Privacy Policy - George Henry Partners

A PDF version of our Privacy Policy may be downloaded here.

1. OUR COMMITMENT TO PRIVACY

George Henry Partners LP (GHP and we) are committed to protecting and respecting the privacy of individuals whose personal information we may collect during the course of our business.

This Privacy Policy (together with our terms and conditions and any other documents referred to on our website, ghpbvi.com) set out the basis on which any personal data we collect from you, or that you provide to us, will be processed by us.

If you have any questions or require any further information regarding our Privacy Policy, then you may contact us at ghp@ghpbvi.com.

Please note that nothing in this Privacy Policy affects any right you have under any applicable law, including the British Virgin Islands Data Protection Act, 2021 (DPA) or any other data protection legislation that applies to you.

2. WHAT PERSONAL INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT?

Personal information that we collect may include:

basic personal information, such as your name (including any relevant prefix or title), your company, your position, and your relationship to other people;
contact information, such as your postal address, email address and telephone numbers;
financial information relating to you, such as billing information in connection with the services that we provide;
technical information, such as information from your visits to our website;
information you provide to us for the purpose of attending meetings and events;
information provided by you or collected by us as part of our client due diligence / KYC processes;
personal information provided to us by or on behalf of our clients or created by us while providing legal services to them;
any other information which you may provide to us from time to time.

We will collect your personal information only where we are legally permitted to do so, and only to the extent it is appropriate and necessary for one or more of the purposes listed in Section 3 below.

GHP will only collect, use and otherwise process information revealing physical or mental health, political opinions, criminal convictions, religious beliefs or relating to your health or sexual orientation or otherwise which is treated by the DPA as “sensitive personal data”, where and only to the extent that you have given your explicit consent unless we are otherwise permitted or required to collect, use and process such information under the DPA, including but not limited to where this is necessary in connection with contract fulfilment (for example in the course of providing legal advice), legal claims or court proceedings or necessary for reasons of public interest.

We also need to ensure that your personal information is accurate and up to date. Accordingly, please let us know of any changes to your personal information by emailing us at the contact e-mail address set out at the end of this Privacy Policy.

3. WHAT WE USE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION FOR

When we request or receive personal information, this may be for one or more of the following purposes:

to provide and improve our existing legal and corporate products and services to you and to our clients;
to inform you of events and developments in the law which we think will be of interest to you;
for human resources purposes, including recruitment;
to administer our website;
to market our services and products to you where we have a legitimate interest, or you have consented to us doing so and in accordance with your preferences;
to provide subscription content such as legal updates, client advisories and newsletters, invitations to events and seminars, news and updates on promotions;
to issue invoices, manage accounts and records, and for the collection of payments and debts;
for the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims or proceedings;
to allow us to comply with our legal, regulatory and risk management obligations (for example, carrying out and maintaining client due diligence);
for any other purpose related and/or ancillary to any of the above or any other purpose for which your personal data was provided to us.

4. HOW DO WE OBTAIN YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION?

We generally collect your personal information directly from you. We may collect such information in a number of ways, including:

through your use of our website;
when you contact us or request information from us;
when you instruct us to carry out legal services for you;
if you are a member of staff or a job applicant.

However, the nature of the services we perform and the context in which we handle your personal information can often result in us collecting your personal information indirectly from third party sources.

Additionally, there may be circumstances where we are required to seek your personal information from independent sources (for example where we need to use your personal information to comply with a regulatory requirement to validate your identity and background).

Sources from which we may obtain your personal information may include:

our members of staff or clients with whom you have a relationship;
other persons who have referred you to us, such as your business contacts;
your lawyer, accountant, tax advisor, wealth manager, and other such advisers who provide your personal information to us on your behalf;
publicly accessible websites, search engines, registers, and databases, including official registers of companies and businesses, databases of journals and news articles, and social media such as LinkedIn;
providers of background check and business risk screening services, such as operators of fraud and financial crime databases, and operators of sanctions / embargoes databases (in some cases they can include authorities such as government departments and the police); and
the relevant corporate client to whom we provide the service and who entrusts us with your personal information. Depending on the context, this could be, for example, the business which is owned or controlled by you or the business for which you work.

5. WHAT IF YOU FAIL TO PROVIDE PERSONAL INFORMATION TO US?

Where we need to collect personal information by law (for instance, in relation to anti-money laundering or other “know your customer” checks) or under the terms of a contract we have with you and you fail to provide the personal data when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have or are trying to enter into with you (for example, to provide you with services). In this case, we may have to decline to provide or receive the relevant services, but we will notify you if this is the case at the time the personal data is collected.

6. DOES GHP USE MY PERSONAL INFORMATION FOR DIRECT MARKETING?

We may from time to time use your personal information to promote to you the legal and corporate services we offer.

However, we will do so only if you are:

someone who has done business with us as a private client or a client business contact;
someone who has indicated an interest in the legal services we offer, for example by registering on our website or otherwise indicating your desire to receive email updates and alerts from us, or exchanging business cards with us at a conference, event, or a business meeting; or
someone who has never done any business with us but whom we have identified (based on business-related information such as your position and title, the company for which you work, etc) as potentially having an interest in the business-related services offered by us.

Where we contact you for such purpose, we will typically contact you by email or or social media platforms (including via third party marketing service providers acting on our behalf) but where the situation warrants, we may contact you by telephone. We will always observe the applicable direct marketing rules when contacting you and we will always respect your marketing preferences.

If you wish to stop receiving promotional emails and legal updates from us, you can make use of the ‘unsubscribe’, ‘opt out’, or ‘update your marketing preference’ link we include within our promotional emails and updates. If for whatever reason such links are not functioning or missing, or if you feel that we have otherwise failed to respect your marketing preference, please alert your usual GHP contact, or alternatively, contact us by emailing us at unsubscribe@ghpbvi.com.

7. CONTACT DATABASE

We may use publicly available information about you or information you have provided us with to add to our contact database. Information that we typically hold in our database includes:

your contact information, including your name, job title, organisation’s name, address, telephone number(s), email address(es) and other identification information;
the area(s) of law or business that you practise or have an interest in.

Once your details are included in GHP’s contact database we may also record details of any:

GHP mailing lists you have subscribed to or unsubscribed from;
mailings (including legal advisories and event invitations) we have sent you;
hyperlinks you have clicked in any mailing that we have sent you;
meetings we have held with you;
event invitations you have replied to; and
events you have attended.

From time to time we may ask you by email to review your contact details and mailing list preferences and update them as necessary. This not only helps us to keep the contact information we hold about you up to date, it also ensures that we only send you information that you have requested and/or is relevant to you.

8. RETENTION OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

We will retain your personal information for such period as may be required taking into account the purpose for which the information is collected. That period is based on the requirements of relevant data protection law, taking into account legal and regulatory obligations to retain the information for a minimum period, limitation periods for taking legal action, good practice, and our legitimate business purposes.

9. WHO WE SHARE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION WITH

We may share your personal information with certain trusted third parties in accordance with contractual arrangements in place with them or in some other circumstances, including:

our professional advisers and auditors;
third party suppliers of certain support services such as word processing, translation and photocopying;
IT and payroll service providers;
third parties engaged in the course of the provision of legal services with our clients’ prior consent, such as barristers, accountants and local counsel;
third parties involved in the organisation of events and seminars;
if we are under a duty to disclose or share your personal information in order to enforce or apply our terms and conditions and other agreements, or to protect the rights, property, or safety of GHP, our clients, or others to include (without limitation) exchanging information with other companies and organisations for the purposes of fraud protection and credit risk reduction;
reorganisation or transfer of all or part of GHP’s business potentially resulting in the transfer of your data to third parties through which the whole or part of the business of GHP will be carried out;
if GHP ceases to trade, or becomes insolvent, enters into receivership or any similar or equivalent event occurs whereby those acting on behalf of GHP may sell the business or parts of it to a third party, in fulfilment of legal or business requirements potentially resulting in the transfer of your data to a third party through which the business or parts of it will be carried out;
providers of background checks and business risks services, such as operators of fraud and financial crime databases, and operators of sanctions / embargoes databases;
to those who provide ancillary services which complement the legal and corporate services that we provide including entities providing legal entity formation / registration services, fund administration services, fiduciary services and other such services;
Government departments and agencies, police, regulators, courts, tribunals, and other like authorities with whom we are legally obliged to share your personal information, or with whom we decide to cooperate voluntarily (but only to the extent that we are legally permitted to do so).

While it is unlikely, we may be required to disclose your personal information by a court order or to comply with other legal or regulatory requirements.

10. HOW WE PROTECT YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

We use a variety of technical and organisational measures to help protect your personal information from unauthorised access, use, disclosure, alteration or destruction consistent with applicable data protection laws.

All our employees and any third parties we engage to process your personal information are obliged to respect the confidentiality of your personal information. Unfortunately, the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure. Although we will do our best to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of your data transmitted via our website – any transmission is at your own risk.

In order to provide our services, we may need to transfer your personal information to locations outside the jurisdiction in which you provide it or where you are viewing GHP’s website for the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy. This may entail a transfer of your information to a location where the level of information protection is less than you may be accustomed to.

If we are required to share your personal information with recipients who are located outside the jurisdiction, we will, wherever possible, take all appropriate steps that are within our control to ensure that adequate legal safeguards are in place for your personal information which is shared with such recipients.

Where we are unable to put in place such adequate safeguards, we may nevertheless share your personal information with such recipients but we will do so only to the extent the applicable legal exemptions permit, and we will ensure that any of your personal information we share with such recipients is kept to the minimum necessary.

In the event of any data breach, we will act promptly to identify the cause and take the necessary steps to contain and mitigate the consequences of the breach. Where appropriate, we will also notify you of the breach in accordance with any applicable law which requires us to notify you of the breach.

11. YOUR RIGHTS REGARDING YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

Subject to certain conditions under applicable legislation, you have the right to:

obtain information regarding the processing of your personal data;
request a copy of the personal data which we hold about you;
have any inaccurate data we hold about you corrected;
object or restrict our use of your personal data;
ask that we not subject you to automated decision making that uses your personal data;
object to us using your personal data for direct marketing purposes;
submit a complaint if you have concerns about the way in which we are handling your data.

To do any of the above, please contact us at ghp@ghpbvi.com. To enable us to process your request, we may require that you provide us with proof of your identity, such as by providing us with a copy of a valid form of identification. This is to ensure that we appropriately protect the personal data we hold from unauthorised access requests and comply with our information security obligations.

We may charge you a reasonable administrative fee for any unreasonable or excessive requests we may receive, and for any additional copies of the data you may request.

12. COMPLAINTS

If you think that there is a problem with the way we are processing your personal information, or if you have a complaint please let us know and we shall investigate your complaint in accordance with our complaints procedure. You can do so by emailing full details of your complaint to ghp@ghpbvi.com.

If you are dissatisfied with our response and wish to make a formal complaint, or if you simply wish to learn more about your rights, you can contact the BVI’s Office of the Information Commissioner once it is properly established (please note that as at the date of this Privacy Policy, the Office of the Information Commission is yet to be established).

13. PRIVACY OF ELECTRONIC COMMUNICATIONS

Although we welcome your queries, please note that any electronic communication between you and us (or any of our lawyers, other employees or agents) may not be secure and, unless you are already a client, may not be treated as privileged or confidential.

14. CHANGES TO THIS POLICY

This Privacy Policy was last revised on 6 October 2021. This Privacy Policy may be updated by us at any time to reflect changes in law or changes in how we run our business. In case of updates, we will post the revised Privacy Policy on our website. Changes will take effect as soon as the revised version is made available on our website. Please check our website ghpbvi.com periodically to inform yourself of any changes. For an explanation of historical changes, please refer to the change log set out in the last page of this Privacy Policy.

12. IP ADDRESSES AND COOKIES

Our website uses cookies. A “cookie” is a small file of letters and numbers that is sent to your computer by a website and automatically saved on your computer by your web browser. This provides us with statistical data about our users’ browsing actions and patterns and does not identify any individual.

You may choose to not accept a cookie file by configuring your web browser to refuse cookies. The procedure for refusal of cookies may vary for different software products. Please review the Help menu of your internet browser or consult with your software supplier if you wish to refuse cookies.

When you visit our website, the server will record your IP address together with the date, time and duration of your visit. An IP address is an assigned number, similar to a telephone number, which allows your computer to communicate over the internet. In addition to your IP address the following technical information will also be collected: your login information, browser type and version, time zone setting, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform, information about your visit including the full Uniform Resource Locators (URL), clickstream to, through and from the website (including date and time), pages viewed, download errors, page interaction information (such as scrolling clicks) and methods used to browse away from the website.

We use the information referred to in the above paragraph for our legitimate interests to compile statistical (non-personal) data on the use of our website and to track how users navigate through our website in order to enable us to evaluate and improve it.

13. CONTACT

Questions, comments and requests regarding this Privacy Policy should be addressed in an email to ghp@ghpbvi.com.

Change Log

Version	Date	Remark
1.0	7 January 2020	Original privacy policy.
2.0	6 October 2021	Updates made as part of DPA implementation.