Privacy Statement

Hertfordshire County Council is the Data Controller for Services for Young People.

How we use your information

This privacy notice tells you what to expect when Services for Young People, part of Hertfordshire County Council, collects personal information. It applies to information we collect about:

• visitors to our websites
• people who use our services, e.g. who subscribe to one of our newsletters or request a publication from us 
• people who send us an enquiry or a comment via this website

Visitors to our websites

When someone visits the Services for Young People website we collect standard internet log information and details of visitor behaviour patterns. We do this to find out things such as the number of visitors to the various parts of the site. We collect this information in a way which does not identify anyone. We do not make any attempt to find out the identities of those visiting our website. We will not associate any data gathered from this site with any personally identifying information from any source. If we do want to collect personally identifiable information through our website, we will be up front about this. We will make it clear when we collect personal information and will explain what we intend to do with it.

When a young person registers for our employment service

Through the website we offer a job matching service to inform young people of local job and training opportunities either via a telephone call or by email. Any young person who would like information about any of the jobs or training opportunities is required to register and will be asked for several pieces of personal information: name, address, phone number, mobile, date of birth, email address and current situation, e.g. still at school, looking for work, working etc. This information is used firstly to check that the young person is within the scope of our services. Other data may also be requested during a subsequent telephone conversation or email correspondence, and that data will be used to provide a better service to young people. It may be shared with other professionals if necessary to provide a full service or to safeguard a young person.

Data collected and details of correspondence via email/telephone will be recorded alongside other data held by us and held securely on our system up to the age of 19 (25 if they have a learning difficulty or a disability or if they have been in care). Such data is only held to provide information, advice and guidance to young people, or to provide services that safeguard young people.

Find out more about how we look after your data.

Use of cookies

Cookies are small text files that are placed on your computer by websites that you visit. They are widely used to make websites work, or work more efficiently, as well as to provide information to the owners of the site.

We allow you to choose the categories of cookies that we store on your computer both when you first visit our site, and at any time at the bottom of the page. You can choose between four categories, from strictly necessary and functional cookies to tracking and targeting cookies.

The table below explains the cookies we use and why.                                                                                                                     

Most web browsers allow some control of most cookies through the browser settings. To find out more about cookies, including how to see what cookies have been set and how to manage and delete them, visit www.allaboutcookies.org.

To opt out of being tracked by Google Analytics across all websites visit http://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.

YouTube cookies

We occasionally embed videos from the YouTube channel using YouTube’s privacy-enhanced mode. This mode may set cookies on your computer once you click on the YouTube video player, but YouTube will not store personally-identifiable cookie information for playbacks of embedded videos using the privacy-enhanced mode. To find out more please visit YouTube’s embedding videos information page.

People who contact us through the website

When we receive a message from a person we will hold a record of the enquiry, either answering it directly or forwarding it to the appropriate person within Hertfordshire County Council for that person to answer it. This normally contains the identity of the enquirer and any other individuals involved in the enquiry.

We will only use the personal information we collect to process the enquiry and to check on the level of service we provide. We do compile and publish statistics showing information like the number of enquiries we receive, but not in a form which identifies anyone.

We usually have to disclose the enquirer’s identity and certain other details to whoever will answer the enquiry. This is inevitable where, for example, the town of residence needs to be known to provide an accurate response. If an enquirer doesn’t want information identifying him or her to be disclosed, we will try to respect that. However, it may not be possible to handle an enquiry on an anonymous basis, especially if the nature of the enquiry is a complaint.

We will keep personal information contained in files in line with our retention policy. This means that information relating to a complaint will normally be retained for two years from closure. It will be retained in a secure environment and access to it will be restricted according to the ‘need to know’ principle. Complaints which reach stage 3 of our process will be kept for eight years.

When the enquiry is from a young person, and where a record of the enquiry may help our staff to provide a better service on a future occasion, the enquirer’s details may be added to our database of records.

Job applicants, current and former Hertfordshire County Council employees

When individuals apply to work on a paid or voluntary basis at Services for Young People or Hertfordshire County Council, we will only use the information they supply to us to process their application and to monitor recruitment statistics. Where we want to disclose information to a third party, for example where we want to take up a reference or obtain a ‘disclosure’ from the Criminal Records Bureau we will not do so without informing them beforehand unless the disclosure is required by law.

Personal information about unsuccessful candidates will be held for 12 months after the recruitment exercise has been completed, it will then be destroyed or deleted. We may retain de-personalised statistical information about applicants to help inform our recruitment activities, but no individuals are identifiable from that data.

Information held about staff registering for access to the password protected areas of the website

Some parts of the the Services for Young People website are restricted to those registrants who are employees of Hertfordshire County Council. Under some circumstances, such access may be granted to partner agencies. In such cases, a record will be kept of registration information, including email address, job title and contact details. By completing the registration form for access to the password protected areas, the registrant is giving permission for these details to be held on record.

Your rights to data we hold about you

Services for Young People tries to be as open as it can be in terms of giving people access to their personal information. Individuals can find out if we hold any personal information by making a ‘subject access request’. If we do hold information about you we will:

• give you a description of it
• tell you why we are holding it
• tell you who it could be disclosed to
• let you have a copy of the information in an intelligible form

To make a request for any personal information we may hold you need to put the request in writing to the address provided below.

If you agree, we will try to deal with your request informally, for example by providing you with the specific information you need over the telephone.

If we do hold information about you, you can ask us to correct any mistakes by, once again, contacting the address below.

Complaints or queries

Services for Young People tries to meet the highest standards when collecting and using personal information. For this reason, we take any complaints we receive about this very seriously. We encourage people to bring it to our attention if they think that our collection or use of information is unfair, misleading or inappropriate. We would also welcome any suggestions for improving our procedures.

This privacy notice was drafted with brevity and clarity in mind. It does not provide exhaustive detail of all aspects of our collection and use of personal information. However, we are happy to provide any additional information or explanation needed. Any requests for this should be sent to the address below.

Data Protection Team

Hertfordshire County Council
County Hall
Pegs Lane
Hertford SG13 8DQ

01992 588099

[email protected]

You can also contact our Data Protection Officer at [email protected] or in writing to the address above.

If you are unhappy with the way that Hertfordshire County Council has used your data or with the way we have responded to a request you also have the right to contact the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Disclosure of personal information

In many circumstances we will not disclose personal data without consent. However when we investigate a complaint, for example, we may need to share personal information with a partner agency if the complaint relates to them.

You can also get further information on:

• circumstances where we can pass on personal data without consent for example, to safeguard young people and to produce anonymised statistics; 
• our instructions to staff on how to collect, use and delete personal data; and 
• how we check that the information we hold is accurate and up to date.

Links to other websites

This privacy notice does not cover the links within this site linking to other websites. We encourage you to read the privacy statements on the other websites you visit.

Changes to this privacy notice

We keep our privacy notice under regular review. This privacy notice was last updated in April 2024.

How to contact us

Requests for information about our privacy policy can be emailed to [email protected] or by writing to:

Services for Young People
Farnham House
Six Hills Way
Stevenage
SG1 2QF
Tel 0300 123 7538

Or: http://www.hertfordshire.gov.uk/contact/
Data Protection Team Hertfordshire County Council CH0150 County Hall Pegs Lane Hertford SG13 8DQ