As a relocation agency we will and must have insight and access into very personal and confidential data.
The following content explains which data we will need, how we will store and what we will do with it. Please confirm your agreement with these by completing the little form at the end of this article.
DEFINITION OF PERSONAL DATA
CONTACT DETAILS & PROFESSIONAL BACKGROUND
When first time communicating with you we will get to know your name, sometimes telephone number, and email address as well as the content of your inquiry. These data will be stored in our cloud-based collaboration tool, so that our team members can access this contact details in case they need to do so. Depending on which services booked, you will be granted access to this tool.
We will typically run a background check on you and search for social network visibility (LinkedIn and Xing). The relevant information (your photograph as well as your job title and the URLs of your profiles in these two networks) is copied into your contact details. We don’t consider this personal data since it is publicly available.
In a first instance, these data are only accessible by our team members, and eventually your HR and youself.
FINANCIAL INFORMATION
For a lot of our services, it is important to know and process your financial data. Your files will be stored in our collaboration system. Financial data we would normally request are employment contract, payslips, credit ratings, savings. This is usually necessary for immigration services and homesearches. You HR has no immediate access to these, but you can grant them access.
While you decide which information you send to us, without them we cannot really do our job and would need to reject your service request.
PERSONAL INFORMATION
In the course of supporting you, we will likely also receive information on marital status, children, insurance status, birthdays, nationalities, religion, passions and hobbies, parents’ names and whereabouts. This is likewise information which we partly need to share, and partly recommend to share, with authorities, and also with landlords.
PLACE OF STORAGE
We use standard TLS secured email processing, this means nobody can access your emails while being processed – however, files remain open for the recipient. If the recipient’s system is hacked, people may get access to your files. They are accessible only to the recipients.
Most landlords require provision of personal data via eMail and so do some immigration bodies or other authorities. Any date received by you or sent on behalf of you remains in our email system and server for a default period of 10 years, which is the legal obligation for any data that proves that our services were ordered and rendered and to what extend.
COLLABORATION SYSTEM
Any document provided by you will be saved in our collaboration system, fully GDPR compliant, likewise for 10 years as they are important to prove the base of our service. either we upload them on your behalf, or you upload them yourself, or you ask your HR to upload it for you. They will be accessible to the relocation consultants working on your case for the period of rendering the services, thereafter basically only me and IT can access your files.
Where communication between you and us happens within our collaboration platform, this content is saved and accessible for the relocation consultants involved with you relocation. You will always be able to see instantly, who this is.
Where documents are uploaded, a folder structure will be set up and access rights will be reconciled with you. It is your deicsion, if HR can access a specific folder, or our team, or just you.
LOCAL PCs & MOBILE PHONES
Our consultants may save your data on their local PC and mobile before uploading them into our collaboration system. They also may download them for better access during appointments with authorities or realtors and they also may print them for the same purpose.
They are instructed to secure their devices with password protection and to delete them permanently once our services are completed.
DATA PROCESSING
DOWNLOAD OPTIONS
Where it is custom or possible to use download options for the recipient of your data, we will make use of this option. This means, we will either offer the person access to a specific public folder (to which you will also have access), or we will make use of the person’s public folder per upload. Where we have to make use of another person’s upload function and server, we cannot guarantee it’s compliance with GDPR. The services do not comprise checking a third person’s public folder GPDR compliance.
However, most landlords and immigration bodies prefer regular email, and where they offer upload, they usually reassure these tools are GDPR compliant.
In most cases, personal information will be conveyed via regular email.
Please remember we have no guarantees about the realtor’s system security, nor can we be held liable for any security breach, nor can we guarantee that the realtor or landlord deletes your files. However, these data need to be disclosed in order to get approval, if you do not agree to this process, we will not be able to find you an apartment or proceed with your immigration.
HOMESEARCH
Further, while not mentioning your name, we will disclose personal information when inquiring for apartment details: nationality, employer, nature of contract, rough information on net salary, job title, marital status, educational background, age, language skills, interests and hobbies, smoking habits, pets, children (age, gender and sometimes hobbies). This is necessary to stand out from other inquiries. Your data will not be stored in a structured way since the portal registration is always via The Red Relocators. We only use real estate web portals which reassure compliance with GDPR.
Where there is personal information provided in conjunction with your name (and often current address) – for example in the form of a personal statement – the realtors’ forms usually contain data protection language for the specific utilization of this data. Please actively ask us to explain if you care.
IMMIGRATION, REGISTRATION, INSURANCES
We will provide information on employment, savings, insurance, family members, marital status, age, nationality etc. to the immigration bodies (embassy, consulate and local foreigners office, sometimes Federal Employment Agency, sometimes the Chamber of Commerce) insofar as they are requested upfront any appointments as a preparation for the decision. The main means of communicating is still eMail while some few immigration bodies nowadays request uploading data.
While you would otherwise send this information to the authorities on your own, you are sending them through us. Some immigration bodies would allow for upload, but most will either require email, or they only require hard copies for the appointment itself. In order to guide you properly through the process, we still need to review and save these data.
OTHER SERVICE WHERE THIRD PERSONS EXPECT TO RECEIVE YOUR PERSONAL DATA
Registration usually only requires your full name and birthday to be conveyed in advance of the appointment. Insurances will require application forms to be completed, and we will be aware of their contents. Kindergartens and school will require your child’s gender, birthday, language skills, address. Driving License bodies will request information as so included in your driving license plus contact details as well as registration information and residence title.
Where we would otherwise disclose personal information we would make you aware of it prior doing so.
Please do avoid using Whatsapp to communicate with us.
DURATION OF SAVING & PROCESSING
DEFAULT
You can assume that any document you sent us will be uploaded to the collaboration tool within relatively short notice. From then on it will be saved and eventually processed.
After your services are fully rendered, your data will not be processed anymore without your prior written consent. It will remain saved and access is going to be denied for anybody but the MD of The Red Relocators, Kerstin Luong, and IT Support.
REQUEST DELETION OF PERSONAL DATA
Once we are done with your services and our final invoice has been issued, you may request us to delete your personal data. Please understand that we can only delete those parts which we are not obliged to keep by law.
Kerstin Luong
Management Director at The Red Relocators GmbH
Hamburg, 01.01.2022