Accommodation Office Privacy Notice

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The Accommodation Office is a section of Accommodation and Commercial Services (ACS), which in turn is a department of The University of Sheffield. The University of Sheffield is a registered data controller with the Information Commissioner’s Office. 

The registered address is: 

Sheffield University
Western Bank
Sheffield
S10 2TN

The University of Sheffield’s Data Protection Officer can be contacted at dataprotection@sheffield.ac.uk 

Any data that we collect via our Accommodation Portal  (currently supplied by StarRez) / Online Chat Service (currently supplied by Tawk.to) is provided to us to help us in the provision to provide accommodation to the Students of the University of Sheffield. This may include information on your room choice or preference and information that you provide to us as a part of the booking process that we need to administer your contract. This may include special category data such as information in relation to your health and sexual orientation. Examples of why we collect this special category data include, but are not limited to;

Health - To allocate Students who require adaptations to their room in the event of a disability / understand whether a PEEP is required.

Sexual Orientation - We use this data as a part of allocating Students into rooms dedicated to LGBT+ Students.

The information that you provide will be held in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018 and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Your personal data will be collected and processed for the purpose of administering accommodation provision at The University of Sheffield.

Your personal data may be processed and stored by the following third-party processors if it is reasonable for us to do so as provider and manager of the Accommodation. Examples of third parties to which we may need to disclose your information include:

  • Organisations or individuals contracted by us to undertake services at the Residence, such as at Allen Court (IQ Students), St Vincent’s Place (Unite Students);
  • The police or public agencies;
  • Your Sponsor (if you have one);
  • Debt recovery or tracing agents.

Further details can be found within the residence contract under the ‘data protection schedule’. The University will not disclose your personal data to any external third party, other than as set out above and/or where you have given us permission to do so, unless we are required to do so by law.

We may share your personal data with other internal departments including relevant academic departments.

The personal data that you provide the University of Sheffield will be held in compliance with our Retention Schedule. 

Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the University must establish a legal basis for processing your personal data and communicate this to you. We process your personal data for the purpose of administering accommodation provision at The University of Sheffield is under the following lawful bases:

  • Article 6(1)(a) GDPR – the data subject has given consent to the processing of his or her personal data for one or more specific purposes.
  • Article 6(1)(b) GDPR – processing is necessary for the performance of a contract to which the data subject is party or in order to take steps at the request of the data subject prior to entering into a contract
  • Article 6(1)(e) GDPR – processing is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller

In addition, we process special category data, such as information in relation to your health and sexual orientation, under Article 9 GDPR using the following lawful basis:

  • Article 9(2)(a) – the data subject has given explicit consent to the processing of those personal data for one or more specified purposes

Your right of access to your personal data

You have a right to request a copy of the information that we hold about you. If you would like to request a copy of some or all of your personal data, please contact the University Secretary's Office. We want to make sure that your personal data is accurate and up to date. You may ask us to correct or remove information that you think is inaccurate. 

Your other rights as a data subject

The GDPR provides you, as a data subject, with a number of rights in relation to your personal data. You have the right to withdraw your consent where that is the legal basis of our processing, have inaccuracies in the personal data that we hold about you rectified, a right to erasure, to request that the processing of your personal data be restricted, to object to certain processing activities and to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office about the way we process your personal data. 

Who do I contact if I want to know more? 

For further information about your right to access information we hold about you, to make a complaint about the way in which we are handling your personal information, or to request to be removed from our systems, please contact the Data Protection Officer at dataprotection@sheffield.ac.uk

If you are not satisfied with our response or wish to raise a complaint with our supervisory body, you may complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office.