What we keep,and what we do not.

A Place Called Here is a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation (SCIO), registered with the Scottish Charity Regulator as charity number SC054556. We are the data controller for the information described on this page, which means we decide how it is used and we are responsible for looking after it.

We are a small charity run by volunteers, so we have not appointed a data protection officer. Our trustees are responsible for data protection. For anything on this page, email Aplacecalledhere1@gmail.com.

• We do not take notes, keep files or record what anyone says in the room.
• This website sets no cookies, uses no analytics and does not track you.
• We never sell your information, and we never share it for marketing.
• Funders see anonymous numbers, and only the stories people have agreed to share.
• If we believe someone’s life is in danger, we will get them help. That is explained below.
• You can ask what we hold about you, and ask us to correct or delete it, at any time.

You do not have to give us your full name, your contact details or anything about your loss to come to the group. There is no referral form, no assessment and no sign-in sheet.

We keep a simple count of how many people attend each week, with no names attached, because funders ask us to show the group is used. Anonymous counts are not personal information.

We keep your name, your contact details and what you tell us, so we can reply and so we have a record of the conversation. When you write to someone at a bereavement charity you may tell us about your health, your feelings or the person you lost. The law treats information about health as special category data and expects extra care with it, and we give it that care.

Why we are allowed to: replying to people who contact us is in our legitimate interests and in yours (UK GDPR Article 6(1)(f)). Where you choose to tell us about your health, we rely on your explicit consent to keep it for that conversation (Article 9(2)(a)), and you can ask us to delete it at any time.

Email reaches us through Google’s email service. Messages sent through Instagram or Facebook are also held by Meta under its own privacy policy. We will not add you to a mailing list unless you ask to be added.

We are a peer support group, not a clinical or emergency service. If something you tell us makes us believe that you, or someone else, is at serious and immediate risk of harm, we may share what is needed with the emergency services, your GP or another appropriate service, without asking first. We will tell you we have done so, unless telling you would put someone at greater risk.

We are allowed to do this to protect someone’s life (UK GDPR Articles 6(1)(d) and 9(2)(c)) and to safeguard people at risk (Data Protection Act 2018, Schedule 1, paragraph 18). We keep a brief record of what was shared, with whom and why.

We invite people who come to the group to fill in a feedback survey, which runs on Google Forms. It is entirely optional and it asks about things like loneliness, coping and wellbeing. You do not need to give your name.

We use the answers to improve the group and to report anonymous findings to funders. Where answers include information about your health, we rely on your explicit consent, given by choosing to complete the survey (UK GDPR Articles 6(1)(a) and 9(2)(a)). Nothing that could identify you is ever passed to a funder.

Some people choose to write or film something about what the group has meant to them. Nothing is published without your written permission. You choose whether your name is used, and you can withdraw your permission at any time by emailing us. When you do, we take it off this website and our own social media pages straight away.

Our legal basis is your consent (UK GDPR Articles 6(1)(a) and 9(2)(a)).

We take photographs and film at the group’s events and walks. Nobody identifiable appears in anything we publish without having agreed to it, and we will remove an image on request without asking you why.

Our legal basis is your consent (UK GDPR Article 6(1)(a)). Once an image is removed from this website and our own pages we cannot recall copies other people have already saved or shared, or printed materials already handed out, but we will stop using it.

Online donations go through JustGiving, which handles your payment details and any Gift Aid declaration under its own privacy policy. We never see your card details. JustGiving passes us your name, the amount and any message only if you choose to share them, and we use them to say thank you.

If you or your business sponsors a mile, an event or our work, we keep the contact details we need to arrange it and to thank you, and the name you have asked us to dedicate a mile to. We rely on our legitimate interests, and on the arrangement we have made with you (UK GDPR Article 6(1)(b) and (f)). We keep financial records because charity accounting rules and HMRC require us to (Article 6(1)(c)).

This website sets no cookies and stores nothing in your browser. It has no analytics, no advertising and no tracking pixels, so there is no cookie banner because there is nothing to agree to.

Like every website, our hosting provider, Vercel, briefly records technical details such as your IP address and the pages requested, to keep the site running and secure. This is in our legitimate interests (UK GDPR Article 6(1)(f)).

• The map showing where the group meets comes from OpenStreetMap. To draw it, your browser connects to OpenStreetMap’s servers, which see your IP address. It sets no cookies.
• The podcast videos do not load anything from YouTube until you press play. Before that you are only seeing a picture stored on our own site. When you press play, the video loads from YouTube in its privacy-enhanced mode, and from that point YouTube’s own privacy policy and cookies apply.
• Links to Instagram, Facebook, JustGiving and Google Forms take you to those services, and their own privacy policies apply once you are there.

We only use services we need to run the charity, and we share the least we can. They are:

• Google, for email and the feedback survey.
• Vercel, which hosts this website.
• JustGiving, for online donations, as an organisation in its own right.
• Meta, if you contact us through Instagram or Facebook.
• The emergency services or another appropriate service, only in the circumstances described under “If we are worried someone is at risk”.

We may also share information if the law requires it, for example with the police or a court. We will never sell your information or give it to anyone for marketing.

Some of these services store data outside the UK, including in the United States. Where they do, the transfer is protected by safeguards recognised under UK data protection law, such as the UK–US data bridge or contract terms approved by the Information Commissioner.

• Emails and messages: up to two years after our last contact with you, then deleted, unless you ask us to delete them sooner.
• Survey answers: turned into anonymous figures, with the original responses deleted within twelve months. The anonymous figures are kept.
• Stories, photographs and film: for as long as you are happy for us to use them. When you withdraw permission, we delete our copies within one month.
• Donation, sponsorship and Gift Aid records: six years after the end of the financial year they relate to, as charity accounting rules and HMRC require.
• Records of a concern about someone’s safety: six years, then deleted.
• Website hosting logs: kept by Vercel for a short period and then deleted automatically.

You have the right to:

• ask for a copy of the information we hold about you;
• ask us to correct anything that is wrong or incomplete;
• ask us to delete your information;
• ask us to stop using it, or to limit how we use it, while a concern is sorted out;
• object to us using it where we rely on our legitimate interests;
• ask for information you gave us in a format you can take elsewhere;
• withdraw your consent at any time, where we rely on it. This does not affect anything we did with your consent before you withdrew it.

To use any of these rights, email Aplacecalledhere1@gmail.com. It is free, and we will reply within one month. We may ask you to confirm who you are before we share anything, so that we never give someone’s information to the wrong person. Some rights have legal limits, and if one applies we will explain it.

We do not make decisions about anyone by automated means, and we do not profile anyone.

The group is for adults aged eighteen and over, and this website is not aimed at children. We do not knowingly collect information from anyone under eighteen.

Please tell us first at Aplacecalledhere1@gmail.com and we will try to put it right. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office, the UK’s data protection regulator, at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113.

We will update this page if anything about how we handle information changes. It was last updated on 13 October 2026.