Privacy notice.

This notice explains how Gardiner's collects, uses, stores and protects personal information, whether you are someone receiving care, a family member or representative, someone enquiring about care, or a visitor to our website. If you work for us or have applied to, a separate notice for staff and applicants applies.

Who we are and how to contact us

"Gardiner's" is two companies, each of which is a data controller registered with the Information Commissioner's Office: Gardiner's Homecare Limited (company number 07264648, ICO registration Z2673981), which provides hourly and overnight care, and Gardiner's Live-In Care Limited (company number 08468247, ICO registration ZA323212), which provides live-in care. The company that provides your care is the controller of your information. The two companies share an office team and systems, and act together where the office team handles your information; Gardiner's Homecare Limited is the point of contact for both.

Our Data Protection Lead is Simon Mahony, Director. You can contact him about anything in this notice, or to exercise your rights, at info@gardinershomecare.co.uk, on 0118 334 7474, or by writing to Gardiner's, Unit A, 82 James Carter Road, Mildenhall, Suffolk, IP28 7DE.

Visitors to our website

Enquiry and callback forms. When you complete a form on our website we collect your name, telephone number, email address and whatever you tell us about the care you are looking for. We use this to respond to you and, if you wish, to arrange an assessment. The lawful basis is our legitimate interest in responding to people who ask us about our services. Form submissions are passed to our enquiry system (see below) and the copy held by our website provider is deleted after 12 months.

Cookies. Our website uses cookies that are necessary for it to work, which do not need your consent. It also uses analytics cookies (Google Analytics), which tell us how visitors use the site, and cookies set by embedded content and advertising services (YouTube and Facebook), which may be used by those companies to recognise you across websites. We ask for your consent through the cookie banner before setting any analytics or advertising cookie, and you can change your choice at any time through the cookie settings link on the site or by blocking cookies in your browser.

Newsletter and marketing. If you sign up to hear from us we use your email address to send you the information you asked for, through our email service provider, until you unsubscribe. Every email has an unsubscribe link, and we act on it immediately. We do not sell or share your details with anyone else for their marketing.

People enquiring about care

When you or someone acting for you contacts us about care, we record your name, contact details and address, the name and contact details of the person enquiring if that is not you, what you tell us about the support needed and the health conditions behind it, and notes of our calls and visits. We hold this in our enquiry system and in email, and calls to the office are recorded. We use it to understand what you need, to arrange and carry out an assessment, to give you a quotation, and to follow up with you. The lawful basis is our legitimate interest in responding to and following up enquiries; for the health information you tell us, it is that the information is necessary for us to assess whether and how we can provide your care. If you ask us to stop contacting you, we will, and if you ask us to delete your enquiry we will do so straight away. Otherwise, if care does not go ahead, we delete the enquiry two years after we last heard from you, because people often come back to us many months after a first conversation.

People receiving care, and their families and representatives

What we hold. Once you become a client we hold: your personal details, address, key safe code and emergency contacts; the details of family members, attorneys, deputies and others you ask us to work with; your assessment, care plan and risk assessments; your medical history, conditions, medication, allergies, mobility and, where relevant, information about your mental capacity; your preferences, routines and, where they affect your care, your religion, culture, diet and background; the daily records our carers make of each visit, including medication given, and any incident, complaint or safeguarding record; correspondence with you, your family and the professionals involved in your care; and your invoicing and payment details, including your bank details if you pay by Direct Debit. Much of this is "special category" information, which the law protects more strictly.

Where it comes from. From you and the people who support you; from your GP, district nurses, hospital, social worker and other professionals; and from our own staff as they provide your care.

Why we use it. To assess your needs and plan your care; to provide your care safely, including giving our carers the information they need for each visit; to communicate with your family and representatives and with the professionals involved in your care; to deal with any incident, complaint or concern; to invoice and collect payment; to meet our legal duties as a registered care provider, including keeping accurate records and notifying our regulator of certain events; to review and improve the quality of our care, and to train our staff.

Lawful basis. We process your information because it is necessary to perform our contract with you and to meet our legal obligations as a provider registered with the Care Quality Commission under the Health and Social Care Act 2008. We process your health and other special category information because it is necessary for the provision of health and social care by staff who are bound by a duty of confidentiality. Where we rely on your consent, for example to share information with a solicitor or insurer acting for you, or to give a family member access to your records through the family app, we will ask for it clearly and you can withdraw it at any time. We make no decisions about you by automated means.

The family app. If you wish, people you nominate can see your care plan and visit records through the family section of our care management app. You choose who has access and can ask us to remove it at any time.

Telephone calls. Calls to and from our office are recorded. You hear a message telling you so when you call. We use recordings to check what was agreed, to look into complaints and incidents, and to train staff. The lawful basis is our legitimate interest in running a safe and accountable service. Recordings are deleted automatically after six months.

Carer visits. When a carer arrives at and leaves your home, our care management app records the time and location so that we can confirm each visit took place and respond quickly if a carer is late. This records the carer's location, not yours, and only at those moments.

Who we share information with

We share your information only where it is needed for your care, where the law requires it, or where you have agreed.

• The people involved in your care: your GP, district nurses, pharmacist, hospital, social worker, occupational therapist and other professionals, so that they have the information they need to treat and support you safely; and, in an emergency, ambulance staff. We seek your permission where we can; where you cannot give it, we share what is in your best interests.
• Your family and representatives: the people you nominate, anyone holding a lasting power of attorney or deputyship for you, and your emergency contacts.
• Our regulator and public bodies: the Care Quality Commission, which inspects our records and may contact you to ask about your care; your local authority where it funds or has arranged your care, or in connection with a safeguarding enquiry; the police and the coroner where the law requires. If we believe you are at risk of harm we may share relevant information with the local safeguarding team.
• Organisations that provide services to us ("processors"), who handle your information only on our instructions and under contract: our care management system (Birdie), our email and document system (Google Workspace), our telephone system, our Direct Debit provider (GoCardless) and our accountants, who see invoicing information only.
• Our group company in South Africa, Kinalta Group SA (Pty) Ltd, whose staff provide administrative support to our office team: scheduling and arranging cover, answering the telephone including out of hours, and invoicing. They work on our systems under our instructions, are vetted and trained to the same standard as our UK staff, and cannot copy or keep your information.

We never sell your information, and we never share it with anyone for their own marketing.

Where your information is kept. Our care records, email and telephone recordings are held in the United Kingdom; some of our office tools are hosted in the European Union, which the UK recognises as providing equivalent protection. Our group company accesses our systems from South Africa, and some of our software suppliers provide support from the United States. Both are international transfers under UK law, and each is covered by an approved safeguard: the Information Commissioner's International Data Transfer Agreement with our group company, and the UK's approved contractual clauses or the UK-US Data Bridge with suppliers. You can ask us for details of these safeguards.

Research and planning. We do not share your confidential information for research or planning purposes. If that changed, the national data opt-out would apply and we would tell you first.

How long we keep your information

• Care records, including your care plan, visit records, medication records and correspondence: 8 years after your care ends, following the NHS Records Management Code of Practice for adult social care records. Paper records at your home are collected when care ends and kept with your office file.
• Invoices and payment records: 6 years after the end of the financial year they relate to, as tax law requires.
• Enquiries that do not become care: 2 years after we last heard from you, or straight away if you ask.
• Telephone call recordings: 6 months.
• Website enquiry forms: 12 months; newsletter details until you unsubscribe.

We may keep a record for longer where there is an open complaint, claim, inquest or safeguarding enquiry, or where a regulator or court requires it; if so we note the reason and review it each year. When a period ends, electronic records are deleted and paper is shredded.

Your rights

You have the right to:

• ask for a copy of the information we hold about you (we do not normally charge);
• ask us to correct information that is inaccurate or incomplete;
• ask us to delete information that we no longer need, or that we hold with your consent, unless we must keep it to meet a legal or regulatory duty;
• ask us to restrict what we do with your information while a question about its accuracy or our use of it is resolved;
• object to any use of your information that is based on our legitimate interests, including call recording and following up an enquiry, and to object at any time to marketing;
• receive the information you gave us in an electronic format you can take elsewhere, where we hold it by automated means on the basis of our contract with you; and
• withdraw any consent you have given, at any time.

To exercise any of these rights, contact the Data Protection Lead using the details at the top of this notice. We may need to confirm your identity, and that of anyone acting for you, before we act. We respond within one month; that period pauses while we wait for identity confirmation or for you to clarify a request, and for a complex request we may take up to two further months, in which case we will tell you why within the first month. If you cannot make a request yourself, your attorney or deputy can make it for you, and we will consider a request from a family member where it is in your best interests.

Complaints. If you are unhappy with how we have handled your information or your request, please tell us first: we will acknowledge your complaint within 30 days and reply in writing with what we have found. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF, 0303 123 1113, ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint.

Changes to this notice

This notice was last updated on 18 October 2026 and is reviewed at least once a year. If we make a significant change to how we use your information we will tell you directly, as well as updating this page.