Privacy notice - Energy Bills Support Schemes

Middlesbrough Council is responsible for delivering the Energy Bills Support Schemes - Alternative Funding (EBSS-AF) and Alternative Fuel Scheme – Alternative Funding (AFP-AF) for eligible customers.

We collect personal data such as name, date of birth, address, contact details, authorised appointees, bank account and evidence of identity and residence. We collect Special Category including ethnic origin religious and philosophical beliefs and health information. We often obtain this information directly from yourself, authorised appointees, and government departments.

We use personal data to carry out our ‘public tasks’.  We use special category data to help us meet our legal obligations in ‘social security’ and ‘social protection’. The law that allows us to use personal data is the Energy Prices Act 2022.

We use personal information to confirm identity, check eligibility, facilitate the payments of the governments Energy Bills Support Schemes and prevent, detect and investigate errors and fraud.

We share your personal information where the law allows or requires us to do so with third parties including the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy.

We use the following measures to ensure that your personal data is secure: data protection and security policies, information security incident reporting, data and device encryption, system and data access controls, user accounts and passwords, physical and environmental security, staff vetting practices, staff training and awareness, data back-ups, ICT network penetration testing, and business continuity and disaster recovery plans.

We only keep your data for as long as the Law requires it and this is set out in our ‘Records Management Retention Schedules’.

No, your personal data is processed and stored only in the United Kingdom.

We will not use this personal data for any direct marketing purposes.

Your Information Rights are set out in law and, subject to some exceptions, you have the:

• Right to rectification - to ask for information to be corrected
• Right to erasure - to have your personal data deleted
• Right to object - to how your data is used
• Right to restriction - to request limits on how your data is used
• Right to portability - to request that we move your data to another organisation
• Right of subject access - to request a copy of data the Council holds about you

If you have a concerns about the way we are collecting or using your personal data, you should raise your concern with us in the first instance or directly to the Information Commissioner's Office. Visit the website of the Information Commissioner's Office.

If you would like to discuss anything in this privacy notice or your information rights, please contact:

The Data Protection Officer
Middlesbrough Council
PO Box 500, Middlesbrough, TS1 9FT
Phone: 01642 245432
Email: dataprotection@middlesbrough.gov.uk