Privacy Policy

The Expert Witness Site respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal data. This privacy policy will inform you as to how we look after your personal data and tell you about your privacy rights and how the law protects you.

1. Important information and who we are

Purpose of this privacy policy

This privacy policy aims to give you information on how The Expert Witness Site collects and processes your personal data, including any data you may provide when you subscribe to our site and avail of our services.

It is important that you read this privacy policy together with any other privacy policy or fair processing policy we may provide on specific occasions when we are collecting or processing personal data about you so that you are fully aware of how and why we are using your data. This privacy policy supplements other notices and privacy policies and is not intended to override them.

Controller

The Expert Witness Site Limited registered as a company under registration number 755668 is the controller and is responsible for your personal data (collectively referred to as “we”, “us” or “our” in this privacy policy).

Contact details

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or our privacy practices, please contact our data privacy manager in the following ways:

Full name of legal entity: The Expert Witness Site Limited

Email address: info@expertwitnesssite.com

Registered Office: Tomsallagh, Ferns, County Wexford. Y21 DP71.

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Data Protection Commission, the Irish regulator for data protection issues (www.dataprotection.ie). We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the Data Protection Commission so, please contact us in the first instance.

Changes to the privacy policy and your duty to inform us of changes

We keep our privacy policy under regular review.

It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with us.

Third-party links

This website may include links to third-party websites, plug-ins and applications. Clicking on those links or enabling those connections may allow third parties to collect or share data about you. We do not control these third-party websites and are not responsible for their privacy statements. When you leave our website, we encourage you to read the privacy policy of every website you visit.

2. The data we collect about you

Personal data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).

We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:

• Identity Data includes information relating to solicitors, such as first name, maiden name, last name, title, username or similar identifier and/or information relating to expert witnesses, such as first name, maiden name, last name, title, qualifications and professional experience.
• Contact Data includes billing address, email address and telephone numbers.
• Financial Data includes bank account and payment details.
• Transaction Data includes details about payments.
• Profile Data includes username and password.

If you fail to provide personal data

Where we need to collect personal data by law, or under the terms of a contract we have with you, and you fail to provide that data when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have or are trying to enter into with you (for example, to provide you with our services). In this case, we may have to cancel a service you have with us but we will notify you if this is the case at the time.

3. How is your personal data collected?

Please note that when filling in a form to avail of an expert witness, solicitors should not include confidential information relating to a legal case, such as the parties involved and/or any information that could lead to identification of the personnel involved. Solicitors should provide generic details only so that no personal information relating to a legal case is collected.

We use different methods to collect data from and about solicitors and/or expert witnesses including through:

• Direct interactions. Solicitors may give us their Identity, Contact and Financial Data by filling in forms; by subscribing to The Expert Witness Site; or by registering for and/or attending a training session. This includes personal data provided when you:
• create an account on our website; or
• subscribe to our service;
• submit a request for an expert witness; or
• sign up for or attend a training session run by us;
• Third parties or publicly available sources. We will receive personal data about expert witnesses from various third parties [and public sources] as set out below:
• Publicly available sources [such as expert witness directories; individual professional websites; professional and regulatory bodies; workplace websites; court judgments; media reports; social media and other media sources.

4. How we use your personal data

We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances:

• Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you.
• Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests (or those of a third party) and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests.
• Where we need to comply with a legal obligation.

Purposes for which we will use your personal data

We have set out below, in a table format, a description of all the ways we plan to use your personal data, and which of the legal bases we rely on to do so.

Change of purpose

We will only use your personal data for the purposes for which we collected it, unless we reasonably consider that we need to use it for another reason and that reason is compatible with the original purpose. If you wish to get an explanation as to how the processing for the new purpose is compatible with the original purpose, please contact us.

If we need to use your personal data for an unrelated purpose, we will notify you and we will explain the legal basis which allows us to do so.

Please note that we may process your personal data without your knowledge or consent, in compliance with the above rules, where this is required or permitted by law.

Disclosures of your personal data

We may share the personal data of solicitors and/or expert witnesses with the parties set out below for the purposes set out in the table above.

• We will pass on details of available expert witnesses to solicitors who are registered with the site;
• to third parties who we engage to provide services to us, such as professional advisers, accountants, auditors, lawyers, insurers, printers, IT service providers, training partners, other business advisors and marketing campaigns on our behalf and providers of security and administration services;
• to competent regulatory or other authorities and bodies as requested or required by law;
• Third parties to whom we may choose to sell, transfer or merge parts of our business or our assets. Alternatively, we may seek to acquire other businesses or merge with them. If a change happens to our business, then the new owners may use your personal data in the same way as set out in this privacy policy.

We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.

5. International transfers

We might transfer your personal data outside of Ireland. In these circumstances, we will aim to only transfer your personal data to countries that have been deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data as is provided for in Ireland. In the event that a country does not ensure an adequate level of protection, we will ensure that appropriate measures are in place to comply with our obligations under applicable law governing such transfers. These may include entering into a contract governing the transfer that contains the “standard contractual clauses” approved for this purpose by the European Commission.

If you would like to receive further details of the measures that we have taken in this regard, please contact us at  info@expertwitnesssite.com.

6. Data security

We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used, or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered, or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions, and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a breach where we are legally required to do so.

7. Data retention

How long will you use my personal data for?

We will only retain your personal data for as long as reasonably necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or reporting requirements. We may retain your personal data for a longer period in the event of a complaint or if we reasonably believe there is a prospect of litigation in respect to our relationship with you.

To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal, regulatory, tax, accounting, or other requirements.

8. Your legal rights

Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data. You have the right to:

Request access to your personal data (commonly known as a “data subject access request”). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.

Request correction of the personal data that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate data we hold about you corrected, though we may need to verify the accuracy of the new data you provide to us.

Request erasure of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have successfully exercised your right to object to processing (see below), where we may have processed your information unlawfully or where we are required to erase your personal data to comply with local law. Note, however, that we may not always be able to comply with your request of erasure for specific legal reasons which will be notified to you, if applicable, at the time of your request.

Object to processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground as you feel it impacts on your fundamental rights and freedoms. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal data for direct marketing purposes. In some cases, we may demonstrate that we have compelling legitimate grounds to process your information which override your rights and freedoms.

Request restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of your personal data in the following scenarios:

• If you want us to establish the data’s accuracy.
• Where our use of the data is unlawful but you do not want us to erase it.
• Where you need us to hold the data even if we no longer require it as you need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.
• You have objected to our use of your data but we need to verify whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to use it.

Request the transfer of your personal data to you or to a third party. We will provide to you, or a third party you have chosen, your personal data in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format. Note that this right only applies to automated information which you initially provided consent for us to use or where we used the information to perform a contract with you.

No fee usually required

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we could refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.

What we may need from you

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. We may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response.

Time limit to respond

We try to respond to all legitimate requests within one month. Occasionally it could take us longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests. In this case, we will notify you and keep you updated.

9. Glossary

LAWFUL BASIS

Legitimate Interest means the interest of our business in conducting and managing our business to enable us to give you the best service and the best and most secure experience. We make sure we consider and balance any potential impact on you (both positive and negative) and your rights before we process your personal data for our legitimate interests. We do not use your personal data for activities where our interests are overridden by the impact on you (unless we have your consent or are otherwise required or permitted to by law). You can obtain further information about how we assess our legitimate interests against any potential impact on you in respect of specific activities by contacting us.

Performance of Contract means processing your data where it is necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are a party or to take steps at your request before entering into such a contract.

Comply with a legal obligation means processing your personal data where it is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation that we are subject to.