Lighter Look at GDPR

GDPR Has anyone ever read one of these GDPR approved privacy notices (let alone ours)??

We have to have one of these to explain how we comply with the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), the DPA (Data Protection Act) and the PECR (Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations) because God knows there’s not enough actual interesting things in the world to read, you need to read 1,000 words of nonsense that makes not one bit of difference to anyone, ever.

Also we don’t really know what these things are. We’re just a small under-achieving business and cricket enthusiast who thought we’d have a laugh and get other people smiling with us.

SHORT WORDS WRITTEN BY TWO PEOPLE WITH SHORT TEMPERS. The best bit about the GDPR is that all this has to be “concise, transparent, intelligible and easily accessible” so hold on to your abdo guards, this is going to be the shortest, clearest and best take on a privacy policy you ever did see. So. Here we go…

TLDR Wondering what this means - Lets help you.......... "Too Long, Didn't read". We’re a tiny, overstretched business and we don’t have the time or energy to do anything nefarious with your data. It’s not that we’re not evil – we’re as corruptible as anyone – we’re just too damn tired to think up a malevolent cunning plot to steal your identity. We collect and store the info we need to provide you with the service you buy from us. We occasionally stalk you via Facebook adverts. That’s really it.

Cookies Seriously who cares? Does anyone even know what a cookie is or does? Well then. Yes we use cookies because that’s kinda how the Internet works. If you don’t want our delicious home-baked white chocolate chip scripts, then you need to block cookies on your browser but don’t come crying to us when nothing does what it’s supposed to.

STALKY VISITOR TRACKING Look, we’re following you, ok? We use Google Analytics, primarily to stare at the real time stats because they’re cool, but also to see what stuff people looking at so we can offer more of the stuff you like. We also use Facebook so that we can promote and sell you stuff. Yes you heard it. We are a business and – shocker – we want you to spend money with us. By following us on Facebook means that we can see how people interact with our site and with Facebook adverts and then we try to flog you relevant stuff. If you’ve not seen the Facebook Ads analytics dashboard MAN ALIVE it’s stalker central!! That stuff is a terrifying Black Mirror horror show. If you’re not on Facebook – well bloody done but the I'm pretty sure Facebookis tracking you anyway. None of these things store any super personal data about you but probably they nab your IP address, not that we’d know where to look for it or what to do with it. All we see is that a person or many people have interacted with the website in a particular way. You can mess with us by doing something totally unexpected on the website and skewing our stats. Or you could do something way more fun and useful with your time LIKE PLAYING CRICKET!!

DATA STORAGE DATA!! It’s all about the data, baby. A literal tonne of petabytes whirring around the world and what? What’s it all for? WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN? What will future historians actually see of us and our slowly collapsing society? So, We store your data in a few different places and use it in a couple of different ways. You ready for this?

Here on this website! If you register with the site we will store your name and email address. If you buy stuff from us we will store your name, email address, postal address, phone number if you give it to us, and purchase history. If you're buying clothing we may even know your chest size ladies or your inside leg measurement gents. Trust us they aren't as good as you promised!! Your payment details ARE NOT held on the site. We obviously go to the maximum effort to keep this data secure and only three people have access to it. Only one of them ever actually looks at it and that’s to solve any technical problems you might have, one doesn't understand t and the other has lost the password! We’ll be honest: we do absolutely nothing unsurprising or radical with your info. We use your purchase history to target you with ads for stuff you might actually like. For e.g. if you buy a cricket shirt, we’ll occasionally ask you if you want to buy some cricket trousers. Does that make us EvilMegaCorp? Idk, it’s fairly standard isn’t it? We actually like to think of this as all part of the cunning plan, sorry I mean service.

Email Newsletters! If you’ve signed up for anything or bought anything on our site – newsletters, sports gear, club shirts, extra large jock strap, anything else – your name and email address also wings its way over to our newsletter email system (eventually), which is the system we use to manage our newsletters and emails. They are (allegedly) GDPR compliant. You can unsubscribe from emails at any time by hitting the unsubscribe button.

YOUR PAYMENT DETAILS When you buy stuff from us online , you will probably pay through PayPal using your debit or credit card. The only payment-based details we hold on our site is how much you’ve spent and whether you paid with PayPal. We have no bank or card details or nada here. PayPal is being totally weird about GDPR but will have to be GDPR compliant or everyone in Europe will have to stop using it and probably they don’t want that. In other words we can't go crazy with your card details down at the local sports shop (oops, that's us isn't it)!

EMAIL MARKETING & NEWSLETTERS If you sign up to our newsletter, we will send you a newsletter – occasionally (but don't hold us to it), but please remember these are hands not wands so if its gone quiet for a while it doesn't necessarily mean death, bankruptcy or we don't care. You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the unsubscribe button in every email. Your name and email address are stored securely in Mailerlite (our GDPR compliant email newsletter service). Mailerlite automatically adds tracking things to links so if you click on a link WE KNOW. If you open an email WE KNOW. If you ignore us reminding you to be playing cricket or spending money at your favorite sports shop WE KNOW! The most important thing about this is we have neither the time nor inclination to actually look at or do anything with these stats.

YOUR RIGHT TO BE DELETED FINE bugger OFF THEN WE DON’T CARE. If you want to go undercover, just chuck us an email at sales@martinberrillsports.com and we’ll delete all the info we have on you from our systems while having a passive aggressive huff about what we could have possibly done wrong. This does not include PayPal. If you want to delete your PayPal accounts you have to do that yourself via PayPal. We cannot delete your purchase history because the taxman will be terribly upset and we would all hate to upset HMRC wouldn't we?! Just so you know, though, you won’t be able to access your account with us anymore (because you won't have one). You will feel isolated and left out but you can always rejoin if you say "pretty please".

SOCIAL MEDIA AND ALL THAT B******S We use social media a bit, partly to promote our products plus to convince everyone that we are indeed still alive and not retired to our private islands in the Caribbean (yet), but mostly as a vehicle for our creative babbling, superb offers and sports opinions. If you talk to us in our Facebook group and we become familiar with you, we might find you on Twitter or Instagram and say hello. You can ask us to be less friendly if you wish and we will of course respect your boundaries (PS Did you score any boundaries on Saturday? No, Didn't think so). You are not required to follow our social media accounts and we won’t ask our employees to temper themselves in the service of us. If they turn out to be racist, bigoted dipshits then we would love to know so we can tell them to go to hell (or give them a bonus). Got it? Read it? Done it? WELL BLOODY DONE YOU! Celebrate your achievement with a gold star!!

OTHER BUSINESSES We CANNOT and WILL NOT and SHALL NOT guarantee this is GDPR compliant for your business. Seek legal advice on this matter for your business. WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR BUSINESS. Not now, not ever, not in any universe or timeline or reboot. This is just the ramblings of a red wine drinking cricket enthusiast who is already venting and fed up with GDPR after just 24 hours!!