Your Rights, Your Information, and How We Use It

Aberdein Considine Wealth Ltd (AC Wealth) is committed to protecting your personal information.

Our Privacy Policy contains important information about what personal details we collect; what we do with that information; who we may share it with and why; and your choices and rights when it comes to the personal information you have given us.

We may need to make changes to our Privacy Policy, so please check our website for updates from time to time. If there are important changes such as changes to where your personal data will be processed, we will contact you to let you know.

This version of our Privacy Policy was last updated April 1st, 2025.

Who We Are

AC Wealth is a Financial Planning company, established under the Law of Scotland, registered company number SC720631. Our Head Office address is First Floor, Blenheim House, Fountainhall Road, Aberdeen, AB15 4DT.

We are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, FRN 1012486.

FCA, 12 Endeavour Square, Stratford, London, E20 1JN. You can check our company FCA registration, firm details and permission on the Financial Services Register by visiting the FCA's website:

www.fca.org.uk/firms/systems- reporting/register

or by contacting the FCA on 0800 111 6768, or writing to the FCA at 12 Endeavour Square, Stratford, London, E20 1JN.

Information We Collect and Use

Our Privacy Policy explains how and why we collect personal information about you.

We are committed to responsible management of personal information in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018 and the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003.

To receive certain information and to use certain services from AC Wealth through the channels on this website, you will be asked to provide personal information about yourself such as your name, address and email address. When you provide this information to us, you consent to our use of that information in accordance with the terms of this Privacy Policy. This information will be used to provide you with the services that you have requested.

AC Wealth, as well as its business partners and its service companies may use your personal information for providing financial services, money laundering checks, marketing, administration and training and AC Wealth may disclose information to our service providers and agents for these purposes.

What Data We Process

We collect and process personal information about you to fulfil our service proposition and our delivery of that to you as our client. This information may include:

Information about who you are - your name, date of birth and contact details

Information connected to your product or services with us - your bank account details

Information about your contact with us – meeting notes, phone calls recordings, emails/letters

Information that is automatically collected - via cookies when you visit one of our websites

Information if you visit one of our offices - visual images collected via closed circuit televisions (CCTV)

Information classified as 'sensitive' personal information - relating to your health, marital or civil partnership status. This information will only be collected and used where it's needed to provide the product or services you have requested or to comply with our legal obligations.

Information you may provide us about other people - joint applicants or proprietors or beneficiaries for products you have with us.

Information on children - where a child is named as a beneficiary on the policy taken out by a parent or guardian on their behalf. In these cases, we will collect and use only the information required to identify the child (such as their name, age, gender).

We are committed to processing your data in a lawful, fair and transparent manner.

What are Cookies?

Some websites use cookies which are text only strings of information that the website you are visiting transfers to the cookie file of the browser on your computer. Their purpose is to identify users and to enhance the user's experience by customising web pages. A cookie will usually contain the name of the domain from which the cookie has come, an expiry date for the cookie, and a value, which is usually a random generated unique number.

Use of Cookies on Our Site

The Website automatically gathers certain information such as IP addresses and the number and frequency of visitors to the Website and individual web pages. This is collected using cookies and is used by us for security and monitoring purposes, to manage the Website, to track usage, to improve the Website and to ensure the Website is as appealing to as many visitors as possible. Cookies are pieces of information that are stored by the browser on the hard drive of your computer. The Website also uses cookies to enable us to provide features such as remembering certain information about you and your preferences so that we and they can deliver targeted advertisements which will be of most interest to you. Cookies can be deleted from your hard drive, or you can configure your web browser so that it rejects cookies. To learn more about cookies and how to reject them, visit www.aboutcookies.org.

Rejection of cookies will not prevent you from using most of the features on the Website. If you experience any problems having deleted cookies, you should contact the supplier of your web browser.

Where we collect your information

We may collect your personal information directly from you, from a variety of sources, including:

An application form for a product or service

Phone conversation with us

Emails or letters you send to us

Meetings with one of our financial advisers or other members of staff.

Registering for one of our events - retirement events, employment seminars.

Participating in research surveys to help us understand you better and improve our products and services.

Our online services such as websites and social media.

If you have a financial adviser and/or are a member of your employer's pension scheme, the information we collect, and process will most likely have been provided by them on your behalf.

We may also collect personal information on you from places such as business directories and other commercially or publicly available sources - to check or improve the information we hold (like your address) or to give better contact information if we are unable to contact you directly.

We take your privacy seriously and we will only ever collect and use information which is personal to you where it is necessary, fair and lawful to do so. We will collect and use your information only where:

You have given us your consent to do so. Consent is the lawful basis on which we will collect and process your data. By signing our Terms of Business, you consent to us processing your data on this basis.

You have given us your explicit consent to send you information about products and services offered by us and/or selected third parties we have chosen to work with which we believe may be of interest and benefit to you. For you to receive these communications you will opt in to this element of the service.

It is necessary to provide the product or service you have requested.

It is necessary for us to meet our legal or regulatory or legal obligations.

it's in the legitimate interests of a third party - e.g. sharing information with your employer's adviser for the governance of a pension scheme of which you are a member

If you do not wish us to collect and use your personal information in these ways, it may mean that we will be unable to provide you with our products and services.

We also use technologies, such as the Facebook Pixel, to customise content and advertising, to provide social media features and to analyse traffic to the site. We also share information about your use of our site with our trusted social media, advertising and analytics partners.

Who We May Share Your Information With

We may share your information with third parties for the reasons outlined in 'What we collect and use your information for'. These third parties include:

Aberdein Considine LLP – AC LLP provide us with support services including IT and will act as a Data Processor on behalf of AC Wealth Ltd.

Companies we have chosen to support us in the delivery of the products and services we offer to you and other clients - research, consultancy or technology companies; or companies who can help us in our contact with you, for example an internet service provider.

Where requested, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the Information Commissioner's Office for the UK (ICO).

law enforcement, credit and identity check agencies for the prevention and detection of crime. HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) or the National Crime Agency (NCA) - eg for the processing of tax relief on pension payments or the prevention of tax avoidance

We will never sell your details to someone else. Whenever we share your personal information, we will do so in line with our obligations to keep your information safe and secure.

Where information is processed

All your information is processed within the UK and European Economic Area (EEA)

How we protect your information

We take information and system security very seriously and we strive to comply with our obligations at all times. Any personal information which is collected, recorded or used in any way, whether on paper, online or any other media, will have appropriate safeguards applied in line with our data protection obligations.

Your information is protected by controls designed to minimise loss or damage through accident, negligence or deliberate actions. Our employees also protect sensitive or confidential information when storing or transmitting information electronically and must undertake annual training on this.

Our security controls are aligned to industry standards and good practice; providing a control environment that effectively manages risks to the confidentiality, integrity and availability of your information.

How Long We Keep Your Data

We will keep your personal information only where it is necessary to provide you with our products or services while you are a client.

We may also keep your information after this period but only where required to meet our legal or regulatory obligations. The length of time we keep your information for these purposes will vary depending on the obligations we need to meet.

Your Individual Rights

You have several rights in relation to how AC Wealth uses your information. They are:

Right to be informed

You have a right to receive clear and easy to understand information on what personal information we have, why and who we share it with - we do this in this Privacy Policy and any privacy notices.

Right of access

You have the right of access to your personal information. If you wish to receive a copy of the personal information we hold on you, you may make a Data Subject Access Request (DSAR).

Right to request that your personal information be rectified

If your personal information is inaccurate or incomplete, you can request that it is corrected.

Right to erasure

You can ask for your information to be deleted or removed if there is not a compelling reason for AC Wealth to continue to have it.

Right to restrict processing

You can ask that we block or suppress the processing of your personal information for certain reasons. This means that we are still permitted to keep your information - but only to ensure we don't use it in the future for those reasons you have restricted.

Right to data portability

You can ask for a copy of your personal information for your own purposes to use across different services. In certain circumstances, you may move, copy or transfer the personal information we hold to another company in a safe and secure way. For example, if you were transferring your business to another Firm or if you were moving your pension to another pension provider.

Right to object

You can object to AC Wealth processing your personal information where it's based on our legitimate interests (including profiling), for direct marketing (including profiling); and if we were using it for scientific/historical research and statistics.

Rights related to automatic decision-making including profiling

You have the right to ask AC Wealth to:

Give you information about its processing of your personal information.

Request human intervention or challenge a decision where processing is done solely by automated processes.

Carry out regular checks to make sure that our automated decision making and profiling processes are working as they should.

How to Make a Complaint

We will always strive to collect, use and safeguard your personal information in line with data protection laws. If you do not believe we have handled your information as set out in our Privacy Policy, please raise your concerns by email at info@acwealth.co.uk, by telephone on 0800 046 1660, or in writing to the below address:

Data Protection Officer

AC Wealth Ltd

First Floor

Blenheim House

Fountainhall Road

Aberdeen

AB15 4DT

Your complaint will be acknowledged within five working days and normally, after a full investigation, you will receive a detailed response within a further ten working days.