Privacy policy

This policy explains how Ashfield Trading Ltd (trading as Accounts for Lawyers), referred to here as "we", "us" and "our", collects, uses and protects your personal information when you use the Accounts for Lawyers website (the "Site"). We are committed to protecting your privacy and complying with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018.

1. Who we are (data controller)

The data controller responsible for your personal data is Ashfield Trading Ltd, which trades as Accounts for Lawyers:

• Registered company name: Ashfield Trading Ltd
• Trading name: Accounts for Lawyers
• Company number: 16358723 (registered in England and Wales)
• Registered office: 20 Ashfield Avenue, Shipley, Bradford, BD18 3AL

If you have any questions about this policy or wish to exercise your rights, please contact us through our contact page.

2. What information we collect

We collect the following personal information through the Site:

• Enquiry forms: when you submit an enquiry (including through the form that may appear if you are about to leave a page), we collect your name, email address, phone number, the type of legal professional you are, your message, and the page you submitted from.
• Email sign-ups: if you subscribe to our updates or download a guide, we collect your email address (and, where relevant, the resource you requested).
• Consent records: when you give consent, we keep a record of the exact wording you agreed to and the date and time you agreed, so we can show that consent was given.
• Analytics and technical data: information about how you use the Site (such as pages viewed, device and browser type, and an approximate country derived from your IP address). Our hosting provider may also log technical request data for security and performance. See our cookie policy for detail.

Providing this information is voluntary. You are not under a statutory or contractual obligation to provide it, but if you do not, we will not be able to respond to your enquiry or send you the updates or resources you have asked for.

3. Why we use your information

• To respond to your enquiry: to deal with your enquiry and to pass it to regulated firms in our specialist partner network so that they can provide the advice you have requested.
• To send you updates you asked for: if you signed up to our email updates, to send you general accounting and tax information relevant to legal professionals until you unsubscribe.
• To improve and protect the Site: to understand how the Site is used and to keep it secure and working properly.

4. Our lawful basis

When you submit an enquiry, we rely on our legitimate interests (Article 6(1)(f) of the UK GDPR) to handle it and to share it with regulated firms from our specialist partner network, so that they can respond and provide the advice you asked for. You have the right to object to this processing at any time, under Article 21 (see your rights in section 7).

For our email sign-ups, we rely on your consent. You can withdraw your consent at any time (see your rights in section 7); withdrawing consent does not affect any processing that took place before you withdrew it.

For website analytics, site improvement and security, we rely on our legitimate interests, specifically measuring and improving the Site and keeping it secure and protected against misuse.

5. Who we share your information with

When you submit an enquiry, we share information about you and your enquiry with regulated firms from our specialist partner network, so that they can contact you and provide the advice you asked for. What we share is: your name, telephone number and email address; your enquiry message; the type of work it describes, the grade we give it under our published grading rubric and a one-line summary of what you are asking for; the role and any description of it you gave; your practice or company name if you gave one; the rough area you are in; whether we were able to confirm your contact details and when; and the website, page and form your enquiry came from, together with the notice you were shown. We do this on the basis of our legitimate interests (see section 4), and you can object at any time (see section 7). Each receiving firm acts as an independent data controller of the information it receives, and uses it under its own privacy policy. We share this information only for the purpose of arranging and providing the advice you asked for.

More than one firm may receive your enquiry. We work with a network of specialist firms rather than a single firm, and we do not name the individual firms on this website. Firms are first shown a short summary of your enquiry with your name and contact details removed, and only a firm that decides it can help receives your details in full. Up to threefirms in the profession your enquiry concerns may take it up that way. Separately, up to three firms in related professions, such as mortgage and finance brokers, independent financial advisers, solicitors and specialist consultants, may also take it up, because they answer a different part of the same question and do not compete for the same work. So at most six firms may receive your details, and often fewer. Whichever firms contact you will each tell you who they are and give you their own privacy information at that point.

If no firm takes up your enquiry. If no firm in the profession your enquiry concerns takes it up within 48 hours, we may offer it instead to firms in the related professions above, so that you still get an answer rather than none. If we cannot confirm your contact details and you do not reply to our follow-up messages, your enquiry may be passed after seven days to a single firm as part of a batch, for the same purpose. We will not pass your enquiry on at all if you have objected or asked us to stop, and you can ask us to stop at any time (see section 7).

How we are paid. We may be paid a fee by a firm your enquiry is passed to. This does not change what you pay that firm, and does not affect the advice they give you.

We also use the following service providers, who process data on our instructions only (as our processors):

• Supabase: secure database hosting for form submissions (EU-hosted).
• Google Analytics: website analytics and performance measurement.
• Vercel: website hosting and content delivery.
• Resend: sending the emails we use to confirm your details and to respond to you.
• Twilio: sending the text messages we use to confirm your details.
• Anthropic, through the Vercel AI Gateway: reading your enquiry to grade the type of work it describes and to write the one-line summary we show to firms.
• Companies House: looking up publicly available information where you mention a company.

Some of these providers process data outside the United Kingdom. Where they do, we rely on a valid transfer mechanism under the UK GDPR.

We do not sell your personal data, and we do not use it for third-party advertising.

6. How long we keep your information

We keep enquiry data for 24 months from the date of your enquiry, after which it is deleted. If you subscribe to our email updates, we keep your email address until you unsubscribe. Consent records are kept for up to six years, under access controls, so that we can demonstrate that consent was given.

7. Your rights

Under UK data protection law you have the right to:

• Access the personal data we hold about you.
• Rectify inaccurate or incomplete data.
• Erase your data in certain circumstances.
• Restrict how we use your data in certain situations.
• Data portability: receive a copy of your data in a machine-readable format.
• Object to certain processing.
• Withdraw consent at any time, where we rely on your consent.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us through our contact page. We will respond within one month.

You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK's data protection regulator, at ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint. We would, however, welcome the chance to address your concerns first.

8. Cookies and analytics

We use cookies and similar technologies for analytics, so we can understand how the Site is used and improve it. For full details of what we use and how to manage or opt out, please see our cookie policy.

9. How we protect your data and international transfers

Form submissions are stored securely and access is restricted to authorised staff only. Some of our service providers (for example, Vercel) are based outside the UK and EEA. Where data is transferred internationally, we rely on appropriate safeguards such as the UK extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework or Standard Contractual Clauses.

10. Changes to this policy

We may update this privacy policy from time to time. The "Last updated" date at the top of this page shows when it was last revised. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.

11. Contact us

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or how we handle your data, please contact us through our contact page.