Help and Contact

We are Hafren Dyfrdwy Cyfyngedig (referred to as Hafren Dyfrdwy in this notice) and we provide water and waste-water (sewage) services and access to recreational visitor sites in Wales. Hafren Dyfrdwy looks after and is responsible for your data (the Controller). Any reference to “we” or “us” in this notice means Hafren Dyfrdwy.

We use a number of external third parties who process your personal data on our behalf, these companies are referred to as ‘Processors’. Any Processors we use also have their own legal responsibility for handling your data.

If you have any questions, or want more details about how we use your personal information, you can ask us:

Name: Hafren Dyfrdwy Cyfyngedig (Company No: 03527628)

E-mail: dataprotection@severntrent.co.uk

Address: Data Protection Officer, 2 St John’s Street, Coventry, CV1 2LZ

Phone Number: 03457 500 500 (+44 3457 500 500 from outside the UK).

Data Subject Access Requests (DSAR)

To request access to your data please use our online form or complete this Subject access request PDF form.

You can also write to: SAR Officer, Hafren Dyfrdwy, 2 St John’s Street, Coventry, CV1 2LZ 

We collect the following types of personal data from any contact we have with you by telephone, letter, e-mail, whatsapp, facsimile, when visiting your home, Webchat service, Mobile Application, our Contact Us forms and via social media like Twitter and Facebook or even face to face at one of our sites. The table below shows the categories of personal data we are likely to collect about you.

Some of the information we collect about you may include your special categories of personal data as defined in UK Data Protection law. Please refer to section 3 for more information.

When anyone visits our website, whether they are a customer or not, we also store information about the way you interact with our website through the use of cookies.  This helps us to make sure it is the best possible experience for you.   Find out more about the way we use cookies.

We will only request special categories of personal data  from you where we believe it will help us manage your account in the best way for you and to ensure that we can respond to your needs during an incident should one occur. Scenarios in which we may request your special category data are:

• you are unable to pay your bill due to illness to allow us to offer you financial assistance.
• We hold specific information in the event of an incident (e.g. if you are on dialysis, haemo-dialysis) to ensure we can offer additional support and provide services when you need it.
• By registering on our Priority Services Register you are confirming that you have a need for support either during an incident or to help you manage your account. If your data or circumstances change, please contact us. We will contact you and confirm your circumstances for any special category data we hold on you every two years. If you do not respond to our contact, we will assume your details remain unchanged. By registering with us you can be automatically added to the Priority Services Register of your energy network operator and supplier. We may also share your data with DEFRA or other relevant Government organisations for the purposes of incident management. The data we share will only be used to provide you with Priority Services.
• if you participate in customer surveys or research, we may on occasion ask you to voluntarily disclose details of medical conditions or disabilities you may have to ensure our analysis is reflective of all our customers.
• If you believe you have suffered ill health as a result of consuming our water, we will use this data as part of water quality investigations and our reporting obligations to the DWI.
• If you suffer accident or injury at one of our sites, this data may be required for insurance purposes or accident and health reporting.

We will process this data in line with UK GDPR under the lawful basis of ‘public task’ for personal data and necessary for reasons of either for 'employment, social security and social protection’ or  ‘Substantial Public Interest’:

• Support for individuals with a particular disability or medical condition
• Safeguarding of economic well-being of certain individuals
• Equality of Treatment
• Insurance claims
• Legal Obligation
• Preventing or detecting unlawful acts
• Protecting the Public
• Regulatory Requirements

You can find more details on special category data transfers here.

We collect your personal data in a number of ways, for example:

• When you register with us and set up an account to receive our services;
• When you contact us through our websites, by telephone, post, email or through any other means;
• When you complete surveys that we use for research purposes (although you are not obliged to respond to them);
• When you enter a competition or promotion; 
• When you make payments to us, through this website or otherwise;
• When you set your preferences for receiving marketing communications from us;
• When you use our services;
• We may record calls to our contact centres, and may monitor calls in order to keep a record of the discussion, to provide you with the highest quality of service, for training, to ensure compliance with our policies and procedures, for security purposes and for any lawful purpose. Please note we hold call recordings for a period of 12 months.
• When we collect publicly available information about you.
• if you opt into using your social media credentials (Facebook, Google or Apple) to use with our web self service,personal data, your registration and profile information from your social media account will be shared with us as authorised by your privacy settings. Please note that if you withdraw your consent, we will no longer have access to your social media account but we will retain your account information as required (see section 8 for more detail).
• We may also access or request information about you that is available to us from organisations or third parties such as, credit reference agencies, fraud prevention organisations, land registries, local councils or other Government departments to ensure we can charge you for our services, offer you access to our financial assistance schemes or priority support services during an incident
  
• When we receive your personal data from third parties, for example Credit Reference Agencies or fraud prevention organisations; and

We use your information in various ways, such as to:

• Provide you with the services provided and deal with any queries or complaints you may raise;
• Administer your account, including;  
• Letting you know of any work we may be conducting in your area;
• Seeking your views on any service we’ve provided;
• Dealing with any problems, enquiries, or complaints you may have; and
• Resolving unpaid bills.
• To encourage you to use our services in the best possible way in line with our statutory duties as a water and waste undertaker;
• To inform you about campaigns that you have consented to;
• Let you know about goods or services we feel would be beneficial to you via post;
• Prevent fraud;
• Trace and recover debts;
• Keep our records accurate and up to date;
• Create statistical information, market research, analysis and customer profiling to better manage and run our business; and
• Comply with any legal and regulatory obligations we may have.

The lawful basis for processing your data are included in the table below:

As part of normal operations, we engage third party contractors to provide us with services, for example, if you call us to inform us about a leak or a blocked sewer, we may use contractors to investigate the issue. Where we use third party contactors, we may need to give your personal data to them, for example, to investigate the issue and inform you of the outcome.

We may also share your personal data with other third parties because we are under a legal, statutory or other obligation to do so or because we believe that sharing your personal data will help us to manage your account in the best way possible for you.

We may share your personal data with the following parties:

• our employees, agents and/or professional advisors;
• other companies within the Hafren Dyfrdwy Plc Group, and with successors-in-title to our business; 
• other third party contractors who provide services to us which require the processing of personal data;
• third party payment providers who process payments made over our website;
• third party payment companies to help you manage your account.
• relevant authorities and third parties including Department for Food, the Environment and Rural Affairs (Defra), and the Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI)
• the water industry regulator, Ofwat; as part of our statutory requirements as a water and sewerage undertaker. From time to time, Ofwat, or a third party acting on their behalf, may contact you directly to take part in a customer experience survey, which helps us measure and improve our service to you.
• relevant authorities in order to prevent fraud and other criminal offences;
• social services, charities and other third parties in order help manage your account in the best way for you and help you get any support you might need;
• credit reference agencies (to find out more see section 8 below);
• external agencies like the police, fire service, or local councils in the event of an emergency situation or in preparation for an incident, as noted under the Civil Contingencies Act 2004; and
• carefully selected partners, to introduce you to water related news, goods and services (by post,) that we think you'll find interesting,
• our affinity insurance partner, HomeServe Membership Limited, who have been carefully selected to provide access to affinity insurance products for our customers, which can help in the event of water related problems.
• If you opt into using your social media credentials to access our web self service, please review the appropriate privacy policy to understand how these companies will use your data and your rights. Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/privacy/policy,  Apple (https://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/en-ww/), Google (https://policies.google.com/privacy).

You may be asked if you wish to speak to HomeServe after we have assisted you with a telephone enquiry. If you don't wish to be contacted for this purpose, please let us know by contacting us. If you decide to engage with or purchase a product or service from one of our partners, including HomeServe, the way in which they use your personal data is their responsibility only, and details will be set out in their own privacy notice. 

We will take appropriate technical and organisational measures to prevent unauthorised or unlawful processing of personal data and against accidental loss or destruction of, or damage to personal data:

• All customer personal data is held in secure systems with controlled access and subject to cyber security measures.
• We apply strict physical security at all our sites.
• All employees receive cyber security and data protection training.
• We ensure that the personal information that you provide us via this website is held on secure servers.
• Where we transfer information to third parties to enable them to process it on our behalf, we ensure that the providers meet or exceed the relevant legal or regulatory requirements for transferring data and keeping it secure.

We will keep your personal information for as long as you are a customer of Hafren Dyfrdwy. After you stop being a customer or if you visited one of our sites, we may keep your data for up to 7 years for one of these reasons:

• To respond to any questions or complaints.
• To show that we treated you fairly.
• To maintain records according to rules that apply to us.

We may keep your data for longer than 7 years where required for legal or regulatory purposes. We may also keep it for research or statistical purposes e.g. your water consumption to help us manage our network efficiently. If we do, we will make sure that your privacy is protected and only use it for those purposes.

Like many other utilities companies, we share your personal data with, and receive your personal data from, Credit Reference Agencies (CRAs). This helps us maintain up-to-date customer records, prevent fraud and identify customers at risk of falling into debt. This makes it easier for us to find and help customers who need financial assistance. This helps us manage debt levels and, in turn, keep prices lower for all customers. If you pay your bill on time, us sharing your data with the CRAs will also positively impact your credit rating.

We will share your personal information with CRAs for as long as you are a customer. This will include details about your settled accounts and any debts not fully repaid on time.

The CRAs may give this information to other organisations that want to check credit status. If you tell us that you have a spouse or financial associate living at the same property, we will link your records together.

CRAs will also link your records together and these links will remain on your file and theirs until either you or your partner successfully applies for a disassociation with the CRAs to break that link. 

You can find out more about the CRAs on their websites, in their Credit Reference Agency Information Notice. This includes details about:

• Who they are
• Their role as fraud prevention agencies  
• The data they hold and how they use it       
• How they share personal information      
• How long they can keep data
• Your data protection rights

Information notices (CRAIN) for the two Credit Reference Agencies we use:

TransUnion (opens in a new window)

Equifax (opens in a new window)

As part of our green recovery efforts to transform our business and the wider water industry, we want to give you the most up to date information about your water usage through the use of smart meters. It will also us to help you use water more efficiently through identifying leaks more quickly and trial new ways of managing peak demand.

We are currently rolling out smart meters on a trial basis incertain geographic areas.. If you apply for a free meter installation or are due to have a meter replaced in one of these areas, a smart meter will be fitted at your home. Your installer will inform you that a smart meter is being installed at your appointment.

What is a ‘smart’ meter?

We use Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) meters, which gives us the ability to collect granular data about your usage without the need to send out a meter reader to your property.  Meter reads can be taken on a quarter-hourly basis that are then automatically sent to ourselves once every hour.

What smart meter information do we collect?

We collect

• Your meter serial number
• The type of meter you have installed
• Meter readings that will tell us how much water you’ve used.

How often do we take smart meter reads?

Our smart meters take a reading every hour and you can see this usage through the My Smart Tracker web page, which is part of our online ‘My Account’ service. <link>.

What do we use the smart meter readings for?

Every six months we will use your meter readings to bill you for the water you’ve used.

In addition, we will use hourly readings for a number of different activities:

·       Spotting leaks – if we notice your consumption is increasing faster than normal it may indicate that there is a problem with your supply. We’ll be able to contact you either through My Smart Tracker or directly to let you know there’s an issue as soon as we spot it.

·       Water usage analysis – we will use this information to drive water efficiency projects across our geographical area and help us manage periods of peak demand.

·       Compare your property’s water usage with similar properties

What is our legal basis for processing your smart meter data?

Do you share my smart meter data with anyone?

If you opt in to use our online service, my smart tracker, a third party provider, Advizzo who provides us the web page platform. The personalised water use tracker allows you to:

• See how much water you’re using – monthly, daily and hourly
• Compare your household’s water usage with similar households in your area
• Spot leaks quickly so you can fix them before they become a big problem
• Access to monthly water usage reports and advice to help you save water

We will also use your consumption data to identify a potential problem with your supply such as a leak. As a result, we may ask a third party contractor to visit your property to investigate. Please see section 6 for further detail on who we may share your personal data with.

Who can I contact if I have an issue or want to object to processing?

If you did not wish to receive your monthly consumption report then please call us on 03457 500 500.

You have a choice about how smart meter data is used apart from where we require it to bill you for our services or for any other legal or regulatory purpose. We can access your daily data unless you let us to know that you wish to opt out of this type of processing. You can contact using the details noted in section 13. 

Under data protection law, you have rights, which in some circumstances may be subject to exceptions including:

Your right of access - You have the right to ask us for copies of your personal information. You can request a copy of the information we hold about you. There is no charge for this. You can do this via our online form or by completing this Subject access request PDF form (opens in a new window). You can also write to: SAR Officer, Hafren Dyfrdwy, 2 St John’s Street, Coventry, CV1 2LZ

or

Email us: customerSAR@severntrent.co.uk

Our process of compiling a subject access request does not include a review of any ongoing issues, and does not form part of Hafren Dyfrdwycomplaints process. 

Hafren Dyfrdwy Water is not covered by the Freedom of Information Act 2000 however, you can request certain types of information under Environmental Information Regulations 2004. For further details please see our EIR page.

Your right to rectification - You have the right to question any information we have about you that you think is wrong or incomplete. Please contact us if you want to do this. If you do, we will take reasonable steps to check its accuracy and correct it.

Your right to erasure - You can request the deletion or removal of personal data where there is no reason for its continued processing. This right is also known as the “Right to be Forgotten”.

Your right to be informed - You can ask for details of how we process your personal data, as covered by this Privacy Notice

Your right to object to processing - You can request that your personal data is not processed for specific purposes such as direct marketing.

As a statutory undertaker we have a duty to promote efficient use of water and encourage customers to dispose of waste appropriately. We may send you information leaflets or emails or make you aware of products that help with this.

To help us to do this, we may share your information with carefully selected partners who offer services or products that we think you may be interested in.

If you don’t want to receive such offers at all, please let us know – you can email or call us on 03457 500 500 or via post using the contact details in section 13.

Your right to restriction of processing - You can request that no further processing of the personal data we have previously collected occurs.

Your right to data portability - In certain circumstances, you can request that we transfer personal information that you have provided to us to a third party.

You are not required to pay any charge for exercising your rights although we reserve the right to charge where UK GDPR allows us to do so. If you make a request, we have one month to respond to you unless an exception under UK GDPR applies.

Please be aware that there may be circumstances when we are unable to complete your request, most likely because we could not provide you with water, waste water or billing services. If this is ever the case, we will inform you of the reason and provide details of how you can register a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (please see section 12 below) if you believe we have got this wrong.

Automated decision making and profiling – please note we do not currently conduct any automated decision making, including profiling, as defined by UK Data Protection laws.

For business customers, the market opened on 1 April 2017 for water supplies to business users, enabling businesses to switch providers and is run by Market Operator Services Limited (“MOSL”). In order to facilitate this, we may share details of contacts at our business customers with MOSL and third party service providers where required. Find out more information on MOSL.  

In addition to the rights above, non-household customers have the right to ‘data portability’ between retailers.

Your right to data portability - You have the right to request that we transfer your data when you switch retailers.

Data Subject Rights Request (DSRR)

If you are a non-household/business customer, you have the right to request your data through either your wholesaler or retailer. If you wish to make a request to us as your wholesaler then please email WMU@Severntrent.co.uk.