Copyright

The material on this website is copyright.

© AHS and Authors 1996 - 2024

Information may be downloaded for personal use only. The information may be passed on to another party for their private use provided that the source and this copyright information is acknowledged. The material may not be reproduced in quantity, or for commercial purposes.

AHS privacy notice

How we use your information

This privacy notice tells you who we are and what to expect when the Antiquarian Horological Society (AHS) or one of the AHS special-interest, regional or overseas groups, collects your personal information. It is intended for visitors, members, guests and anyone who has a relationship with the AHS or its groups, whether or not they use the AHS website and other digital channels.

The notice provides information on:

• who we are
  
• how we use your information
  
• cookies and tracking
  
• the legal grounds for processing your information
  
• who we share information with
  
• transfers of data abroad
  
• how long we keep your information
  
• your rights
  
• access to personal information and correction
  
• consent and your right to opt out
  
• complaints, enquiries and feedback
  
• changes to this privacy notice
  

Who we are

The Antiquarian Horological Society (AHS) is a learned society formed in 1953. It exists to encourage the study of all matters relating to the art and history of time measurement, to foster and disseminate original research, and to encourage the preservation of examples of the horological and allied arts.

In order to achieve its aims, the AHS hosts meetings, talks and events around the UK and overseas; publishes a range of specialist books as well as a quarterly journal (Antiquarian Horology), and supports education, conservation and historical research through a series of bursaries, prizes and awards. It also runs special-interest groups on wristwatches, electrical timekeeping and public clocks, plus regional and overseas groups.

The AHS is constituted as a company limited by guarantee and is run by a Council elected from the membership, supported by a small staff and advisors.

The AHS is the data controller of your personal information, including personal information collected or processed by AHS special-interest, regional or overseas groups.

How we use your information

The main purposes for which we collect and process the details of Members, guests, visitors and anyone who has a relationship with the AHS, are to provide the Membership service, other service, goods or information that has been requested.

If you are a Member, we will notify you (by post, email or telephone) when there are changes to the Membership scheme, or when your Membership is due for renewal, or has recently lapsed, or when we have relevant news and information for you relating to events, products, services and fundraising.

Cookies and tracking

When you visit www.ahsoc.org or any AHS website, we may place a cookie on your computer to aid in improving the usefulness of the site. If you have disabled cookies this will not affect your use of the sites.

However, for a member log-in to be successful, the AHS website will need to place a cookie on your computer when you log in to the members' area. That cookie contains no personal or tracking information and is simply placed there to indicate a successful log-in. It will be active for no more than 24 hours. It is deemed to be  ‘strictly necessary ‘ under the terms of data protection laws for access to secure website pages, and specific user acceptance is not required.

Similarly, a third-party cookie placed by the action of on-line purchasing initiated by a visitor to an AHS website is also defined as  ‘strictly necessary ‘ for the operation of a shopping cart and subsequent checkout, and does not require specific user consent.

If we would like to collect personally identifiable information via the website or other digital channels, we will make it clear when we do so and will explain what we intend to do with the data.

The legal grounds for processing your information

Under the terms of data protection laws, we can only process your personal information for certain reasons. Our reasons are set out below.

a) We need to process your personal data in order to deliver a contracted service, including the purchase of a book, buying or booking a ticket for an event, or when you become a Member of the AHS. As part of your Membership service, we will notify you (by post, email or telephone) when there are changes to the Membership scheme, or when your Membership is due for renewal, or has recently lapsed, or when we have relevant news and information for you relating to events, products, services and fundraising.

b) The processing of your personal data is within our legitimate interests, where we carry out activities that enable the AHS to promote the study of all matters relating to the art and history of time measurement, to foster and disseminate original research, and to encourage the preservation of examples of the horological and allied arts.

c) You have consented to the use of your personal data for a specific purpose which requires that consent, such as for a particular type of marketing.

Who we share information with

We will never sell your data. We will not share personal data with third-party organisations for marketing purposes without your permission. We may, however, occasionally outsource functions when we do not have the in-house capacity required, such as the use of a mailing house for mailings.

In some cases, the outsourced service provider will be the data controller and take legal responsibility for compliance with data protection laws. There may be other cases when the service is outsourced but the AHS retains data-controller responsibility and will directly ensure that personal data is only processed in accordance with lawful AHS instructions. In any case, we will only outsource services to reputable firms that have procedures in place to ensure the safe and confidential processing of personal data at all times.

We may also disclose personal information where required by law or where otherwise necessary for a lawful purpose. 

Transfers of data abroad

We will always ensure an adequate level of protection is provided for personal information transferred outside the European Economic Area. If the organisation we share personal data with is in a country without adequate data protection in place, we will place contractual requirements on the third-party organisation to handle personal data to the same standard that is required by legislation in the United Kingdom.

How long we keep your information

We only use your data for the purposes for which it was obtained. It will only be kept for as long as it is required for those lawful reasons.  

Your rights

Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) you have the following rights:

• to obtain access to, and copies of, the personal data that we hold about you
  
• to require us to correct any inaccurate personal data we hold about you
  
• to require us to restrict our processing of your personal data
  
• to object to us processing your personal data
  
• to object to receiving marketing communications from us
  
• to withdraw your consent to processing of your personal data
  
• to require us to erase your personal data (‘right to be forgotten’)
  
• to obtain from us the personal data which you have provided, in order to transmit it to another organisation ('data portability')
  

Please note that the above rights are not absolute, and we may be entitled to refuse requests where exceptions apply. How we deal with some of your rights are set out elsewhere in this privacy notice. You also have the right to refer your concerns or queries to the supervisory authority, the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Access to personal information and correction

We strive at all times to ensure that your personal information is accurate and up to date. You may ask us to correct or remove information you think is inaccurate by contacting us as detailed in the 'Complaints, enquiries and feedback’ section of this notice. If your personal details change, please help us to keep your information up to date by notifying us at the address below.

Under the terms of data protection legislation you have the right to request access to and a copy of information that we hold about you, by making a Subject Access Request. You can do this in several ways:

• download, complete and return the Subject Access Request form
  
• email the Secretary at secretary@ahsoc.org
  
• write a letter to The Secretary, The Antiquarian Horological Society, 4 Lovat Lane, London EC3R 8DT

Consent and your right to opt out

If we intend to use your personal information for certain types of marketing or other purposes where your consent is required (namely, because the use of your data is not covered by the contracted service or legitimate interest legal bases explained in this notice), we will seek your specific consent to use your information for these purposes. Whenever we seek your consent we will explain how we intend to use your data. Consent will require a positive affirmation from you, generally in the form of an opt-in such as ticking a box to signal your agreement.

After you give consent to the use of your personal information for certain types of marketing or other purposes where your consent is required, you can withdraw your consent to being contacted for these purposes at any time.

Complaints, enquiries and feedback

The AHS strives to meet the highest standards when collecting and using personal information. For this reason, we take any complaints we receive about this very seriously. We encourage people to bring it to our attention if they think that our collection or use of information is unfair, misleading or inappropriate. We would also welcome any suggestions for improving our procedures.

This privacy notice is intended to be brief and clear. It does not provide exhaustive detail of all aspects of AHS collection and use of personal information, but we are happy to provide you with any additional information or explanation.

If you have an enquiry, a complaint or suggestions regarding our data protection processes, please contact:

The Secretary, The Antiquarian Horological Society, 4 Lovat Lane, London EC3R 8DT

or email us at secretary@ahsoc.org.

If you are not satisfied by the response to your complaint, you are entitled to escalate your concern. The first step is to seek an internal review of AHS handling of your complaint. Please submit your application for a review in writing to the Secretary at the above address.

Changes to this privacy notice

We keep our privacy notice under regular review. Please visit this page periodically in order to keep up to date with any changes.

This privacy notice was last updated on 23 August 2018.