Job Applicant Privacy Policy

This privacy notice sets out how Pinewood Technologies PLC collects, uses and protects your personal data when you apply online for one of our vacancies (https://pinewood.ai/careers/) and go through the recruitment and selection process.

The recruitment process will involve:

• Assessing and progressing your application,
• Assessing your suitability (skills, strengths, behaviours for the role)
• Activities needed to complete the on-boarding and screening process should your application be successful.

Maintaining the security of your personal data and ensuring that you are in control of how your personal data is handled is a priority at Pinewood. We are dedicated to ensuring that we are transparent about the personal data that we collect about you, how we use it and the conditions whereby we may disclose your personal data to others. We will ensure that your data is kept secure and that you are aware of the steps we have taken to ensure the security of your personal data.

If you have any questions about this notice, including any requests to exercise your legal rights, please contact us using the information set out in the ‘Contact Details’ section below.

Please note that if you are applying for one of our vacancies online, our website privacy notice will also apply which you can view here https://pinewood.ai/privacy-policy/.

Contents:

1. WHO WE ARE
2. TYPES OF DATA WE COLLECT ABOUT YOU
3. HOW IS YOUR PERSONAL DATA COLLECTED
4. HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA
5. DISCLOSURES OF YOUR PERSONAL DATA
6. INTERNATIONAL TRANSFERS
7. DATA SECURITY
8. DATA RETENTION
9. YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS
10. CONTACT DETAILS
11. COMPLAINTS
12. CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY NOTICE OR YOUR PERSONAL DATA

1. WHO WE ARE

Pinewood Technologies PLC, a public limited company with the company number 03542925 having its registered office at 2960 Trident Court Solihull Parkway, Birmingham Business Park, Birmingham, England, B37 7YN is the controller and responsible for your personal data (referred to as “Pinewood”, “we” or “us” in this notice).

2. TYPES OF DATA WE COLLECT ABOUT YOU

Personal data means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. We may collect, use and store different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:

• Identity Data including first name, last name, any previous names.

• Contact Data includes address, email address and telephone numbers.

• Education and Similar Data including education, skills and qualifications, health issues requiring adaptations to working environment, individual demographic information in compliance with legal requirements (such as marital status, national identifier, passport/visa information, nationality, citizenship, military service, disability, work permit, date and place of birth or gender), nationality / visa / right to work permit information; (e.g. passport, driving licence, national insurance numbers), education and work history including professional qualifications and skills.

• Employment Data including job title, grade and job history, employment contract related information (including compensation, location, hours of work and so on), work history/job data; previous employers, positions, dates, etc., compensation; basic salary, benefits, bonuses, etc.; employer feedback / references to include regulated references where necessary.

• Application Process Data including photograph(s), details provided in relation to conflicts of interest or trade body membership, building CCTV images, audio recordings of telephone interviews, video recordings of interviews, notes from face to face interviews, psychometric test results and associated reports, results from behavioural assessments (e.g. assessment centre exercises), results from technical assessments.

• CV Data includes any information you provide to us in your CV which is not included above.

During the process we also capture some special category data about you. When we refer to “special category data”, we mean personal data that reveals racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious beliefs, philosophical beliefs or trade union membership, genetic data, biometric data (where used for identification purposes), data concerning health, sex life or sexual orientation of an individual. The special category data we collect includes data concerning health (e.g. any disabilities), racial or ethnic origin, and religious beliefs] for the purposes set out in “HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA” section below.

For certain roles, we have a legal right / reason, to undertake Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks or in Scotland, a Disclosure Scotland check. Where we do so, we only do so in accordance with the data protection laws and the prevailing legislation in the area of criminal backgrounds checks as updated from time to time.

We also collect, use and share aggregated data such as statistical or demographic data which is not personal data as it does not directly (or indirectly) reveal your identity. Please note that any personal data or special category data collected as part of the diversity, equality, and inclusion sections of our recruitment and selection process will only be used in an aggregate form.

We do not envisage that any decisions will be taken about you using automated means, however we will notify you in writing if this position changes.

3. HOW IS YOUR PERSONAL DATA COLLECTED

We use different methods to collect data from and about you including through:

• Your interactions with us. You may give us your personal data by filling out our one job applications or corresponding with us in relation to our vacancies, or recruitment and selection process (whether via post, email, or telephone). This includes where you upload or otherwise provide your CV as part of the application process.
• Our recruitment and selection process. We will collect personal data about you when conducting our recruitment and selection process (including as part of the interview and assessments required as part of the recruitment process).
• Third parties or publicly available sources. We may also receive personal data about you from various third parties (such as Workable who supplies our applicant tracking and recruitment software, recruitment agencies, job boards, recruitment assessment centres, occupational health professionals and background check providers) and public sources (e.g. Companies House) based on the information you provide to us. Where we receive such information from these third parties, we will only use it in accordance with this notice.

4. HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA

The law requires us to have a legal basis for collecting and using your personal data. We rely on one or more of the following legal bases:

• Performance of a contract with you: Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you or in order to take steps at your request before entering into a contract with you.
• Legitimate interests: We may use your personal data where it is necessary to conduct our business and pursue our legitimate interests. We make sure we consider and balance any potential impact on you and your rights (both positive and negative) before we process your personal data for our legitimate interests. We do not use your personal data for activities where our interests are overridden by the impact on you (unless we have your consent or are otherwise required or permitted to by law). Our legitimate interests include:
  • your contact details such as your name, address, telephone number and personal email address which will be used to communicate with you in relation to the recruitment process;
  • your CV, any education history, employment records, professional qualifications and certifications in order for us to consider your suitability for the job you are applying for;
  • details of the job role you are applying for any interview notes made by us during or following an interview with you, in order to assess your suitability for that role;
  • pay and benefit discussions with you to help determine whether a job offer may be made to you;
  • voicemails, emails, correspondence, and other communications created, stored or transmitted by you on or to our computer or communications equipment in order to progress the application through the recruitment process;
  • CCTV footage of you onsite in our building reception area for security reasons, for the protection of our property and for health and safety reasons; and
  • network and information security data in order for us to take steps to protect your information against loss, theft or unauthorised access.

• Legal obligation: We may use your personal data where it is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation that we are subject to. We will identify the relevant legal obligation when we rely on this legal basis. This includes:
  • checks for eligibility to work in the UK or EU as appropriate and as required by immigration laws, such as passport and visa documentation;
  • formal identification documentation relating to you, such as a passport or driving licence, to verify your identity (including your date of birth);
  • Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS), Disclosure Scotland, DVLA checks, checks where we have a legal right or reason for doing so; and
  • The results of a credit check if the role requires and where we have a legal right or reason for doing so.

• Consent: We rely on consent only where we have obtained your active agreement to use your personal data for a specified purpose.

Special Category Personal Data

Where we process any “special category data”, in addition to one of the legal bases noted above, we also need that we have a further legal basis for such processing. This will most commonly be one of the following:

• Employment, social security and social protection: To enable us to perform our legal obligations in respect of employment, social security, social protection law, or needed in the public interest. This may include health information to assess and/or to comply with our obligations under the Equality Act 2010 (for example a requirement to make reasonable adjustments to your working conditions or to enable our candidates to apply for jobs with us, to be able to take online/telephone assessments, to attend interviews/assessment centres, to prepare for starting the job and to ensure that we comply with regulatory obligations placed on us with regard to our hiring);
• Occupation Health: For occupational health reasons or where we are assessing your working capability, subject to appropriate confidentiality safeguards. This may include information about your physical or mental health, or disability status, to assess whether any reasonable adjustments are required for you during the recruitment process, and, where you are successful in your role application, carrying out any medical assessment required for your role, pension and any insurance benefits.
• Explicit Consent: Where you have given us your explicit consent to the processing;
• Made public by the data subject: Processing relates to personal data that you have made public;
• Legal claims and judicial acts: the processing is necessary for establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims (such as any claims in the employment tribunal); or
• Substantial public interest: the processing is necessary for reasons of substantial public interest (such as regulatory requirements, preventing or detecting unlawful acts or equal opportunities monitoring for example the collection of information about race, ethnic origin, sex or religion).

5. DISCLOSURES OF YOUR PERSONAL DATA

We may share your personal data where necessary with the following parties for the purposes above:

We may also share personal data with third parties to whom we may choose to sell, transfer or merge parts of our business or our assets. Alternatively, we may seek to acquire other businesses or merge with them. If a change happens to our business, then the new owners may use your personal data in the same way as set out in this policy.

We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions. However, in some cases, the external third party may be acting as a controller of your personal data and therefore we advise you to read their privacy notice and/or data protection policy.

6. INTERNATIONAL TRANSFERS

We may transfer your personal data outside of the UK, for example where our group entities or external third-party suppliers are located. Whenever we transfer your personal data out of the UK, we ensure a similar degree of protection is afforded to it by:

• ensuring we will only transfer your personal data to countries that have been deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data; or
• putting in place specific contracts approved for use in the UK which give personal data the same protection it has in the UK.

Please contact us if you want further information on the specific mechanism used by us when transferring your personal data out of the UK.

7. DATA SECURITY

We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a breach where we are legally required to do so.

8. DATA RETENTION

We review our retention periods regularly and will only hold your data for as long as it is necessary for the original purpose it was collected for, as required by law (including any legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or reporting requirements) or as set out in any relevant contract we have with you.

To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or other requirements.

In some circumstances we will anonymise your personal data (so that it can no longer be associated with you) for research or statistical purposes, in which case we may use this information indefinitely without further notice to you.

9. YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS

You have a number of rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data.

You have the right to:

• request access to your personal data (commonly known as a “subject access request”). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.
• request correction of the personal data that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate data we hold about you corrected, though we may need to verify the accuracy of the new data you provide to us.
• request erasure of your personal data in certain circumstances. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have successfully exercised your right to object to processing (see below), where we may have processed your information unlawfully or where we are required to erase your personal data to comply with local law. Note, however, that we may not always be able to comply with your request of erasure for specific legal reasons which will be notified to you, if applicable, at the time of your request.
• object to processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) as the legal basis for that particular use of your data (including carrying out profiling based on our legitimate interests). In some cases, we may demonstrate that we have compelling legitimate grounds to process your information which override your right to object.
• you also have the absolute right to object any time to the processing of your personal data for direct marketing purposes (see the “consent” paragraph in the “HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA” section above for details of how to object to receiving direct marketing communications).
• request the transfer of your personal data to you or to a third party. We will provide to you, or a third party you have chosen, your personal data in a structured, commonly used, machine-readable format. Note that this right only applies to automated information which you initially provided consent for us to use or where we used the information to perform a contract with you.
• withdraw consent at any time where we are relying on consent to process your personal data (see “HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL DATA” section above for some details of when we rely on your consent as the legal basis for using your data). However, this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent. If you withdraw your consent, we may not be able to provide certain products or services to you. We will advise you if this is the case at the time you withdraw your consent.
• request restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of your personal data in one of the following scenarios:
  • if you want us to establish the data’s accuracy;
  • where our use of the data is unlawful but you do not want us to erase it;
  • where you need us to hold the data even if we no longer require it as you need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or
  • you have objected to our use of your data but we need to verify whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to use it.

If you wish to exercise any of the rights set out above, please contact us via the details set out in the “CONTACT DETAILS” section below.

10. CONTACT DETAILS

Please contact us if you have any questions about our privacy notice or information we hold about you:

By email: enquiries@pinewood.co.uk

Or write to us at: Pinewood Technologies PLC, 2960 Trident Court, Solihull Parkway, Birmingham Business Park, Birmingham, West Midlands, B37 7YN.

11. COMPLAINTS

You have the right to complain to the Information Commissioners Officer (ICO) if you are concerned about the way we have processed your personal information (https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/). Please visit the ICO website for further details.

We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance.

12. CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY NOTICE OR YOUR PERSONAL DATA

Any changes we make to our privacy notice in the future will be published on this page and, where appropriate, notified to you by email. This privacy notice was last updated on 4 February 2025.