Introduction: You and your personal data

Personal data is data that relates to a living individual who can be identified from that data. It could include such information as their name, address or telephone number.  Identification of the individual can be by the information alone or in conjunction with any other information in a data controller’s possession, or likely to come into such possession. The processing and storage of personal data is governed by the General Data Protection Regulation (the GDPR).

1. Who are we?

The PCC of St Thomas, Kilnhurst is the ‘data controller’ of the personal data that you provide to us. This means the Kilnhurst PCC decides how your personal data is processed and for what purposes.

2. How do we process your personal data?

The PCC of St Thomas, Kilnhurst complies with its obligations under the GDPR by keeping personal data up to date; by storing and destroying it securely; by not collecting or retaining excessive amounts of data; by protecting personal data from loss, misuse, unauthorised access and disclosure and by ensuring that appropriate technical measures are in place to protect personal data.

We use your personal data for the following purposes: –

  • To administer your records as a member of our church;
  • To manage your data as our employee or as a volunteer in our organisation;
  • To maintain our own accounts and financial records (including the processing of gift aid claims to HMRC);
  • To monitor attendances at our services and midweek groups;
  • To enable communication and exchange of contact details between those church members who wish to share their details with other church members through our ChurchSuite system;
  • To inform you of news, events, activities and services running at St Thomas’ Church;

3. What is the legal basis for processing your personal data?

  • We obtain explicit consent from you (the ‘data subject’) so that we can keep you informed about news, events, activities and services and process your gift aid donations.
  • We process your data as a not-for-profit body with a religious aim under the provisos that:
    • the processing relates only to members or former members (or those who have regular contact with us in connection with those purposes); and
    • there is no disclosure of any data to a third party without your consent.

4. Sharing your personal data


Your personal data will be treated as strictly confidential and will only be shared with other members of the church in order to carry out a service to other church members, or for other purposes connected with the activity of the church. We will only share your data with third parties outside of the parish with your consent.

5. How long do we keep your personal data?


We keep data in accordance with the guidance set out in the guide “Keep or Bin: Care of Your Parish Records” which is available from the Church of England website.

We will maintain your personal data for the whole time you are a member of our organisation, and for some time after you cease to be so, unless you wish your records to be removed immediately. In general, we will endeavour to keep data only for as long as we need it.  This means that we may delete your data when it is no longer needed.

For other records, we retain electoral roll data while it is still current; gift aid declarations and associated paperwork for up to 6-years after the calendar year to which they relate; and parish registers(baptisms, marriages, funerals) permanently as required under church law.

6. Your rights and your personal data 

Unless subject to an exemption under the GDPR, you have the following rights with respect to your personal data: –

  • The right to request a copy of your personal data which the PCC of St Thomas,Kilnhurst holds about you;
  • The right to request that the PCC of St Thomas, Kilnhurst corrects any persona ldata if it is found to be inaccurate or out of date; 
  • The right to request your personal data is erased where it is no longer necessary for the PCC of St Thomas, Kilnhurst to retain such data;
  • The right to withdraw your consent to the processing at any time;
  • The right to request that the data controller provide the data subject with his/her personal data and where possible, to transmit that data directly to another data controller, (known as the right to data portability), where applicable;
  • The right, where there is a dispute in relation to the accuracy or processing o fyour personal data, to request a restriction is placed on further processing;
  • The right to object to the processing of personal data, where applicable;
  • The right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioners Office. 

7. Further processing

If we wish to use your personal data for a new purpose, not covered by this Data Protection Notice, then we will provide you with a new notice explaining this new use prior to commencing the processing and setting out the relevant purposes and processing conditions. Where and whenever necessary, we will seek your prior consent to the new processing.

8 . Contact Details

To exercise all relevant rights, queries or complaints please in the first instance contact the Church Administrator on 01709 589674 or at the Church Office, The Vicarage, Highthorn Road, Kilnhurst, Mexborough. S64 5TX, or by email: office@kilnhurst-st-thomas.org.uk

You can contact the Information Commissioners Office on 0303 123 1113 or via email https://ico.org.uk/global/contact-us/email/ or at the Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire. SK9 5AF.