External Relations

Your personal data

The University of Glasgow will be what’s known as the ‘Data Controller’ of your personal data processed in relation to prospective student communications. This privacy notice will explain how the University of Glasgow will process your personal data.

Why we need it

Enquirers - We are collecting your personal data such as name, country of residence, subject areas of interest, level of study, intended year of entry, fee status and most recent school / university attended, in order to fulfil a prospectus request or manage your enquiry.

Applicants – Throughout the application process we will send you additional communications covering areas we believe to be of interest and importance to you while making your decision to study at the University of Glasgow.

We will only collect data that we need in order to provide and oversee these services to you.

Event Registrations - Your name will appear on a registration list accessed only by authorised persons of the University of Glasgow and used only for the purpose of checking you in to the event. This list will not be retained and will be destroyed following the event.

Legal basis for processing your data

We must have a legal basis for processing all personal data.

• Responding to your enquiry of providing a prospectus - the legal basis for processing is contractual obligation.
• Supplying our new student and offer holder E-communications and postal mailings – the legal basis for processing is contractual obligation.
• Event enquiries – the legal basis for processing is consent.
• Providing pre-applicant marketing communications - the legal basis for processing is consent.

What we do with it and who we share it with

We may provide access to such information (including copies of the documents provided by you) to our external auditors when relevant.

We currently use third party services to provide our managed email communications, postal mailings and prospectus distribution. You may be sent information about events or resources at the University where this would be relevant to any future study on this basis, but only if you have requested it. If you decide to receive this information, you can opt out at any point by using the Unsubscribe link in any of our communications.

How long do we keep it for?

Your data will be retained by the University for 12 months after the session start date of the year of entry indicated in your enquiry/request. After this time, data will be securely deleted. If this date is not stated, your data will be held for 2 years after the initial enquiry date.

Your information may be used anonymously (i.e. excluding personal or identifiable data) for internal monitoring and reporting purposes such as helping us to estimate how many prospectuses to print each year and monitoring the quantities and locations of prospectus requests.

Data entered via GeckoLabs will be securely deleted once your contact record has been inactive for more than two years. Inactive contacts will not have submitted any forms, been updated or messaged within this two year period. 

Communications

• Mailing and Data Solutions provide our prospectus and postal mailing distribution. Data is accessed or transferred by The University of Glasgow via a secure FTP transfer and is held by MDS for 7 days before being destroyed.
• We use Dotdigital to supply our bulk email service for prospective student communications. Dotdigital is a private company (data processor) used to provide a bulk email service to the University. Your personal information will be held in the EU however there may be occasions where the sub-processors access the data (amounting to a transfer) in order to provide elements of their services for support. For further details, refer to Dotdigital privacy policy.
• If you would prefer that your data is not stored in Dotdigital, you can opt out of communications at any point. You can also email Recruitment Marketing directly at mrio-recruitmentmarketing@glasgow.ac.uk

International event enquiry data

• Data may be shared with International Officers based overseas who are employed by a third party. A Service Level Agreement is in place detailing use of data.
• Data may be shared with a relevant in-country agent to facilitate counselling and marketing the University. Data protection and sharing of data is covered by a separate agreement between the University and the agent in question.
• Data may be shared with a Government Sponsorship body but only after confirmation of approval by the enquirer.

Eventbrite

For some university events we use Eventbrite, a third party service which is not operated by the University of Glasgow.

• View the Eventbrite privacy policy.

If you wish to attend an event organised by us, but do not wish to use Eventbrite, please contact the event organiser.

Gecko Labs

Please note that the University uses a secure third party data-capture application, GeckoEnage, to manage the data you have provided whilst attending events both on and off campus.

The application is only used for the purposes of capturing and contact data for event registration, management and event communications. 

The University also uses the GeckoEngage application for some of our University events which include our Open Days and virtual events. We also use GeckoEngage forms for application to our UCAS Clearing vacancies and sending communications relating to Clearing applications. 

The University also uses GeckoChat for the one-to-one live chat and chat bot enquiries. We may ask for a name and email to help resolve your enquiry. 

Data entered via GeckoLabs will be securely deleted once your contact record has been inactive for more than two years. Inactive contacts will not have submitted any forms, been updated or messaged within this two year period. 

• View the GeckoLabs privacy policy

Online Surveys (formerly BOS)

We currently use onlinesurveys.ac.uk to manage some of our surveys and event registration forms.

• View Online Surveys privacy policy
• View Online Surveys terms & conditions

Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager

The University uses Google Analytics to measure web traffic and web journey behaviour and Google Tag Manager in order to track marketing spend and serve tailored marketing content through various platforms including Google Adwords, Facebook, Instagram and Youtube. You can change these settings at any time through our cookie preferences menu. 

What are your rights?*

You can request access to the information we process about you at any time. If at any point you believe that the information we process relating to you is incorrect you can request to see this information and may in some instances have it restricted, corrected or, erased. You may also have the right to object to the processing of data and the right to data portability.

Where we have relied upon your consent to process your data, you also have the right to withdraw your consent at any time.

If you wish to exercise any of these rights, please contact dp@gla.ac.uk

*please note that the ability to exercise these rights will depend on the legal basis on which the processing is being carried out.

Complaints

If you wish to raise a complaint on how we have handled your personal data, you can contact the University Data Protection Officer who will investigate the matter.

Our Data Protection Officer can be contacted at dataprotectionofficer@glasgow.ac.uk

If you are not satisfied with our response or believe we are not processing your personal data in accordance with the law, you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO). 

Amendments to this privacy policy

This privacy statement will be reviewed and updated on a regular basis. It was last updated on 7 September 2023.