Housing Solutions

This privacy notice explains what personal information is collected, what it is used for and who it is provided to. The notice also describes why the Council requires your data, and the legal basis on which it does this. This privacy notice relates to the Housing Solutions Service. It provides additional information that specifically relates to this particular service, and should be read together with our general privacy notice.

Whenever you get in touch with us either in person, by phone or online, we’ll usually need your basic contact details: name, address, telephone number, email address etc, together with enough information about your enquiry to be able to help you quickly and effectively.

As part of your application for assistance as a person who is homeless or threatened with homelessness, your record will contain the following information relating to you and other persons who live with you (or you wish to live with you) insofar as it is relevant to your application for housing assistance:

• Basic details such as your names, addresses (including previous addresses) and dates of birth;
• Personal circumstances;
•  Letters, notes and reports in support of your application;
• Details of any support received;
• Things that other organisations (such as health or other care services) tell us about your situation to help us to better understand your application.
• Names of any support services or professionals who have worked or are working with you;
• References from your mortgagee(s) and current/previous landlords.

We use special category personal information, such as:

• race or ethnic origin
• sex and sexual orientation,
• physical and mental health 

We use your personal data for the following reasons: 

• If you have a disability or language issue, as this may influence the way our services need to be delivered to meet your needs.
• We also use this information for equalities monitoring purposes, so we can be sure that we're reaching and responding to all sectors of the community, inclusive of ethnicity, age and disability.
• The information we collect will only be used by the Housing Solutions Service for the purposes of your application for assistance and to enable us to discharge our functions under Part 7 of the Housing Act 1996;
• The information collected will not be used for any purpose other than your application for assistance as a person who is homeless or threatened with homelessness, and it will not be shared with any other services, unless required for verification purposes, the prevention and detection of crime or the protection of public funds;
• To maintain records of the services we provide to applicants for housing assistance;
• To monitor the quality of the services we provide to you or a family member and check how our services are performing overall; for example by carrying out quality checks or requesting your feedback;
• To carry out financial assessments, for example for housing benefit
• To log and respond to any complaints you make about our services;
• In order to improve our service delivery, we may use personal information to create statistics which help us to see how our services are being used and how they should be funded.

We will only use your personal data where it is necessary in order to perform our public tasks and duties as a Local Authority (Art 6(1)(e) of the General Data Protection Regulation), and to meet our statutory obligation under Part 7 of the Housing Act 1996.
In some cases, we may be required to share your information by law (Art 6(1)(c)) or where it is necessary to protect someone in an emergency (Art 6(1)(d)).

We will only use any special category personal data we hold where it is necessary to deliver housing services (Art 9(2)(h)), and where there is a substantial public interest (such as to carry out our statutory or legal duties, for the prevention of crime) (Art 9(2)(g)).
We may also need to use special category data:

• where it is necessary to protect someone in an emergency (Art 9(2)(c))
• where it is necessary for legal cases (Art 9(2)(f))
• where it is necessary for employment purposes (Art 9(2)(b)
• where it is necessary for archiving, research or statistical purposes ((Art 9(2)(j))) 

Some of the personal information we may hold will come directly from you when you contact us or use our services. 
In order to provide our services, or to comply with legal obligations, we may request and receive information from other organisations and services, for example:

• The Department of Work and Pensions (DWP)
• Manchester City Council Revenues and Benefits Service
• National Probation Service  
• Housing Providers, including Registered Social Landlords 
• Cheshire and Greater Manchester Community Rehabilitation Company
• Greater Manchester Police
• Your General Practitioner (GP) and Health Authority 
• Other Local Authorities
• Your Landlord

Your personal data may be shared securely to other departments within the Council, only where it is both necessary and appropriate to do so for the reasons given above.
In order to provide our services to you, we will need to securely share your personal to other organisations outside the Council. For example, we may share your data with:

• The Department of Work and Pensions (DWP)
• Manchester City Council Revenues and Benefits Service
• National Probation Service
• Housing Providers, including Registered Social Landlords 
• Cheshire and Greater Manchester Community Rehabilitation Company
• Greater Manchester Police
• Your General Practitioner (GP) and Health Authority 
• Other Local Authorities

Where this information is shared, your confidentiality and privacy will be protected. To make sure this takes place, there are clear rules in our own procedures as well as national legislation. In most situations, other people must have your permission before we can give them information about you. For example, members of your family, the Department of Works and Pensions, or Housing Benefit Officers.
However, there are some circumstances when we are obliged to share information without your permission, for example

• To protect you or another person in an emergency (for example with the police, NHS or with Immigration/Border Control)
•  For the administration of justice (such as providing information to Court)
• To meet other legal obligations, such as:
  • where we are required to share safeguarding information by law to other agencies and other Councils;
  • where we are required to provide information to an auditor or standards body, or as part of any formal inquiry or investigation

Our retention schedule sets out how long we keep personal information for.

You can find out more about your rights regarding the personal information used for this service. Your rights apply to the information held by the Council as a data controller, and the information we hold on behalf of the other data controllers.

We may change this privacy notice from time to time. If you have any questions or concerns about how we use your personal information, please contact the Council’s Data Protection Officer.

You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office if you're unhappy about how we process your information.

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