The Improvement Service, Improvement Service partner companies, and third party suppliers to the Improvement Service, are committed to protecting your privacy online. This Privacy Policy sets out the way we deal with personal information. We ask you to read it carefully.

We will treat any personal "data" or information (which means data from which you can be identified, including your name, address, email address and the like) that you provide to us, or that we obtain from you, in accordance with the provisions of the Data Protection Act of 1998.

What personal information do we collect and how do we collect it?

When you register on the Improvement Service website, or any of its Community of Practice sites, we ask you to provide personal information that we require in order to provide a service to you in accordance with our usual operating procedures and quality standards. We note in the section below the reasons why we process your personal information.

We may also, from time to time, ask you for, or enable you to provide, additional information so that we can improve our service to you or make your visits to our site more rewarding. There will be no obligation on you to provide this additional information.

Additional information about you (i.e. that which is not submitted on the registration form) is usually obtained through your browser and through the use of a "cookie" or other information software. Cookies are text files which identify users' computers to our server and which can be used to store some of the preferences of the user moving around our site. The information obtained by these means is not personal information, but it does allow us to improve the experience of visitors to our website. Most web browsers will automatically accept cookies unless you configure them not to. Please note that this might have the effect of hindering some website functionality.

What do we do with your personal information?

The Improvement Service will hold any information obtained via this website, or any other website controlled by Improvement Service. We will not provide it to any third parties without your permission unless it is in response to a lawful request for information such as a court order, witness summons, or complaint from governmental authorities. Your information may be provided to Improvement Service partner companies and third party suppliers in order to fulfil legitimate business processes (e.g. fulfilment, mailing houses, conference registration etc.)

We will not sell, trade or rent your information to other parties unless we have first obtained your consent. If you do give us permission, we will only share information with organisations we have carefully selected and believe to be reputable. We may provide aggregated data about our customers - sales, traffic patterns and related site information - without your consent, but we will not supply any personal information which could be used to identify you in this way.

Your personal information will be used only for the purposes of communicating with you in relation to our services, for assessment and analysis to enable us to review, develop and improve the services we offer, or for any other purposes to which you have given your consent.

How do we protect your personal information?

The Improvement Service has a strong commitment to data security. We use all reasonable endeavours to protect personal information from loss, misuse or alteration. We have put in place physical, electronic, and managerial procedures to safeguard and secure the information you provide to us online. The Improvement Service takes appropriate steps to communicate its privacy policy and guidelines to all employees. Only authorised employees will have access to your personal information.

While we strive to protect your personal information in our hands, we cannot guarantee the security of the information you transmit to us. In this regard, we urge you to take every precaution to protect your personal data while you are on the internet. As a minimum set of measures, we encourage you to change your passwords often, using a combination of letters and numbers, and make sure that you are using a secure browser as you surf the internet. However, (where applicable) you will be responsible for, and must take all due care to protect, any user ID or password that we have provided for your use on our websites.

Please note that in the event that the Improvement Service website, or any of its sub-sites, contain links to other websites, we can in no way be responsible or accept any liability for the privacy practices of those other sites. We encourage users to read the privacy policies of any other website accessed by you which collects personal information. This Privacy Policy applies solely to the personal information collected in the Improvement Service website or any of its sub-sites.

How do we handle your email information?

We prefer to communicate with our users by e-mail as this is efficient, quick and saves costs. However, if you wish us not to do so please notify us in writing right away. If we do not hear from you to the contrary we will assume you are happy for us to do so and we will correspond to the e-mail address you have supplied to us. If you ever want to stop this then please write to us at the address below and e-mail us for security reasons. E-mails will not be encrypted or otherwise sent in any special form.

How can you amend your personal information, or ask us to remove it or cease using it for direct marketing purposes?

Registered users of any of the Improvement Service websites can amend their personal details by logging in and clicking on ‘Your profile’. Users can unsubscribe from any newsletters by logging in and clicking on ‘Your subscriptions’.

In the event of any changes being made to this Privacy Policy, the amended policy will be posted on this site. If you have any questions relating to this Privacy Policy, please email us at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or write to The Data Protection Officer, The Improvement Service, Westerton House, East Mains Industrial Estate, Broxburn EH52 5AU, UK.