Data privacy for Partners

Utility Warehouse Limited (“Utility Warehouse”, “UW”, “we” or “us”) has issued this Privacy Notice (“Notice”) on behalf of itself and its affiliates within the Utility Warehouse group to describe how we handle personal data that we hold about our independent distributors of Utility Warehouse’s goods and services whom we refer to as ‘Partners’ (collectively referred to as “you”).

If you have any questions or concerns about our use of your personal data, please contact us at [email protected]. You can also write to us at Utility Warehouse 508 Edgware Road, London NW9 5AB.

The data controller of your personal data is Utility Warehouse Limited, which is registered with the ICO with registration number ZA243042  and/or one of its affiliates within the Group.

Please take a moment to read this Privacy Notice so that you understand how we use your personal data. If we change the way we collect or handle your personal data, we will update this Privacy Notice and you will be able to see the changes here.

Where you are also a customer of UW, please also refer to our Customer Privacy Notice. 

The affiliates within our group of companies (‘the Group’) include:

• Electricity Plus Supply Limited;

• Gas Plus Supply Limited;

• Telecom Plus PLC;

• Telecommunications Management Limited;

• Utilities Plus Limited;

• Utility Warehouse Limited;

• Utility Debt Collectors Limited; and

• 1p Mobile Limited.

This list of companies will be updated from time to time to reflect any changes.

As a Partner of Utility Warehouse, or when making an application to become a Partner, we will  process personal data  about you and if necessary your dependents, and other individuals whose personal data  has been provided to us. The types of personal data we may process include, but are not limited to:

• Identification data – such as your name, gender, photograph, date of birth, driving licence details, staff member IDs.

• Contact details – such as home and business address, telephone/email addresses, emergency contact details.

• Background information – such as criminal records data (for vetting purposes, where permissible and in accordance with applicable law).

• National identifiers – such as national ID/passport.

• Financial information – such as the amount you earn from your position as a Partner and money loaned to you (e.g. to obtain a vehicle through hire purchase).

• IT information – information required to provide access to company-hosted IT systems and networks such as IP addresses, log files and login information which you may need to use as a Partner.

Sensitive personal data includes any information that reveals your racial or ethnic origin, religious, political or philosophical beliefs, genetic data, biometric data for the purposes of unique identification, trade union membership, or information about your health/sex life and personal data relating to criminal convictions and offences (“Sensitive Personal Data”). We only process this type of information in very limited circumstances, where authorised by law or where necessary to comply with applicable laws.

However, in some circumstances we may need to collect, or request on a voluntary disclosure basis some Sensitive Personal Data for legitimate purposes (for example: information about criminal convictions for insurance purposes).

We may use your personal data for the purposes of assisting you with your business development activities, for due diligence purposes to ensure that you are permitted to act as a Partner in relation to the sale of Utility Warehouse services, training and sales quality purposes, to allow you to hire or purchase vehicles from us, or to permit you to borrow funds from us for your business development purposes.

If you apply for any credit with us, such as to participate in the UW Vehicle Plan, we will carry out additional checks through approved third party suppliers. We are required to perform these checks to comply with our regulatory obligations when providing finance. These are checks to:

• Verify your identity;

• Assess your credit worthiness. Such credit checks may form a “footprint” on your credit file that may be visible to other organisations. The external credit reference agency will provide us with your credit information, such as your credit score and any judgements against you which will allow us to assess your ability to pay; and

• Comply with our anti-money laundering, anti-terrorist financing and anti-bribery and corruption obligations by checking sanctions lists, politically exposed persons lists, adverse media sources and other publicly available information. In certain circumstances, we may also ask you for further information about the source of funds you are using or about how your wealth was accumulated and will process the information and documents you provide. Please find further information here before making such an application https://www.equifax.co.uk/privacy-hub/crain. 

Other legitimate business purposes 

We may also process your personal data to investigate violations of law or breaches of the Partner Policies and Guidelines. We may monitor your business performance in compliance with our policies and procedures and we may also use your personal data to reward you with benefits or holidays for or other incentives (for example, to book reward activities on your behalf). We will also use your personal data in relation to disciplinary procedures in accordance with our policies and procedures.

To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations

We also may use your personal data where we consider it necessary for complying with laws and regulations, including collecting and disclosing personal data as required by law (e.g. in connection with anti-money laundering, tax, health and safety, anti-discrimination laws), under judicial authorisation, or to exercise or defend the legal rights of the Utility Warehouse group of companies.

We take care to allow access to personal data only to those who require such access to perform their tasks and duties, and to third parties who have a legitimate purpose for accessing it. Whenever we permit a third party to access personal data, we will implement appropriate measures to ensure the data is used in a manner consistent with this Notice and that the security and confidentiality of the information is maintained.

We may disclose your personal data to the following categories of recipients:

• Group companies: As mentioned above, we will share your personal data with other members of the Utility Warehouse group for other legitimate business purposes such as IT services/security, tax and accounting, to process the hire purchase of vehicles and general business management.

• Third party service providers: In addition, we make certain personal data available to third parties who provide services to us. We do so on a “need to know basis” and in accordance with applicable data privacy law. For example, some personal data will be available to third-party companies who provide us with commission payment support services and assist you with your business development activities and to help improve the success of your sales, for example with training providers and merchandising stores. We may share your personal data with third parties when arranging incentives or for you to receive benefits or other incentives, to enable you to exercise your share options, or to ask you to fill in performance/satisfaction surveys. As stated above, if you apply for credit to purchase a vehicle for example we use third party credit reference agencies.

• Other third parties: We may also disclose personal data to third parties on other lawful grounds, including:

  • To comply with our legal obligations, including where necessary to abide by law, regulation or contract, or to respond to a court order, administrative or judicial process, including, but not limited to, a subpoena, government audit or search warrant.

  • Where we are required or permitted by law to report suspected financial crime to law enforcement or regulatory agencies. 

  • In response to lawful requests by public authorities (including for national security or law enforcement purposes).

  • To regulatory and law enforcement agencies, where we are required or requested to provide information. 

  • As necessary to establish, exercise or defend against potential, threatened or actual litigation.

  • Where necessary to protect the vital interests of another person.

  • In connection with the sale, assignment or other transfer of all or part of our business.

  • With your consent.

Our legal basis for collecting and using the personal data described above will depend on the personal data concerned and the specific context in which we collect it.

However, we will normally collect personal data from you where we need the personal data to perform a contract with you (i.e. to administer a contract to enable you to be independent distributor of Utility Warehouse goods and services), or where the processing that personal data is in our legitimate interests (for example, conducting performance and satisfaction surveys, carrying out disciplinary action, and providing training and screening) and not overridden by your data protection interests or fundamental rights and freedoms.

In some cases, we may also have a legal obligation to collect personal data from you or may otherwise need the personal data to protect your vital interests or those of another person.

We use AI and other automated tools to support how we work with our Partners. For example, we may use them in business development support, due diligence and onboarding

checks, identity, credit, sanctions and anti-money-laundering screening (including where you apply for finance such as the UW Vehicle Plan), monitoring sales quality and compliance with the Partner Policies and Guidelines, and calculating commissions and incentives.

Where a decision could have a legal effect on you or a similarly significant effect — for example, whether you can act as a Partner or whether we can provide you with finance — we do not rely on AI alone. A suitably trained member of our team reviews the outcome before it takes effect and can change it. No significant decision about you is made solely by automated means.

Where this processing involves sensitive (special category) personal data, we apply additional protections and only carry it out where the law allows.

If you have questions about or need further information concerning the legal basis on which we collect and use your personal data, please email us at [email protected].

Our suppliers operate at a global level, we may need to transfer personal data to suppliers based in countries other than the ones in which the information was originally collected. When we export your personal data to a different country, we will take steps to ensure that such data exports comply with applicable laws. For example, if we transfer personal information from the United Kingdom to a country outside which has not been approved as providing an ‘adequate’ level of protection’ by the UK, we will implement an appropriate data transfer mechanism.  We rely on the UK’s International Data Transfer Agreement or EU Standard Contractual Clauses with the International Data Transfer Addendum as appropriate.  You can request a copy of such a transfer mechanism.

Personal data will be kept as long as needed to carry out the purposes described in this Notice or as otherwise required by applicable law. Generally this means your personal data will be retained for as long as you are a Partner and/or in receipt of a residual income from us plus a period of seven years thereafter in accordance with our document retention policy.

We will use your contact details to send you direct marketing about our own similar products, services and Partner opportunities that we think will be of interest to you. We do this on the basis of our legitimate interests and, for electronic messages (such as email, WhatsApp, in app and SMS), in reliance on the "soft opt-in" — because we obtained your details when you first subscribed to become a Partner. You can ask us to stop sending you direct marketing at any time by contacting us.

You have various privacy rights in relation to your personal data:

• Accessing your personal data: You can request a copy of your personal data at any time;

• Correcting your personal data: You can ask us to correct the personal data we hold on you if it is incorrect;

• Erasing your personal data: You can ask us to delete your personal data (this only applies in certain circumstances);

• Objecting to or restricting processing of your personal data: You can object to our processing of your personal data (this only applies in certain circumstances);

• Transferring your personal data: You can ask us to transfer your personal data to you or a third party, including a new supplier should you choose to move your services away;

• Withdrawing your consent to processing: You can withdraw your consent (where we have relied on it) to our processing of your personal data. However this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing conducted prior to your withdrawal;

• You can opt-out of marketing communications;

We respond to all requests from individuals wishing to exercise their data protection rights in accordance with data protection law. We aim to respond to your request within one month; however, if it is complex or you make several requests, we may extend our time to respond. If we do, we will inform you.

You are able to exercise your rights free of charge, however if you make unfounded, repetitive or excessive requests, we may charge a fee or refuse to carry out your requests.

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your personal data or the response to any request regarding your personal data, you have the right to raise a complaint directly with us. You can do so by contacting our Data Protection team at [email protected] or by writing to us at the address above, setting out the details of your concern.

We will acknowledge receipt of your complaint within 30 days and will investigate it and respond to you without undue delay.  If you remain dissatisfied with the outcome, you also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK's independent data protection regulator.  Please note that the ICO will generally expect you to have raised your concern with us first. The ICO can be contacted: 

• Online: ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint

• By telephone: 0303 123 1113

• By Post: Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF.

We respond to all requests from individuals wishing to exercise their data protection rights in accordance with data protection law. We will try to respond to your request within one month; however, if it is complex or you make several requests, we may extend our time to respond. If we do, we will inform you.

You are able to exercise your rights free of charge, however if you make unfounded, repetitive or excessive requests, we may charge a fee or refuse to carry out your requests.

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