BIF – the Brain Injured and Families, European Confederation is committed to your privacy.

This policy explains when and why we collect personal information about people who visit our website, how we use it, the conditions under which we may disclose it to others and how we keep it secure.

We may change this policy from time to time so please check this page occasionally to ensure that you’re happy with any changes. By using our website, you’re agreeing to be bound by this Policy.

Any questions regarding this policy and our privacy practices should be sent by email to bifsecretariat@headway.org.uk or by calling us on +44 208 640 8413.

How do we collect information from you?

We obtain information about you when you use our website, for example, when you complete our forms and surveys, use our services or register for our email newsletter.

We are committed to protecting your privacy and will use your personal information in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR).

What type of information is collected from you?

The personal information we collect might include your name, address, email address, IP address, and information regarding what pages are accessed and when.

How is your information used?

We may use your information to:

• respond to an enquiry you have sent to us through the website.
• seek your views or comments on the services we provide;
• notify you of changes to our services;
• send you communications which you have requested and consented to receiving. These may include information about campaigns, events such as TBI Challenge, appeals, other fundraising activities, promotions of our associated companies goods and services;
• process a grant or job application
• contact you about your membership or payment
• process/renew applications to umbrella organisations such as EDF (European Disability Forum)

We review our retention periods for personal information on a regular basis. We are legally required to hold some types of information to fulfil our statutory obligations (for example tax purposes). We will hold your personal information on our systems for as long as is necessary for the relevant activity, or as long as is set out in any relevant contract you hold with us.

Who has access to your information?

We will not sell or rent your information to third parties. We will not share your information with third parties for marketing purposes.

We may share your information with third party umbrella organisations e.g. EDF (European Disability Forum), in order to renew/process membership applications.

Third-party service providers working on our behalf: We may pass your information to our third-party service providers, agents subcontractors and other associated organisations for the purposes of completing tasks and providing services to you on our behalf. 

Examples of third-party service providers with which we may share your information include:

• cloud-based database services like Salesforce, Wufoo or similar in connection with surveys, for example;
• mail houses for the distribution of BIF News or other requested mailings;

When we use third-party service providers, we disclose only the personal information that is necessary to deliver the service and we have a contract in place that requires them to keep your information secure and not to use it for their own direct marketing purposes. Please be reassured that we will not release your information to third parties for them to use for their own direct marketing purposes, unless you have requested us to do so, or we are required to do so by law, for example, by a court order or for the purposes of prevention of fraud or other crime.

We may transfer your personal information to a third party as part of a sale of some or all of our business and assets to any third party or as part of any business restructuring or reorganisation, or if we’re under a duty to disclose or share your personal data in order to comply with any legal obligation or to enforce or apply our terms of use or to protect the rights, property or safety of our supporters and customers. However, we will take steps with the aim of ensuring that your privacy rights continue to be protected.

Some parts of the service provided on this website are provided by third-party service providers and not by us. You consent to us transferring your personal information to such third-party service providers for the purposes of dealing with your queries and for the purposes of record keeping. We require all third-party service providers to conform in full to the General Data Protection Regulation.

Your choices

We would like to send you information on the latest news, campaigns, fundraising and events from BIF, however you have a choice about whether or not you wish to receive information from us.

We will not contact you for marketing purposes by email, post, phone or text message unless you have given your prior consent, and you can opt-out at any time.
You can change your marketing preferences by emailing the BIF Secretariat bifsecretariat@headway.org.uk

How you can access and update your information

The accuracy of your information is important to us. If you change email address, or any of the other information we hold is inaccurate or out of date, please email us at: bifsecretariat@headway.org.uk, or write to us at: Unit 1 College Fields, 16 Prince George’s Road, London, SW19 2PT. Alternatively, you can telephone +44 208 640 8413.
You have the right to ask for a copy of the information BIF holds about you. To make such a request, email bifsecretariat@headway.org.uk or call +44 208 640 8413.

Security precautions in place to protect the loss, misuse or alteration of your information

We take appropriate measures to ensure all personal data is treated securely. The BIF website is encrypted and protected with the latest 128-bit encryption on TLS.
This means that any data you send to us is secure, although you should take steps to ensure the device you are using is free from malware and use caution when connected to open WiFi networks.

Once we receive your information, we endeavour to ensure its security on our systems.

Where we have given (or where you have chosen) a password which enables you to access certain parts of our websites or services, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share your password with anyone.

Targeted information

We may analyse how you interact with us to ensure the information we send to you is of relevance and interest. We may also use your personal information to detect and reduce fraud and credit risk.

Links to other websites

Our website may contain links to other websites run by other organisations. This privacy policy applies only to our website‚ so we encourage you to read the privacy statements on the other websites you visit. We cannot be responsible for the privacy policies and practices of other sites even if you access them using links from our website.

In addition, if you linked to our website from a third-party site, we cannot be responsible for the privacy policies and practices of the owners and operators of that third-party site and recommend that you check the policy of that third-party site.

16 or under

Protecting the privacy of children aged 16 or under is of paramount importance. If you are aged 16 or under‚ please get your parent/guardian’s permission before providing us with personal information.

Transferring your information outside of Europe

As part of the services offered to you through this website, the information which you provide to us may be transferred to countries outside the European Union (“EU”). By way of example, this may happen if any of our servers are from time-to-time located in a country outside of the EU. These countries may not have similar data protection laws to the UK. By submitting your personal data, you’re agreeing to this transfer, storing or processing. If we transfer your information outside of the EU in this way, we will take steps to ensure that appropriate security measures are taken with the aim of ensuring that your privacy rights continue to be protected as outlined in this policy.

Use of ‘cookies’

Like many other websites, the BIF website uses cookies. ‘Cookies’ are small pieces of information sent by an organisation to your computer and stored on your hard drive to allow that website to recognise you when you visit. They collect statistical data about your browsing actions and patterns and do not identify you as an individual. For example, we use cookies to store your country preference. This helps us to improve our website and deliver a better more personalised service.

It is possible to switch off cookies by setting your browser preferences. For more information on how to switch off cookies on your computer, visit allaboutcookies.org. Turning cookies off may result in a loss of functionality when using our website.

What is a cookie?

A cookie is a small text file that is stored on your computer when you visit a website. Cookies don’t usually contain any personal information and are mostly useful to you. Generally they are used to improve your experience and inform marketers of your journey, so that in turn they can make improvements to the website.

Essential

‘Essential’ cookies let you move around the website ensuring that the vital features, like keeping you logged in and updating your shopping basket, work. These cookies don’t gather any information that could be used for marketing purposes or remembering where you have been on the internet.

Essential cookies will NOT be used to:

• Gather information that could then be used to advertise products or services to you
• Remember your username or preference beyond your current visit

As the lowest level of cookies available, accepting ‘essential’ cookies is a condition of using BIF. Without these cookies our website wouldn’t function and would become very difficult for you to use.

Functional

‘Functional’ cookies help us remember settings and preferences that will improve your web experience, e.g. how many search results you wish to view and in what order.

They also enable us to collect information about how you use our website, like which pages you view and if there are any errors. These cookies don’t collect any personal information that could identify you – it’s all anonymous and is only used to help us improve our website, understand what interests our users, and measure how effective our advertising is.

We use functional cookies to:

• Remember settings you’ve applied, such as layout of the search page
• Ensure the website looks consistent throughout
• Provide statistics on how our website is used
• Understand how effective our campaigns are
• Help us improve the website by measuring any errors that occur
• Test different designs of our website

Functional cookies will NOT be used to:

• Gather information that could be used to target you with adverts on other websites
• Remember your preferences or username beyond your current visit

In some cases, some of these cookies are managed for us by third parties, but we don’t allow the third party to use the cookies for any purpose other than those listed above.

You can control whether or not these cookies are used, but preventing them will reduce the ease of use on our website and we cannot guarantee how our site will perform for you.

The cookies we define as ‘functional’ are:

Cookie(s)	What the cookie does
First party	Remembers the users search preferences (e.g. view by latest or price)
Google Analytics	Collects anonymous information about a user’s journey on the website. (e.g. where they came from, if there were any errors)

Behavioural

Behavioural cookies are linked to services provided by third parties, such as Like buttons and Share buttons. The third party provides these services in return for recognising that you have visited our website.

We use behavioural cookies to:

• Link to social networks like Facebook, who may subsequently use information about your visit to target advertising to you on other websites

You can control whether or not these cookies are used, but preventing them stop us from offering you some services. All of these cookies are managed by third parties, and you may alternatively use the third parties’ own tools to prevent these cookies.

The cookies we define as ‘behavioural’ are:

Cookie(s)	What the cookie does	Reference
You Tube	Allows a user to watch videos without leaving the website	You Tube
Facebook	Provides a better user experience through social integration	Facebook

Further information on cookies:

Useful info: http://www.allaboutcookies.org

Internet Advertising Agency: http://www.youronlinechoices.eu

International Chamber of Commerce United Kingdom: www.international-chamber.co.uk/blog/2012/01/18/icc-uk-cookies-guide

Review of this policy

This policy was last reviewed in September 2020.