Protecting Your Data

Protecting Your Data

Introduction

Marmalade Bed & Breakfast needs to gather and use certain information about guests, and protecting this data is a critical part of our service to you. This policy describes how such data is collected, handled and stored.

How Guest Data is Collected

We collect guest data from four sources, as follows:

·        Direct Contacts. Guest data may be passed directly to us either verbally (such as in conversation or on the telephone) or in writing (such as in a letter or email).

·        Link to Freetobook. To enable guests to make bookings through our website, we provide a link to a third-party booking service provider called Freetobook. Once you have left our website and transferred to Freetobook, your booking transaction is governed entirely by Freetobook’s privacy policy, for which we are not responsible. Freetobook sends us an email summary of each booking transaction that guests make using the link.

·        Booking.com via Freetobook. Guests can also make bookings with us using the major on-line travel agent known as Booking.com. Such booking transactions are collated by Freetobook and, again, an email summary is sent to us.

·        Guest Check-In. During check-in, we collect from guests any additional data that may be required by Immigration (Hotel Records) Order 1972.

No guest data is collected within our website.

Guest Data that is Collected

The guest data that may be collected either through direct verbal/written contacts or via Freetobook covers:

·        Guest names, contact details (address, telephone number and email address) and nationalities

·        Guest passport numbers (where required by Immigration (Hotel Records) Order 1972)

·        Booking details (dates, rooms and any particular customer requests)

·        Credit/Debit card details

This data is entirely factual and contains no record whatsoever of any subjective opinions that we may form regarding guests.

For a small fee, we will be pleased to provide guests with a copy of their personal data upon written request.

Purposes for which Guest Data is Kept

We use guest data solely to support the following purposes:

·        To maintain operational details of bookings and future availability

·        To administer financial transactions relating to guest stays

·        To maintain a register of occupancy in compliance with Immigration (Hotel Records) Order 1972

·        To provide contact details for communications to guests (we do not send marketing material to guests)

·        To tailor products and services to guests’ preferences

We do not pass guest data to third parties unless required to do so by law or in support of legal action.

How Guest Data is Stored

Guest data that is collected through direct verbal/written contacts is recorded in hardcopy and locked away when not in use. Data that is forwarded to us by Freetobook is retained in email form and copied to our availability management spreadsheets; all such data is kept on computers and secondary storage devices and accessed under strict password protection. All computer devices are locked away when not in use.

Guests’ credit/debit card details that are provided to Freetobook during booking transactions are not forwarded us us. Instead, such details are maintained on secure Freetobook systems that are accessible to us only under double-password protection. Any guest credit/debit card details that are provided directly to us in verbal/written contacts are destroyed following the applicable guest stay.

Note on Cookies

Like many websites, ours gathers data (using small files called ‘cookies’ and Google Analytics) to provide generic statistics on website usage such as the number of accesses to the website per day and the duration of each access. Such data is used solely by our website hosting provider and we have no access to it.