Privacy POlicy

Effective Date: March 2025

We take your privacy very seriously. Please read this privacy policy carefully as it contains important information on how and why we collect, store, use and share your personal data. It also explains your rights in relation to your personal data and what to do if you have a complaint. 

This privacy policy does not apply to any third party websites that may have links to our own website.

Clients of this firm should read this policy alongside our general terms and conditions, which provide further information on confidentiality.

  1. Who are we and what do we do?
    1. Open Plan Law Limited is a company authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority under number 629269. Contact details can be found at section 16.
    2. We collect, use and are responsible for certain personal data about you. When we do so we must comply with the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR). We must also comply with the EU General Data Protection Regulation (EU GDPR) in relation to services we offer to individuals in the European Economic Area (EEA).
    3. Our services and website are not aimed specifically at children. If you are a child and you want further information about how we might use your data, please contact us (see ‘How to contact us’ at section 16).
  2. Terminology

Some key terms used in this policy are:

  • We, Us, Our:
    Open Plan Law Limited
  • Personal Data:
    Any information relating to an identified or identifiable individual.
  • Special Category Personal Data:
    Personal data revealing:
    • Racial or ethnic origin
    • Political opinions
    • Religious or philosophical beliefs
    • Trade union membership
    • Genetic data
    • Biometric data (when used for identification purposes)
    • Data concerning health, sex life, or sexual orientation
  • Data Subject:
    The individual to whom the personal data relates.

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  1. Personal data we collect about you
    1. We collect or use the following information:

Personal Data We Will Collect

  • Your name, address, and telephone number
  • Information to enable us to check and verify your identity, e.g. your date of birth or passport detailsincluding your passport and other photographs
  • Gender and pronoun preferences
  • Occupation
  • Marital status
  • Electronic contact details, e.g., your email address and mobile phone number
  • Information related to the matter in which you are seeking our advice or representation
  • Information to enable us to undertake credit or other financial checks on you
  • Your financial details so far as relevant to your instructions, eg the source of your funds if you are instructing on a purchase transaction
  • Payment details (including card or bank information for transfers and direct debits)
  • Information about how you interact with and use our website, products, and services
  • Audio recordings, e.g., calls
  • Video recordings, e.g., virtual meetings

Personal data we may collect depending on why you have instructed us

  • Your National Insurance and tax details
  • Details of your professional online presence, e.g., LinkedIn profile
  • Criminal records data, including driving or other convictions
  • Your nationality and immigration status and information from related documents, such as your passport or other identification, and immigration information, eg if you instruct us on an immigration matter. 
  • Your employment records including, where relevant, records relating to sickness and attendance, performance, disciplinary, conduct and grievances, eg if you instruct us on matter related to your employment or in which your employment records are relevant.
  • Your racial or ethnic origin, gender and sexual orientation, religious or similar beliefs, eg if you instruct us on discrimination claim or a claim in which this information is relevant.
  • Genetic information and/or biometric information used to identify someone, eg where this is relevant to matter we are working on for you.
  1. The main purpose of collecting and using this information is to provide products and services to you. However, we may also collect and use the above information for the purposes set out in section 5.3.
  2.  If you do not provide personal data we ask for, it may delay or prevent us from providing those services.
  1. How your personal data is collected
    1. We collect most of the above information from you. 
    2. However, we may also collect information:
      1. from publicly accessible sources, e.g. Companies House or HM Land Registry;
      2. directly from a third party, e.g.:
        1. sanctions screening providers;
        2. credit reference agencies;
        3. client due diligence providers;
      3. from a third party with your consent, e.g.:
        1. your bank or building society, another financial institution or advisor;
        2. your employer and/or trade union, professional body or pension administrators;
        3. your doctors, medical and occupational health professionals;
      4. via our website—via the contact form or cookies and similar technologies on our website if used (for more information on cookies, please see our Website Use policy).
  2. How and why we use personal data
    1. Under data protection law, we can only use your personal data if we have a proper reason, e.g.:
      1. you have given consent—where we need your consent, we will ask for it separately of this privacy policy and you can withdraw consent at any time;
      2. to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations;
      3. to fulfil our contract with you or take steps at your request before entering into a contract; or
      4. for our legitimate interests or those of a third party.
    2. A legitimate interest is when we have a business or commercial reason to use your personal data, so long as this is not overridden by your own rights and interests. You have the right to object to processing based on legitimate interests. We must then stop the processing unless we can demonstrate compelling legitimate grounds which override your interests, rights and freedoms or the processing is required to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.
  1. The table below explains what we use your personal data for and why.
  • Providing services to you
    • To fulfill our contract with you or to take steps at your request before entering into a contract
  • Preventing and detecting fraud against you or us
    • For our and/or your legitimate interests, i.e., to minimize fraud that could be damaging for you and/or us
  • Conducting checks to identify our clients and verify their identity
  • Screening for financial and other sanctions or embargoes
  • Other activities necessary to comply with professional, legal, and regulatory obligations, that apply to our business e.g., under health and safety law or rules issued by our professional regulator
    • Depending on the circumstances:
  • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
  • For our legitimate interests
  • To check whether there is any conflict of interest between us and you and/or between you and another client
    • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
  • To enforce legal rights or defend or take legal proceedings
    • Depending on the circumstances
      • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
  • For our legitimate interests, i.e., to protect our business, interests, and rights
  • Gathering and providing information for audits, enquiries, or investigations by regulatory bodies
    • Depending on the circumstances:
  • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
  • For our legitimate interests
  • Ensuring internal business policies are complied with, eg policies covering security and internet use
    • For our legitimate interests, i.e. to make sure we are following our own internal procedures so we can deliver the best service to you
  • Operational reasons, such as improving efficiency, training, and quality control
    • For our legitimate interests, i.e. to be as efficient as we can so we can deliver the best service to you at the best price
  • Ensuring confidentiality of commercially sensitive information
    • Depending on the circumstances:
      • For our legitimate interests, i.e., to protect trade secrets and other valuable information
      • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
  • Statistical analysis to help us manage our business, e.g. in relation to our financial performance, client base, services range or other efficiency measures
    • For our legitimate interests, i.e., to improve efficiency and deliver the best service at the best price
  • Protecting the security of systems and data used to provide services, preventing unauthorised access and changes to our systems
    • Depending on the circumstances:
      • For our legitimate interests, i.e., to prevent and detect criminal activity that could be damaging for you and/or us 
      • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
  • Updating and enhancing client records
    • Depending on the circumstances:
      • To fulfill our contract with you or take steps at your request before entering into a contract
      • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
      • For our legitimate interests, e.g., to keep in touch about services
  • Statutory returns
    • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
  • Ensuring safe working practices, staff administration, and assessments
    • Depending on the circumstances:
      • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
      • For our legitimate interests, e.g. to make sure we are following our own internal procedures and working efficiently so we can deliver the best service to you
  • Providing updates and marketing services to existing and former clients and third parties
    • Depending on the circumstances:
      • For our legitimate interests, i.e., to promote our business
      • Consent (which you can withdraw at any time)
  • Credit reference checks via external credit reference agencies
    • For our legitimate interests, i.e., to ensure clients can pay for services
  • To deal with complaints or claims
    • Depending on the circumstances:
      • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
      • For our or your legitimate interests, e.g., to make sure any potential claim is reported to our insurer
  • External audits and quality checks, to the extent not covered by ‘activities necessary to comply with legal and regulatory obligations’ above
    • Depending on the circumstances:
      • For our legitimate interests, ie to achieve and maintain relevant accreditations so we can demonstrate we operate at the highest standards
      • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
  • To share your personal data with members of our group and third parties that will or may take control or ownership of some or all of our business (and professional advisors acting on our or their behalf) in connection with a significant corporate transaction or restructuring, including a merger, acquisition, asset sale or in the event of our insolvency. In such cases information will be anonymised where possible and only shared where necessary
    • Depending on the circumstances:
      • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations
      • For our legitimate interests, i.e., to protect or grow the value of our business and assets
  1. Where we process special category personal data (see section 2 ‘Terminology’), we will also ensure we are permitted to do so under data protection laws e.g.:
    1. we have your explicit consent;
    2. the processing is necessary to protect your (or someone else’s) vital interests where you are physically or legally incapable of giving consent; 
    3. the processing is necessary to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or
    4. the processing is necessary for reasons of substantial public interest.
  1. Marketing
    1. We may use your personal data to send you updates (e.g. by email, text message, telephone, post or social media channels) about our services, including exclusive offers, promotions or new services.
    2. We have a legitimate interest in using your personal data for marketing purposes (see section 5 ‘How and why we use your personal data’). This means we do not usually need your consent to send you marketing information. Where this is not the case, we will always ask for your consent.
    3. In all cases, you have the right to opt out of receiving marketing communications at any time by:
      1. contacting us (see ‘How to contact us as section 16); or
      2. using the ‘unsubscribe’ link in emails or ‘STOP’ number in texts.
    4. We may ask you to confirm or update your marketing preferences if you ask us to provide further services in the future, or if there are changes in the law, regulation, or the structure of our business.
    5. We will always treat your personal data with the utmost respect and never sell it to other organisations for marketing purposes.
  2. Who we share your personal data with
    1. We routinely share personal data with:
      1. third parties we use to help deliver our services to you, e.g. providers of our case management and finance system, IT service providers including cloud service providers such as data storage platforms, shared service centres and financial institutions in connection with invoicing and payments;
      2. third party external advisors or experts engaged in the course of providing services to you, e.g. barristers, tax advisors, local counsel and technology service providers such as eDiscovery and document review platforms;
      3. companies providing services for money laundering checks and other crime prevention purposes and companies providing similar services, including financial institutions and credit reference agencies;
      4. other third parties we use to help promote our business, e.g. marketing agencies;
      5. third parties approved by you, e.g. social media sites you choose to link your account to or third party payment providers;
      6. our insurers and brokers;
      7. our bank.
    2. We only allow those organisations to handle your personal data if we are satisfied they take appropriate measures to protect your personal data. We ensure all outsourcing providers operate under service agreements that are consistent with our legal and professional obligations.
    3. We or the third parties mentioned above may occasionally also share personal data with:
      1. our and their external auditors, eg in relation to the audit of our or their accounts, in which case the recipient of the information will be bound by confidentiality obligations
      2. our and their professional advisors (such as lawyers and other advisors), in which case the recipient of the information will be bound by confidentiality obligations;
      3. law enforcement agencies, courts, tribunals and regulatory bodies to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations;
      4. other parties that have or may acquire control or ownership of our business (and our or their professional advisers) in connection with a significant corporate transaction or restructuring, including a merger, acquisition or asset sale or in the event of our insolvency—usually, information will be anonymised but this may not always be possible and the recipient of any of your personal data will be bound by confidentiality obligations.
    4. If you would like more information about who we share our data with and why, please contact us (see ‘How to contact us as section 16).
  3. Where your personal data is held
    1. Personal data may be held at our offices and those of our third party agencies, service providers, representatives and agents as described in section 7 ‘Who we share your personal data with’.
    2. Some of these third parties may be based outside the UK. For more information, including on how we safeguard your personal data when this occurs, see section 10 ‘Transferring your personal data abroad’.
  4. How long your personal data will be kept
    1. We will not keep your personal data for longer than we need it for the purpose for which it was collected or as required by law. 
    2. As a general rule, we will keep your personal data for at least seven years from the conclusion of your matter, in case you, or we, need to bring or defend any complaints or claims. However, different retention periods apply for different types of personal data and for different services, e.g.:
      1. we will need to keep information relating to a trust for the duration of that trust and for a minimum of seven years thereafter;
      2. deeds related to unregistered property may be kept indefinitely as they evidence ownership;
    3. Following the end of the relevant retention period, we will delete or anonymise your personal data.
    4. If you would like further information about how long we keep your personal data, please contact us (see ‘How to contact us at section 16).
  5. Transferring your personal data abroad
    1. It is sometimes necessary for us to transfer your personal data to countries outside the UK. This may include countries which do not provide the same level of protection of personal data as the UK.
    2. We will transfer your personal data outside the UK only where:
      1. the UK government has decided the recipient country ensures an adequate level of protection of personal data (known as an adequacy decision); or
      2. there are appropriate safeguards in place (eg standard contractual data protection clauses published or approved by the relevant data protection regulator), together with enforceable rights and effective legal remedies for you; or
      3. A specific exception applies under data protection law.
    3. For more information, please contact us using the How to contact us information at section 16:

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  • Organisation name - Microsoft OneDrive Storage
  • Category of Recipient: Data storage
  • Country the Personal Data Is Sent To: US
  • How the Transfer Complies with UK Data Protection Law: Adequacy decision, specifically UK Extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework

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  • Organisation name - Toggl
  • Category of Recipient: Time recording
  • Country the Personal Data Is Sent To: US
  • How the Transfer Complies with UK Data Protection Law: Adequacy decision, specifically UK Extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework

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  1. Your rights
    1. You have the following rights, which you can exercise free of charge:

Access

  • You have the right to ask us for copies of your personal data. You can request other information such as where we get personal data from and who we share personal data with. There are some exemptions which means you may not receive all the information you ask for.

Rectification

  • You have the right to ask us to correct or delete personal data you think is inaccurate or incomplete

Erasure (also known as the right to be forgotten)

  • You have the right to ask us to delete your personal data in certain situations.

Restriction of Processing

  • You have the right to ask us to limit how we use your personal data in certain situations, e.g.: If you contest the accuracy of the data.

Data Portability

  • You have the right to ask that we transfer the personal data you gave us to another organisation or to you—in certain situations

To Object

  • You have the right to object:
    • At any time to your personal data being processed for direct marketing purposes (including profiling).
    • In certain other situations to our continued processing of your personal data, e.g. processing carried out for our legitimate interests unless we demonstrate compelling legitimate grounds for the processing which override your interests or for establishing, exercising or defending legal claims.

Not to Be Subject to Automated Individual Decision-Making

  • The right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing (including profiling) that produces legal effects concerning you or similarly significantly affects you

The Right to Withdraw Consent

  • When we use your consent as our lawful basis, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time. Withdrawing consent will not affect the lawfulness of our use of your personal data in reliance on that consent before it was withdrawn

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  1. If you make a request, we must respond to you without undue delay and in any event within one month.
  2. If you would like to exercise any of those rights, please:
    1. complete a data subject request form—available on our website at [insert link]; or
    2. email, call or write to us—see section 16 ‘How to contact us’; and
    3. provide enough information to identify yourself (e.g. your full name, address and client or matter reference number) and any additional identity information we may reasonably request from you;
    4. let us know what right you want to exercise and the information to which your request relates.
  1. Keeping your personal data secure
    1. We have implemented appropriate technical and organisational measures to keep your personal data confidential and secure from unauthorised access, use and disclosure. We limit access to your personal data to those who have a genuine business need to access it. Those processing your personal data will do so only in an authorised manner and are subject to a duty of confidentiality. We regularly test our systems to ensure information security.
    2. We require our business partners, suppliers and other third parties to implement appropriate security measures to protect personal data from unauthorised access, use and disclosure.
    3. We also have procedures to deal with any suspected data security breach. We will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected data security breach where we are required to do so.
  2. How to complain
    1. Please contact us if you have any queries or concerns about our use of your personal data (see ‘How to contact us’ at section 16). We hope we will be able to resolve any issues you may have.
    2. You may also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office (the UK data protection regulator also known as the ICO) and/or the relevant supervisory authority in your jurisdiction. 
    3. The contact details for the ICO are:

Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF

Helpline number: 0303 123 1113

Website: https://www.ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint

  1. Please contact us if you would like further information.
  1. Changes to this privacy policy
    1. This privacy policy was published on 10 January 2025.
    2. We may change this privacy policy from time to time. When we do we will publish the updated version on our website and ask for your consent to the changes if legally required.
  2. Updating your personal data

We take reasonable steps to ensure your personal data remains accurate and up to date. To help us with this, please let us know if any of the personal data you have provided to us has changed, e.g. your surname or address—see ‘How to contact us’ at section 16). 

  1. How to contact us
    1. Individuals in the UK

You can contact us by post, email or telephone if you have any questions about this privacy policy or the information we hold about you, to exercise a right under data protection law or to make a complaint.

Our contact details are shown below:

  • Organisation Name: Open Plan Law Limited
  • Address: Prama House, 267 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 7HT, United Kingdom
  • Email: contact@openplanlaw.com 

                          Emails will be received by the practice principals.

  • Telephone: +44 (0) 01865 339 337

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  1. Do you need extra help?

If you would like this policy in another format (for example audio, large print, braille) please contact us—see ‘How to contact us’ at section 16).