Privacy Notice & Cookies Policy

Demonstrating our complete compliance with GDPR, the Data Protection Act 2018, and social care audit requirements.

1. Who We Are & Data Controller Details

Blue Ridge Care is an Ofsted-registered children's residential home. We act as the Data Controller for any personal data collected through this website, our email portals, and referral channels.

Registered Address: 32 Tasman Close, Corringham, Stanford-Le-Hope, SS17 7LD, Essex
Data Protection Officer (DPO) Email: admin@blueridgecare.co.uk

2. What Information We Collect & Why

To fulfil our regulatory safeguarding obligations, support placements, and deliver a secure portal, we collect the following categories of data:

  • Portal Users: Name, work email address, job title, and placing local authority. We collect this to verify your identity as a social care professional before granting access to our restricted operational policy library.
  • Download Audit Logs: Each time you download a policy, we record your User ID, the policy name/version, the timestamp, your IP address, and your browser user agent. This is a crucial safeguarding audit trail to monitor who has accessed and downloaded children's home policies.
  • Referrals & Enquiries: Information regarding the social worker, placing authority, and brief case matching criteria submitted via our placements form.

3. Data Protection Impact Assessment & Retention

In compliance with our Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) concerning sensitive social care records:

Data Retention & Anonymisation Protocol:
All policy download logs (containing user IDs, IP addresses, and versions) are preserved for exactly twelve months to satisfy Ofsted and local authority placement audits. Upon reaching the twelve-month threshold, all personal identifiers (User IDs and IP addresses) are permanently deleted or anonymised, leaving only aggregate statistical counts for system volume reviews.

4. Cookies & Granular Consent

Our website utilizes cookies to ensure platform stability, remember user preferences, and study anonymous traffic.

  • Strictly Necessary Cookies: Essential for platform security, validating CSRF tokens, and maintaining secure login sessions. These cannot be disabled and do not track marketing habits.
  • Performance & Analytics Cookies: Allows us to monitor page loading speed and anonymised traffic to refine our interface (disabled by default, requires explicit click).
  • Functional Cookies: Preserves user preferences across visits, such as keeping the Dyslexia-friendly font settings active (disabled by default).

You can modify your cookie choices at any time by clearing your browser cache or clicking the granular settings toggles on our cookie notice.

5. Your Legal Rights Under GDPR

Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018, you hold statutory rights including:

  • The right to be informed about how your data is processed.
  • The right of access to request copies of your personal files (Subject Access Request).
  • The right to rectification to correct inaccurate details.
  • The right to erasure ("Right to be Forgotten"), subject to overriding child-protection or statutory social care retention mandates.
  • The right to file a complaint directly with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) in the UK (ico.org.uk).