Privacy Policy

About Us

HC Surveying Ltd ("we", "us", "our") is a RICS-regulated building surveying practice incorporated in Jersey, Channel Islands (company number 6382509). Our registered address is Noel House, Les Ruisseaux Estate, JE3 8DD, Jersey Channel Islands.

We are regulated by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS). Our registration can be verified at ricsfirms.com.

You can contact us at harry.chinn@hcsurveying.je or by telephone on +44 7700 705 607.

Intellectual Property

All content on this Website — including text, images, graphics, and design — is owned by or licensed to HC Surveying Ltd and is protected by applicable intellectual property laws.

Survey reports and other deliverables produced by HC Surveying Ltd remain our intellectual property. You are granted a personal, non-transferable licence to use any report prepared for you for the purpose for which it was commissioned. Reports may not be reproduced, published, or shared with third parties without our prior written consent, except where required for the purposes of your property transaction.

Website Use

You may use this Website for lawful purposes only. You must not use it in any way that causes, or may cause, damage to the Website or impairment of its availability or accessibility.

We make reasonable efforts to ensure the Website is accurate and up to date, but we do not warrant that the content is complete, current, or free from error. Nothing on the Website constitutes professional advice and should not be relied upon as a substitute for a formal engagement with us.

We reserve the right to modify or withdraw the Website, or any content on it, at any time without notice.

The Data We Collect

We may collect and process the following categories of personal data:

Information you provide to us directly

Your name and contact details, including email address and phone number
Property details such as address and asking price provided in connection with a quote request or instruction
Any additional information you choose to include in correspondence or contact forms

Information collected automatically when you use our Website

IP address and browser type
Pages visited and time spent on the Website
Device and operating system information
Referring website or search term

This automatically collected data is gathered via Google Analytics and is used in aggregated, anonymised form to help us understand how visitors use the Website. See Section 6 for more detail on cookies.

How We Use Your Data

We use the personal data we collect for the following purposes:

To respond to enquiries and provide quotes — when you contact us via the Website, we use your details to respond and, where appropriate, to prepare a fee proposal
To deliver our services — if you instruct us, we use your personal data and property details to carry out the agreed service and produce your report
To fulfil our legal and professional obligations — as a RICS-regulated practice we are required to maintain certain records in accordance with professional standards
To improve our Website — anonymised analytics data helps us understand how visitors use the site and where improvements can be made
To communicate with you — we may contact you in relation to your enquiry or instruction, or to follow up after a report has been delivered

Legal Basis for Processing

We process your personal data on the following legal bases under the Data Protection (Jersey) Law 2018, which is closely aligned with UK GDPR:

Contract — where processing is necessary to fulfil a service you have requested or instructed us to carry out
Legitimate interests — where we have a legitimate business interest in processing your data, such as responding to enquiries or improving our Website, and that interest is not overridden by your rights
Legal obligation — where we are required to process data to comply with our legal or regulatory obligations as a RICS-regulated practice
Consent — where you have given explicit consent, such as accepting cookies on the Website

How Long We Keep Your Data

We retain personal data only for as long as is necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, or as required by law or RICS professional standards.

Enquiries that do not result in an instruction — retained for up to 12 months from the date of the enquiry
Client records and survey reports — retained for a minimum of six years from the date of the instruction in line with RICS guidance and limitation period requirements
Website analytics data — retained in accordance with Google Analytics' default retention settings

After the applicable retention period, personal data is securely deleted or anonymised.

Cookies and Google Analytics

Our Website uses cookies — small text files placed on your device — to help us understand how visitors use the site. We use Google Analytics to collect anonymised data about Website traffic and usage patterns.

Google Analytics may collect information about your IP address, browser, device, and how you interact with the Website. This data is processed by Google and is subject to Google's own privacy policy, available at google.com/policies/privacy.

You can opt out of Google Analytics tracking at any time by installing the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on, available at tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.

You can also manage or disable cookies through your browser settings. Note that disabling certain cookies may affect the functionality of the Website.

Sharing Your Data

We do not sell, rent, or trade your personal data. We may share your data in the following limited circumstances:

Service providers — we use third-party tools including Google Analytics and Webflow (our website platform) which may process data on our behalf. These processors are bound by appropriate data processing agreements
Professional obligations — we may be required to share data with RICS or other regulatory bodies in connection with our professional obligations
Legal requirements — we may disclose data where required to do so by law, court order, or regulatory authority

We do not transfer your personal data outside of the United Kingdom, Jersey, or the European Economic Area except where appropriate safeguards are in place.

Your Rights

Under the Data Protection (Jersey) Law, you have the following rights in relation to your personal data:

Right of access — to request a copy of the personal data we hold about you
Right to rectification — to request correction of any inaccurate or incomplete data
Right to erasure — to request deletion of your personal data in certain circumstances
Right to restriction — to request that we limit how we use your data in certain circumstances
Right to object — to object to processing based on legitimate interests
Right to data portability — to receive your data in a structured, machine-readable format where applicable

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at harry.chinn@hcsurveying.je. We will respond within one month of receiving your request.

If you are not satisfied with how we handle your data, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Jersey Office of the Information Commissioner (JOIC) at jerseyoic.org.

Third-Party Links

Our Website may contain links to third-party websites, including our Google Reviews profile and LinkedIn page. We are not responsible for the privacy practices of those sites and encourage you to review their privacy policies independently.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices or applicable law. The current version will always be available on this Website. We encourage you to review this page periodically.