Privacy Policy

Privacy policy: Furniture Industry Research Association website

The Furniture Industry Research Association, and its commercial partner FIRA International, are committed to protecting your privacy when you use our online or other services ("Services"). In this policy we explain how and why we collect, process, use and disclose your personal information, what we do with it and what controls you have over our use of it. In this Privacy Statement the terms 'we' or 'us' means the Furniture Industry Research Association, and its commercial partner FIRA International.

Please read this Privacy Statement carefully as it contains important information to help you understand our practices regarding any personal information that you provide to us.

From time to time, we may change this Statement in response to changes in our systems and our continuing commitment to protecting your information.

As a result, please refer to this Privacy Statement regularly to review any amendments.

What personal data do we collect?

We log your Internet Protocol (IP) address in order to receive and send information from and to you over the internet.

When you join the Furniture Industry Research Association, register for any of our services, supply data to make an enquiry, or order products or services from us, you may be asked to provide some personal data such as your name, home, business or billing address, telephone number, e-mail address, and credit or debit card number.

We also automatically collect data about visitors to our website (for example on browsing patterns) by using Cookies. (See below.)

Cookies

A cookie is a small piece of data or message that is sent from a web server to your browser and is stored on your hard drive. A cookie can't read data off your hard disk or read cookie files created by other sites. Cookies do not damage your system.

You can reset your browser so as to refuse any cookie or to alert you to when a cookie is being sent.

If you choose not to accept our cookies, some of the features of our site may not work as well as we intend.

We use cookies for the purposes of system administration of our website, to give us information about the number of visitors to different parts of our website, and to enhance your visit to our site.

How do we use your personal data?

We use your personal data to provide goods and services to you or your organisation, to carry out membership administration, to let you know about other goods and services in which you may be interested, to inform you about changes and improvements to our website, and for direct marketing purposes (but we do give you the option to opt out of this).

We may also use your personal data to monitor the use of the site, to record traffic flows and to carry out research about our visitors’, members’ and customers’ demographics, interests and behaviour. We do this to understand our visitors, members, customers and potential customers better.

When you give us personal data, those data may be sent electronically to servers anywhere in the world and may be used, stored and processed anywhere in the world, including countries outside the European Economic Area. (Bear in mind that many countries outside the EEA do not adequately protect your rights as a data subject.)

Whenever and wherever we collect, process or use personal data, we take steps to ensure that it is treated securely and in accordance with our privacy policy.

How We Might Share Your Information

The third parties with whom we may need to share personal information to help us provide services and products to you and to run our Website are:

  • our subsidiaries or affiliates;
  • our advisors;
  • our third party service providers who process information on our behalf to help run some of our internal business operations including email distribution, IT services, business support and customer services;
  • independent debt recovery agencies or service providers, solicitors or other agents for the purpose of collecting monies due or outstanding on your account; and
  • law enforcement bodies in order to comply with any legal obligation or court order.

FIRA International Ltd are part of Element Materials Technology and may need to transfer personal information across to help operate our business efficiently. We also allow third party service providers to process personal information where this is needed in connection with a service they provide to us. These arrangements may involve your personal information being located in various countries around the world e.g. Canada, US, Australia where privacy laws differ. We only make these arrangements or transfers where we are satisfied that adequate levels of protection are in place to protect information held in that country and Element Materials Technology has in place an international data transfer agreement incorporating the EU approved model clauses for such transfers. You hereby understand and consent to the transfer of personal information to these countries and parties.

Members’ Directory

If you contact a Furniture Industry Research Association member via the Members’ Directory then all the information (including your name, email and phone number) which you input and submit will be automatically emailed to the organisation you are contacting. We cannot be held responsible for any loss or damage incurred by you sharing your details with a member, or held responsible for how they process the details you submit to them.

Direct Marketing

We may contact you by e-mail to market our goods and services, but you may at any time request us to stop using your personal data for direct marketing purposes. If you wish to do this, please contact: info@fira.co.uk

Links

This website contains links to the sites of third parties. We accept no responsibility or liability for the content of other websites which are not under the Furniture Industry Research Association’s strict control. We are not responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting other websites and such sites are not governed by our Privacy Statement. We cannot control the content or the security of any third party websites. Linking to such websites is done at the user's own risk and we make no representations as to those third party websites' content. We cannot be held responsible for any loss or damage incurred by the user as a result of using third party websites. No links are intended to be, nor should be construed as, an endorsement of any kind by us of that other website.

You may not create a link to this website from another website or document without our prior written permission.

Security

The Furniture Industry Research Association places great importance on the security of all information associated with our members. We invest appropriate resources to protect your personal information, from loss, misuse, unauthorised access, modification or disclosure. For example, our security and privacy policies are periodically reviewed and enhanced as necessary and only authorised personnel have access to user information. However, no internet-based site can be 100% secure and the Furniture Industry Research Association cannot be held responsible for unauthorised or unintended access that is beyond our control. Although Furniture Industry Research Association will do its best to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of your data sent over the internet or by email.

Inaccuracies and Corrections

We would like to keep your personal data accurate and up to date. If you become aware of any errors or inaccuracies, please let us know by contacting: info@fira.co.uk

Your Rights

You have the right to request copies of your personal information within our custody and control and details of how we use that information. If any of the information held about you is incorrect or out of date please write to the address below to report your concerns and we will amend our records. You also have the right to require us to stop processing your personal data and/or to withdraw your consent to processing based on consent. However this may not apply where we have other legal justifications to continue processing your personal data as part of your membership of the Furniture Industry Research Association.

Complaints Process

If you have a complaint about how we have handled your personal information you may contact us using the details below and we will investigate your complaint. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority (i.e. the ICO) once you have tried to resolve the issue with us.

Contact Us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Statement, or you think we have incorrect information or you would like a copy of the information we hold about you, you may request details of personal information which we hold about you. Your request should be made in writing to:

Company Secretary
Furniture Industry Research Association
Unit 3 Cockerell Close
Stevenage
Hertfordshire
SG1 2NB

Email contact through info@fira.co.uk

Last updated 1 November 2021