Privacy Policy

The Dental Channel® Ltd (“The Dental Channel”, “The Company”, “we” or “us”) respects and values the privacy of all users of our website (dental-channel.co.uk). This privacy policy describes what personal data we collect, why we do so and how it is used so that you can be assured of our commitment to your privacy, our obligations and your rights under the law.

We require that this privacy policy is read and accepted when registering an account. We hope that the following is clear and concise, but should you have any questions please contact us via one of the methods listed at the end.

1. Who we are, what we do and how we use your data

1.1. The Dental Channel Ltd is a private limited company that delivers quality-assured continuing professional development (CPD) for dental professionals. This service is complemented by professional networking features that allows members to connect with each other and share their interests in a manner similar to well-known social media sites.

1.2. In order to deliver these services and comply with the requirements of the General Dental Council for delivering verifiable CPD we need to collect specific information in order to provide the appropriate documentary evidence for CPD certification. You may also provide additional information to enhance your profile, blog and community pages as desired. You have complete control over with whom this is shared.

2. Information we collect

2.1 Our service
We require the following personal data to provide verifiable CPD:

• Name and GDC number (for the CPD certificate)
• Profession (display relevant CPD information e.g. minimum hours required by the GDC)

We require your email address in order to communicate with you e.g. to provide confirmation of course completion or your professional network (community) updates.

We require a contact telephone number in order to communicate with you should we be unable to do so via other means e.g. there is a problem with the email address provided.

Other personal and non-personal information can be given but is not obligatory. Some is required for specific features to work correctly e.g. your CPD five-year cycle start date to display your five-year CPD summary accurately, some to enhance communication e.g. telephone, and some to enhance your profile e.g. place of work.

2.2 Cookies and tracking services
Our site uses cookies in order to deliver its key services, which must be accepted to use them. Please see our cookie policy for a full description.

3. Access to and control of data by members

3.1 Account profile
You can edit your profile data directly from your account profile form. You may export your data and delete it without needing to contact us. Alternatively, you may submit a “subject access request” via our support ticket system.

3.2 Profile privacy
You may control the privacy level of all your account data. At registration the only information publicly available is your name because this is necessary for other members to contact you and be identified on the site.

Your data privacy can be set to:

• ‘Everyone’: available on the public internet;
• ‘Registered Users’: available to all members of The Dental Channel;
• ‘My friends’: available only to your professional network (your "friends") on the site;
• ‘Only me’: self-explanatory! Only you can view this information.

The default privacy setting for additional information in your profile is ‘Only Me’. You should change this to the required level. For example, if you wish to publish your practice website address for all to see the privacy should be set ‘Everyone’.

3.3 Live webinars
In the interests of openness and transparency your name is displayed in the attendees list to all participants when joining a live webinar. If you do not wish to have your name displayed, you should not participate in the live webinar. NB the identity of participants is not disclosed in live webinar recordings.

3.4 Community CPD groups
Each CPD course has an accompanying private community group in which course participants are automatically enrolled and identified by name to other group members only. If you do not wish to be identified, you should leave the group (you can re-join on request).

3.5 Community notifications
The default setting for community updates is to receive site and email notifications. These can be turned on or off individually in your community settings.

4. Retaining your data

We will not retain your data for any longer than necessary to provide our services, comply with our legal obligations or resolve disputes. We review inactive accounts on a yearly basis. We may contact you using the registered email address regarding your account status. If the account is no longer required or we receive no response and the five-year cycle relating to the last completed CPD course has ended it might be deleted.

5. How and where do we store your personal data?

Our servers are based in the EU, which means that your data are fully protected under the GDPR.

6. Do we share your data?

6.1 We do not rent or sell any of your personal data with any third parties. In some limited circumstances we may be required to share certain personal data, which might include yours, if we are involved in:

• 6.1.1 Delivering CPD for an external organisation in which you have consented to participate and share your specific data for the purposes of confirming participation in verifiable CPD (e.g. name and confirmation of participation);
• 6.1.2 Legal proceedings or complying with legal obligations, a court order, the instructions of a government authority;
• 6.1.3 Enforcing our Terms & Conditions.

6.2 As part of our quality assurance processes we provide subject matter experts with anonymised feedback from our CPD course reflections (evaluations) in order to improve our services.

7. How do we protect your information?

7.1. When you log into our website your credentials (username and password) are encrypted using secure socket layer technology (SSL). No method of transmission over the internet is totally secure, so we cannot guarantee its absolute security. We use the latest technology to protect against data breaches and run regular encrypted backups.

7.2. Online payments are processed externally using PayPal so your financial details are not stored by us. Please refer to PayPal for its privacy policy.

8. Contact

We trust that this policy gives you complete confidence in the way in which we handle your personal data. Should you have any questions please submit your request via one of the following methods:

• Support ticketing system (recommended);
• Telephone: +44 20 8299 9742
• Post (128 Woodwarde Road, London SE22 8UT).