, and to measure our advertising. Basis: your consent, given through the cookie banner. You can withdraw it at any time.
• To send you news about our services. Basis: your consent or, for existing clients and business contacts where the law allows, our legitimate interest. Every message tells you how to stop receiving them.
• To meet legal, tax and accounting duties, and to defend legal claims. Basis: legal obligation and legitimate interests.

Where we rely on legitimate interests, we have weighed them against your rights and freedoms, and you can object at any time. You do not have to give us any information, but without a way to contact you we cannot reply, and without project details we cannot give you a quote.

We do not use solely automated processing to make decisions about you that have legal or similarly significant effects.

Who we share it with

We share personal information only when we need to:

• Service providers who run parts of our business for us, such as website hosting, phone and messaging, scheduling, analytics, advertising measurement, accounting and payments. They may use it only to provide their service to us, under written contracts.
• Professional advisers such as solicitors and accountants, who must keep it confidential.
• Authorities, such as HMRC, when the law requires it, or to protect rights, safety or property.
• A buyer or successor, if our business is reorganised, merged or sold, under the same protections as this policy.

We do not sell personal information. If you accept marketing cookies, advertising platforms receive information about your visit. You can stop that at any time by switching marketing cookies off in Cookie settings, and we treat a Global Privacy Control signal from your browser as the same request.

Transfers outside the UK

Some of our providers, including cloud and software services, handle information outside the UK, for example in the European Economic Area or the United States. When that happens, we use a safeguard UK law recognises: UK adequacy regulations (including the UK-US data bridge, where the US provider is certified to it), or the International Data Transfer Agreement or the UK Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses published by the Information Commission's Office (ICO), after checking that your information stays properly protected. You can ask us which safeguard covers your information.

How long we keep it

• Enquiries that do not become projects: up to 24 months after our last contact.
• Client, contract and billing records: for the length of the relationship, then for as long as UK tax and company law require, usually six years after the end of the financial year they relate to.
• Co-Founder Programme applications that do not go ahead: up to 12 months, unless you ask us to delete them sooner.
• Server logs: usually no more than 90 days, unless we need them to look into a security problem.
• Analytics and marketing data: for the periods set out in our Cookie Policy.

When a period ends, we delete the information or make it anonymous.

How we protect it

We encrypt information in transit, give access only to the people who need it, keep our systems updated and monitored, and bind our team to confidentiality. No system is completely secure. If a breach puts your rights at risk, we will tell you, and we will report it to the ICO where the law requires it.

Your rights

Under UK data protection law, you have the right to:

• find out what personal information we hold about you, and get a copy;
• have information that is wrong or incomplete corrected;
• have your information deleted;
• restrict how we use it, or object to our use of it, including for direct marketing;
• receive it in a portable format;
• withdraw your consent at any time, without affecting anything we did before you withdrew it;
• ask for a person to review any significant decision made about you by automated means, and to challenge it.

To use any of these rights, send a request through the contact form or call us. We may ask for information to confirm your identity. Someone else can make a request for you with your written permission. We reply within one month. For complex requests, the law lets us extend this by up to two further months. We will search for your information in a reasonable and proportionate way. If we cannot do what you ask, we will explain why.

Complaints

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your information, please tell us first through the contact form or by phone. We acknowledge every data protection complaint within 30 days, look into it without undue delay and tell you the outcome.

You also have the right to complain to the ICO, the UK's data protection regulator, at ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint or on 0303 123 1113. We would appreciate the chance to put things right first.

Cookies and your choices

We use strictly necessary cookies to run the site, and analytics and marketing cookies only if you agree. You can change your mind at any time through Cookie settings at the bottom of every page. Our Cookie Policy has the details.

Other websites

Our site links to other websites, such as social networks, the booking tool we use and the business support schemes on our city pages. They have their own privacy practices, so please read their policies too.

Changes to this policy

If we change this policy, we will post the new version here with a new effective date. If a change is significant, we will say so clearly on the site before it takes effect.