Privacy Policy
The Follies Trust
Last updated: 18th June 2026
1. Who we are
The Follies Trust (“we”, “us”, “the Trust”) is a charity registered with the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland (registered charity number NIC101116) and a company limited by guarantee registered in Northern Ireland (company number NI060272). We are recognised by HM Revenue & Customs for Gift Aid purposes (charity reference XR93693).
The Trust has no paid staff and no office; it is run entirely by volunteer trustees. For the purposes of UK data protection law, the Trust is the “data controller” of the personal data described in this policy.
If you have any question about this policy, or want to exercise any of the rights set out below, contact us at:
- Email: [email protected]
- Post: The Follies Trust, c/o the Honorary Treasurer, Follies Trust 105 Somerset Studios, BELFAST BT7 1RP
2. The personal data we collect
We collect personal data in a small number of ways through this website:
Publication orders. When you order one of our publications through the online shop, we collect your name, billing and delivery address, email address, phone number, and any notes you add to the order. We do not take payment online. Once we receive your order we email you separately with instructions for paying by bank transfer or cheque, and your order is processed once payment is received. We do not collect or store any card or bank account details through the website.
Enquiries. If you contact us using the enquiry form on the site, we collect your name, email address, and the content of your message so that we can reply to you.
Comments. If you leave a comment on a post or news item, we collect your name, email address, and (optionally) a website address, along with the comment itself. Your comment and name will be publicly visible if approved; your email address is not displayed publicly.
Donations. Donations by bank transfer or cheque are arranged directly with us by post or email and are not processed through the website. If you complete a Gift Aid declaration form, the information on that paper form is used solely to support a Gift Aid claim with HMRC and is retained for as long as HMRC requires for that purpose.
Technical and security data. Like most websites, we automatically log visitor IP addresses for security purposes through our website security software. We also use a small number of cookies; see our Cookie Policy for full details, including how our cookie consent banner works. We do not knowingly collect any special category data (such as health or political information) through this website, and we have no online payment facility, so we never see your card or bank details.
3. Why we use your data, and our lawful basis
| Purpose | Data used | Lawful basis under UK GDPR |
|---|---|---|
| Processing and fulfilling a publication order | Name, address, email, phone, order notes | Performance of a contract with you (Art. 6(1)(b)) |
| Responding to enquiries | Name, email, message content | Legitimate interests in answering questions about our charity (Art. 6(1)(f)) |
| Displaying blog/news comments | Name, email, website (optional), comment text | Legitimate interests in running an interactive website; consent for publication of the comment itself |
| Gift Aid claims | Name, address, declaration details (paper form) | Legal obligation / legitimate interests in claiming Gift Aid correctly |
| Website security and fraud prevention | IP address, request logs | Legitimate interests in protecting the website and its users (Art. 6(1)(f)) |
| Non-essential cookies (see Cookie Policy) | As listed in the Cookie Policy | Consent (Art. 6(1)(a)) |
We never use your order, enquiry, or comment details for marketing purposes, and we do not currently operate an email newsletter or mailing list. If this changes in future, we will update this policy and seek your consent before adding you to any list.
4. Who we share your data with
We share personal data only with the following categories of recipient, and only as far as necessary:
- Our website hosting provider, which stores the website and its database on our behalf.
- Our website security software provider, which processes visitor IP addresses to detect and block malicious activity.
- HM Revenue & Customs, where required to support a Gift Aid claim.
- Our bookkeeping and accounting records, kept by Trustees for the Trust’s statutory accounting and audit obligations.
We do not sell personal data, and we do not share order, enquiry, or comment data with any social media platform. (Our social media presence is used only to share our own published content — it does not draw on visitor personal data.)
5. International data transfers
We do not knowingly transfer personal data outside the UK.
6. How long we keep your data
- Order records: pending and failed orders are deleted after 7 days, cancelled orders after 30 days, and completed orders have personal details removed (while order totals are retained for accounting purposes) after 180 days; refunded orders are anonymised after 90 days.
- Enquiry form submissions: kept only as long as needed to deal with your enquiry, and then deleted.
- Comments: kept until the post is removed or you ask us to delete your comment.
- Security/IP logs: kept for a limited rolling period sufficient for security purposes, then automatically purged.
- Gift Aid records: kept for the period required by HMRC.
7. Your rights
Under UK GDPR you have the right to: ask for a copy of the personal data we hold about you; ask us to correct inaccurate data; ask us to delete your data; ask us to restrict how we use it; object to processing based on legitimate interests; and ask for your data in a portable format where technically relevant. To exercise any of these rights, contact us using the details in Section 1. We will respond within one month.
You also have the right to complain to the UK’s data protection regulator, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), at ico.org.uk, or to the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland if your concern relates to our charitable conduct generally.
8. Cookies
Our website uses cookies. Full details of every cookie we use, what it does, and how long it lasts are set out in our separate Cookie Policy. You can manage your cookie preferences using the consent tool shown when you first visit the site.
9. Keeping your data secure
We take reasonable technical and organisational steps to protect personal data, including keeping our website software up to date, using security monitoring software, and restricting access to order and enquiry data to the trustees who need it to fulfil orders or respond to enquiries.
10. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time, for example as we improve our cookie consent tools or change our shop provider. The date at the top shows when it was last revised.