Who we are
Better 4 Enterprise Solutions (“B4ES”, “we”, “us”) is the data controller for personal data collected through this website and in the course of our own business relationships.
Contact us about anything in this notice at hello@b4es.co.uk.
Two different roles
It is important to distinguish between two situations, because our obligations differ in each.
- As a controller. When you contact us, enquire about our services, apply for a role or engage us directly as a business client, we decide how and why your personal data is used. This notice describes that processing.
- As a processor. When we deliver services to an accountancy practice, we process their clients' personal data on their documented instructions. In that situation the practice is the controller and their own privacy notice governs. Our processing is bound by a written agreement meeting the requirements of Article 28 of the UK GDPR.
What we collect
- Enquiry information — name, firm or company, email address, telephone number and the content of your message, submitted through the contact form on this site.
- Anti-abuse information — when you submit the contact form we record a one-way salted hash of your IP address and the country your request came from, solely to rate-limit automated abuse. The hash cannot be reversed to recover your IP address, and we do not use it to identify or track you.
- Engagement information — the contact, contractual and operational details needed to provide services and manage the relationship.
- Recruitment information — anything contained in a CV or application you send us.
- Technical information — limited server log data such as IP address, browser type and pages requested, generated automatically when you visit the site.
Why we use it, and our lawful basis
- Responding to enquiries — legitimate interests, in responding to a request you have made of us.
- Providing services and managing engagements — performance of a contract, or steps taken at your request before entering one.
- Recruitment — legitimate interests, in assessing candidates for roles.
- Legal and regulatory obligations — including accounting and anti-money-laundering record-keeping where applicable.
- Site security and integrity — legitimate interests, in keeping the site available and secure.
We do not use your personal data for automated decision-making or profiling, and we do not sell it.
Who we share it with
Contact form submissions are stored in our own database on Cloudflare infrastructure, which also hosts this website and delivers the notification email. No separate third-party form or email provider is involved.
We share personal data only where necessary: with our delivery partner where they are involved in providing services to you, under a written agreement imposing confidentiality and security obligations; with professional advisers such as accountants, insurers and lawyers; with service providers who support our operations, such as email and IT hosting; and with regulators or law enforcement where we are legally required to do so.
We do not share your information with third parties for their own marketing purposes.
International transfers
Some processing takes place outside the United Kingdom, principally in Pakistan where our delivery partner operates. Where personal data is transferred outside the UK we put in place an appropriate transfer mechanism, such as the International Data Transfer Agreement or the UK Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses, supported by a documented transfer risk assessment and technical measures including encryption and access control.
You can request further information about the safeguards applied to a specific transfer by contacting hello@b4es.co.uk.
How long we keep it
- Enquiries that do not lead to an engagement — up to 24 months from last contact.
- Client engagement records — for the duration of the engagement and then for the period required by law and by our professional and insurance obligations, ordinarily at least six years.
- Recruitment applications — up to 12 months, unless you ask us to keep them longer for future roles.
- Server logs — a short rolling period for security and diagnostic purposes.
How we protect it
We apply organisational and technical measures appropriate to the risk, including access control on least-privilege principles, multi-factor authentication, encryption in transit and at rest, staff confidentiality undertakings, security training, and a documented incident response and breach notification procedure. Our security approach is described in more detail on our security page.
Your rights
Under UK data protection law you have the right to be informed about how your data is used; to request access to it; to have inaccurate data corrected; to request erasure in certain circumstances; to restrict processing; to data portability where applicable; to object to processing based on legitimate interests; and to withdraw consent where consent is the basis relied upon.
To exercise any of these rights, contact hello@b4es.co.uk. We will respond within one month. If your request relates to data we process on behalf of an accountancy practice, we will direct you to that practice, as they are the controller for that data.
Changes to this notice
We may update this notice from time to time. The date at the top shows when it was last revised. Material changes will be highlighted on this page.