Privacy and Data Protection


Fuel Poverty Research Network Charitable Trust’s Privacy Statement

  1. The purpose of this privacy statement 

The purpose of this privacy statement is to provide you with details of how the Fuel Poverty Research Network Charitable Trust (FPRN) collects, stores and uses the personal data you supply to us.

Personal data is information which relates to identifiable living individuals. We will act in accordance with current legislation and meet current best practice with regard to the processing of personal data. The FPRN is registered as a data controller in the United Kingdom under the Data Protection Act 1998. Our data protection registration number is Z877975.

The FPRN needs to keep personal data on its employees, trustees, grant holders, bursary holders and clients to carry out its day-to-day operations, to meet its objectives and to comply with legal obligations.

References to “we”, “us”, “you” or “our” in this privacy statement are references to the FPRN, a charity registered in England and Wales, registered charity number 1185345.

  1. The data we collect and why we collect it 

We will collect personal information from you when you or your organisation: 

  • enquires about our activities and requests information from us; 
  • submits a grant or bursary application form; 
  • are awarded a grant or bursary by us; 
  • are commissioned to work for us; or 
  • subscribes to our electronic communications 

This information may include your name, title, email address, physical address, telephone numbers, job title, CV, qualifications, and bank account details.  We may also ask for some additional, non-personal information.

The FPRN will process and circulate grant applications amongst Trustees, staff and occasionally advisors, and will store information provided by them. In addition, data may be used: to compile lists of rejected funding applications, which will be retained for internal use only; to compile published lists of grant holders, which may be posted on the Internet; to provide case study examples on the FPRN’s website or in our electronic  communications; to inform you of the FPRN’s  future grant programmes, events and outputs; by individuals and organisations working for the FPRN; for the prevention of fraud.

  1. Consent

When you submit a grant or bursary application, you will be asked to confirm that you give consent to the FPRN to process the data provided for the purposes detailed above. In order to receive our FPRN network discussion list emails, we will ask you to subscribe to it.  FPRN CT will not send you any unsolicited emails. We will only send you emails or other messages where you have signed up to receive these. FPRN network members who use the discussion list emails are expected to adhere to certain standards for use of that discussion list.

  1. Security and security measures 

Once we have received your information, we will use strict procedures and security features to try to prevent unauthorised access. In the event of the charity’s closure, procedures will be put in place to ensure that the information we need to retain is stored securely.  

Sending information over the internet is generally not completely secure, and we can’t guarantee the security of your data while it is in transit. Any data that you send is at your own risk.

  1. Retention of data 

Data will be held securely and lawfully processed, and will not be retained for longer than necessary. If we are making payments to you or your organisation we are required to retain your personal data for accounting purposes for 7 years following the final payment to you, after which it will be securely destroyed.  Grant reports will be retained for a longer period for the purposes of archive records. We do not retain any data relating to grant and bursary applications other than the name of the applicant and proposed project, unless you are successful in obtaining a grant or bursary from us. 

  1. Location

We store your data securely via GSuite- a collaboration platform operated by Google. GSuite is highly secure and GDPR compliant. Google store data across an international network of servers. Your data will only be stored electronically on the Google Drive (part of GSuite)- no paper copies of your data will be generated.

  1. Disclosure of data

We won’t share your information with any other organisations for marketing, market research or commercial purposes, and we don’t pass your details to other websites. 

  1. Updating and maintaining data 

If you wish to update your data or unsubscribe from our newsletter please do so by pressing the ‘unsubscribe’ button in Jiscmail or by emailing  committee@fuelpovertyresearch.net.  

  1. Your rights and acceptance of this policy

You can find out what information we hold about you, ask us not to use any of the information we collect, or ask us to delete the information on you that we hold. To do this, please contact us by email us on committee@fuelpovertyresearch.net or by post to the FPRN 28 Walkley Crescent, Sheffield, S6 5BB.  If you request a copy of the information that we hold on you, we will provide this to you within one month.   

  1. Cookies

We may obtain information about your general internet usage by using a cookie file which is stored on the hard drive of your computer.  Cookies contain information which is transferred to your computer’s hard drive.  They help us to improve our website and to deliver a better and more personalised service.  You may refuse to accept cookies by activating the setting on your browser which allows you to refuse the setting of cookies.  However, if you select this setting you may be unable to access certain parts of our website.  Unless you have adjusted your browser setting so that it will refuse cookies, our system will issue cookies when you use our website.

  1. Links to third party websites

This Privacy Statement applies only to the FPRN and not to any other organisation that you access via links on our website.  If you go to another website from our website, please read the privacy statement on that website to find out what it does with your information.

  1. Making changes to this privacy statement 

We may make changes to this policy from time to time. If we change our Privacy Policy we will post the changes on this page, and will hold a record of the changes that we make. When we make significant changes to this policy we will communicate with our supporters to tell them what has changed. Please revisit the policy when you want to confirm how we use your personal information.

This policy was last revised 27 October 2020.

Our data policies: