Who we are
We are a Local Authority established under the Local Government etc. (Scotland) Act 1994 and have our Headquarters at Newtown St Boswells, Melrose, TD6 0SA. You can contact our Customer Advice and Support Service by:
- email: CustomerAdvice@scotborders.gov.uk
- phone: 0300 100 1800
Our Data Protection Officer can be contacted using the details above or by emailing dataprotection@scotborders.gov.uk
How we will use your information
The personal information we hold about you may be collected by:
- online form
- phone
- a member of our staff
- one of our partners
This notice is for customers who have given us their personal information, their company’s information or alternatively where we have been provided with information from:
- the Assessor
- other Local Authorities
- other services
- Management Agents
- Solicitors
- outgoing owners or tenants
- Debt Recovery agents
- NEC Software Solutions UK Limited
- Civica UK Limited
We will use your information for the administration and collection of Non Domestic Rates. Where an application is received for Non Domestic Rates Relief or Exemption this will allow us to assess eligibility and award it if entitled. Where an overpayment of Non Domestic Rates is made, we will use your information to refund the payment to you. To increase transparency around the use of public funds through NDR relief awards we are required by Scottish Government to publish information on our website about reliefs awarded; personal information will be removed prior to publication.
We provide these services to you as part of our statutory duty under the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1975, the Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015, the Planning etc. (Scotland) Act 2006. Without this information, we would be unable to undertake the administrative duties within this service, resulting in an impact to public funds and vital services.
We process personal data. Personal data is information which can be used to identify you such as your:
- name
- previous name
- address
- previous address
- date of birth
- phone number
- email address
- information about other people, such as agents who act on your behalf
Who we may share your information with
Your information will be accessed by our staff who need to do so in order to provide the service described above. We are legally obliged to safeguard public funds so details will be checked internally for fraud prevention and verification purposes and may be shared with other public bodies for the same purpose, who may in turn share this information with us.
Information will only be shared with other bodies where we are required or permitted to do so by law. We share information:
- internally, where permitted by law
- For the administration and collection of Council Tax
- Sheriff Officers - where Non Domestic Rates debt is subject to a Summary Warrant we use our Debt Management Partners are Walker Love and Scott & Company, this information cannot be used by the Sheriff Officer for any other purpose
- The Assessor for the Scottish Borders
- HMRC
- Scottish Government
- other Local Authorities
- Our Data Processors (e.g. Civica on Demand)
- other external companies in relation to the collection of unpaid Non-Domestic Rates
- our external printers - Xerox Business Services and Digital Printing Solutions & CFH Docmail Ltd
- LoCTA Limited
- Where there is a requirement for translation and interpreting services we may share your data with any of the following as appropriate:
- Language Line
- Alpha Translating and Interpreting Services LTD
- Scottish Borders Interpreter Agency
- Contact Scotland BSL
- Royal Blind – Scottish Braille Press
We may also need to process more sensitive personal information about you for reasons of substantial public interest as set out in the Data Protection Act 2018.
Your information may also be shared and analysed internally in order to provide management information, inform service delivery reform and similar purposes to meet our duty to achieve best value and continuous service improvement.
In general we do not transfer personal data outside either the UK or the European Economic Area (EEA) and on the rare occasions when we do we will inform you. We will only transfer data outside the UK and the EEA when we are satisfied that the party which will handle the data and the country it is processing it in will provide adequate safeguards for personal privacy.
Decision making
We do not use automated decision-making processes. Some processes are semi-automated (such as anti-fraud data matching) but a human decision maker will always be involved before any decision is reached in relation to you.
Information you have given us about other people
If you have provided anyone else's details on this form, please make sure that you have told them that you have given their information to ud. We will only use this information to contact those people to assess your own entitlement to this service. If they want any more information on how we will use their data they can view our privacy statement or email dataprotection@scotborders.gov.uk
How long do we keep your information for?
We currently keep your information without time limit where you are or have been liable for Non Domestic Rates in the Scottish Borders. We have a project underway to implement the deletion of Non Domestic Rates information that we hold about you where your Non Domestic Rates has been paid in full. The project will determine the period we can retain your information. The full range of circumstances where we will keep or delete information is also being decided as part of this project and will be detailed here once the project reaches completion.
Your Rights
You have the right to request access to any personal data held about you by us. You can also request that we restrict the use of your information or even object to any further processing. You can do this by contacting the Data Protection Officer. We will respond to your request within 30 calendar days.
For more information on your rights please visit our website or alternatively if you would like a hard copy of this information, please contact us.
How to raise a complaint
We aim to directly resolve all complaints about how we handle personal information. If your complaint is about how we have handled your personal information, you can contact the Data Protection Officer by email dataprotection@scotborders.gov.uk or phone 0300 100 1800.
However, you also have the right to lodge a complaint about data protection matters with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), who can be contacted by:
- post: Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF
- phone: 0303 123 1113
- website
If your complaint is not about a data protection matter you can find details on how to make a complaint.