1. Introduction

As part of our grant-making activities and the other services we offer, we need to collect certain information from you. Without this information, we would not be able to assess grant applications or provide our other services.

However, the way we collect, process and store this information must comply with the law, specifically the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which came into force in 2018. This also gives you certain important rights regarding this data and how we use it.

This guidance aims to explain in simple terms what information we seek from you and how we remain GDPR complaint in doing so.

Specifically, it will:

  • Explain what information we ask for, our purpose in doing so and the legal basis on which we do so.
  • Specify how we use the data and who within our organisation will see it.
  • Details our policy on sharing data and how long we keep it.
  • Gives a summary of the rights you have over your data.
  • Specify our cookies policy.
  • Lastly we explain how we handle modifications to this policy.

We also have a more detailed Data Protection policy to which this guidance refers as required, and the policy also contains links to the relevant sites where more detail is available in each of these areas.

2. The data we collect from you

The following lists the data we collect from you and why we do so. More on the legal basis specified by GDPR can be found in our Data Protection policy, part 3(a).

Assessing grant applications

Data (summary):

  • Administrative details of the organisation (name of contact, email, charitable status etc.)
  • Overview information about the organisation, its aims and activities.
  • Overview information about the project, its intended recipients and purposes etc.
  • Financial information: income and expenditure of the organisation, cost of the project, amount sought, bank details.

Legal basis:
Legitimate interests – to be able to assess applications, perform due diligence, facilitate monitoring of the projects we fund, make payments to applicants, and to perform subsequent research and analysis into issues relevant to the charity sector we work in.

Service provision – training and advice

Data (summary):

  • Such information about the organisation that we need to know to be able to offer you relevant advice or to tailor our training to your needs.

Legal basis:
Legitimate interests – the data is needed to provide our services and to perform subsequent research and analysis into issues relevant to the charity sector we work in.

Website functionality

Data (summary):

  • Website activity collected through cookies.

Legal basis:
Legitimate interests – it is necessary for us to store a small amount of information, usually through cookies, to deliver functionality that you would expect, such as the contact form and social media links.

3. How we use your data

We only collect such data as we need to pursue our legitimate activities and only show it those people in the organisation involved in those activities (see our Data Protection policy, section 1, and section 6(b) for more details).

i. Grant making

  • You supply us with information through the relevant application form, possibly a formal meeting to discuss the application and any other informal contacts needed to support the application.
  • This is used to produce an assessment of the application, to be scrutinised by the board (grants up to £2000) or management (grants up to £500).
  • Once the grant decision is made, the details you supplied are archived at our office both as hard copy and on the charity’s computers for the purposes of monitoring how the grant monies are being used, for future research and analysis activities and as a record of our activities.

ii. Service provision

  • You supply such data as you are willing to give in an ad hoc fashion to help us facilitate your enquiry or deal with your service request.
  • Notes will be taken to facilitate our helping you with your enquiry or service request and used to fill out the relevant enquiry\service request form.
  • Once the enquiry has been handled or service request has been met, any notes or form will be archived at our office both as hard copy and on the charity’s computers for the purposes of future research and analysis activities and as a record of our activities.

The charity’s computers are few in number, all stand-alone and are all adequately protected with the relevant up-to-date software to prevent illegal access to your information from outside (see our Data Protection policy, section 6 for more details).

Please be aware however that the internet is not a secure medium and therefore we cannot guarantee the security of data sent to us electronically and transmission of such data is therefore entirely at your own risk. We will never ask for your bank details to be sent over the internet – these should only ever be posted to us.

4. Sharing your data

We will only share your data with third parties under the following circumstances:

  • You have given explicit consent for us to do so, and we will only share the information that you have given us permission for, and no other (see our Data Protection policy, section 3(c) for more details). This consent can be withdrawn at any time. Examples of how we might share your data include (but are not limited to):
    • Web material as examples of our work.
    • Case studies in publically available papers or research.
    • Given to like organisations to help with their operations.
  • Where we are required to do so by law.

We have no need of any third parties to help process your data, and as such, we have no need to send your data outside the UK.