Privacy notice

Who we are

• Data controller: AW School of Motoring Ltd
• Trading name: AWSM Driving
• Company number: 16736956 (registered in England and Wales)
• Registered office: 20 Wenlock Road, London, England, N1 7GU
• ICO registration number: ZC040317
• Privacy contact email: privacy@awsmdriving.co.uk

AW School of Motoring Ltd is responsible for deciding how and why your personal data is processed. If you have any questions about this notice or how we handle your personal information, please contact us using the email address above.

Our website, cookies and technical information

Our website is a simple information website. We do not use advertising cookies, tracking pixels or third-party analytics tools to monitor visitors' browsing.

Our website is hosted and protected by Cloudflare. Cloudflare may process limited technical information, such as IP addresses, browser details and website request data, to deliver the website, keep it secure and protect it against malicious traffic. Cloudflare may set strictly necessary cookies for security purposes. These cookies do not require your consent and are not used for advertising.

We do not use information collected through our website for targeted advertising.

Personal data we collect

When you enquire about or take driving lessons with us, we may collect:

• Identity and contact details: full name, telephone number, email address and home address (for example, for pick-ups).
• Driving licence check: the DVLA check code you give us and the last 8 characters of your driving licence number, used only to carry out the check described in section 6.
• Emergency contact details: the name and phone number of a person you nominate.
• Lesson information: bookings, attendance, cancellations, lesson history and driving progress records.
• Payment information: bank transfer and transaction records.
• Communications: messages and enquiries sent by WhatsApp, phone, email or other channels.
• Health information: only if you tell us about a medical condition that may affect your driving (see section 5).
• Dashcam footage: recorded by our tuition car's outward-facing cameras (see section 8).

We only collect personal information that is reasonably necessary for the purposes described in this notice.

Where we get your personal data

Most of the information we hold comes directly from you. We may also receive information from:

• a parent or guardian who arranges or pays for lessons on behalf of a pupil under 18;
• the DVLA, when we check your driving licence using the check code you provide;
• Total Drive, when you make an enquiry or booking through its system.

If you give us details of an emergency contact, please make sure they are happy for you to share their details with us.

How we use your personal data and our lawful bases

Providing driving lessons

To arrange bookings, deliver automatic driving lessons, monitor your progress and communicate with you.
Lawful basis: performance of a contract, or steps taken at your request before entering into a contract.

Checking your driving licence

Before your first lesson, we use the DVLA online service to confirm that you hold a valid licence for the vehicle you will drive. The check may also show penalty points or disqualifications, which are treated as information about offences. We only carry out the check with your agreement, when you choose to give us a check code. We do not keep a copy of your driving record, your licence number or details of any penalty points.
Lawful basis: performance of a contract and legal obligation; for any offence information, your consent.

Booking management

We use Total Drive to help organise and manage lesson bookings.
Lawful basis: performance of a contract and our legitimate interests in running our business efficiently.

Payments, accounting and legal obligations

To manage payments, keep financial records and meet our tax and accounting obligations.
Lawful basis: legal obligation and performance of a contract.

Communications, complaints and disputes

To respond to enquiries, handle complaints, protect our business and deal with insurance or legal matters where necessary.
Lawful basis: legitimate interests and, where applicable, legal obligation.

Dashcam recordings

To support road safety, investigate accidents or incidents, protect pupils and other road users, and assist with insurance or legal matters.
Lawful basis: legitimate interests, balanced against the rights and freedoms of the people recorded.

Celebratory photographs

To share photographs celebrating a pupil's driving test pass, only with the pupil's explicit consent.
Lawful basis: consent, which you can withdraw at any time.

Do you have to give us your information?

We need your name, contact details and a valid provisional or full driving licence (confirmed through the DVLA check) to provide driving lessons. If you do not provide this information, we will not be able to give you lessons. Providing a photograph for social media is entirely optional.

Dashcams

Our tuition car, a Peugeot e-208, is fitted with front-facing and rear-facing dashcams, used for road safety, incident recording and insurance purposes.

• No cameras face the inside of the car.
• Audio recording is switched off.
• The cameras use loop recording, so footage is automatically overwritten, usually within 2 to 3 days.
• Footage of an accident or significant incident may be saved and kept for as long as needed for insurance, legal or safety purposes, then securely deleted.

Access to saved footage is restricted. Footage may be shared with insurers, legal advisers, the police or other relevant authorities where necessary and lawful. Dashcam footage is never used for marketing or posted on social media.

Please be aware that the outward-facing cameras may capture images of other road users, pedestrians and members of the public.

Pass photographs and social media

We may invite you to take a celebratory photograph after you pass your driving test.

• Taking a photograph is entirely voluntary.
• Photographs are only published on our official Facebook or Instagram pages with your explicit consent.
• For pupils under 18, we will also obtain consent from a parent or legal guardian before publishing.
• Saying no will not affect your lessons or the service you receive in any way.
• You can withdraw your consent at any time. We will stop using the photograph and take reasonable steps to remove it from our pages.

Please note that we cannot guarantee the removal of copies, screenshots or reposts made independently by other people.

Who we share your data with

We use trusted service providers to help run our business:

• Total Drive: lesson enquiries and booking management.
• Cloudflare: website hosting, delivery and security.
• WhatsApp (Meta): messaging with pupils.
• Google: email (Gmail) and our Google Business Profile.
• DVLA: driving licence checks.
• Our bank: receiving bank transfer payments.
• Insurers, legal advisers and relevant authorities: where necessary for insurance claims, legal obligations, disputes or the prevention of crime.

Where providers process personal data on our behalf, we take appropriate steps to make sure it is handled securely and lawfully. When you follow a link to another platform, such as WhatsApp, Total Drive, Facebook, Instagram or Google, that platform will process your information under its own privacy policy.

Some of these providers may process data outside the United Kingdom. Where this happens, appropriate safeguards are used as required by UK data protection law.

We never sell or rent your personal data, and we do not share it with third parties for their own marketing.

Pupils under 18

We teach pupils from the age of 17. Where a pupil is under 18, a parent or guardian may help arrange or pay for lessons, and we may communicate with them about bookings, payments and practical arrangements.

Marketing and automated decisions

We do not send marketing messages. We only contact you about your enquiry, lessons, bookings, payments and driving test.

We do not make decisions about you using automated decision-making or profiling.

How long we keep your personal data

• Enquiries that do not lead to lessons: up to 12 months.
• Booking and lesson records: up to 6 years after your last lesson, in case of complaints, disputes or insurance claims.
• Financial records: at least 6 years from the end of the relevant accounting period, as required by HMRC.
• Emergency contact and health information: deleted when you finish your lessons, unless needed for an ongoing insurance claim or dispute.
• Driving licence check details: not kept after the check is completed.
• Dashcam footage: usually overwritten within 2 to 3 days. Saved incident footage is kept only until the matter is resolved.
• Photographs: kept on our social media pages until you withdraw consent or they are no longer needed.

We review what we hold regularly and securely delete personal data when it is no longer needed.

How we protect your personal data

We use reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect personal information against unauthorised access, accidental loss, alteration, disclosure or destruction. Access is limited to those who need it for legitimate business purposes. No method of electronic storage or communication is completely secure, but we take reasonable steps to protect the information we hold.

Your data protection rights

Under UK data protection law, you may have the right to:

• Access: request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
• Rectification: ask us to correct inaccurate or incomplete information.
• Erasure: ask us to delete your personal data in certain circumstances.
• Restriction: ask us to restrict how we use your data in certain circumstances.
• Objection: object to processing based on our legitimate interests.
• Data portability: receive certain data in a commonly used electronic format.
• Withdraw consent: where we rely on your consent.

These rights are subject to certain legal conditions and exemptions. For example, we may need to keep financial records to meet legal obligations. To exercise your rights, please email privacy@awsmdriving.co.uk. We will normally respond within one month.

Complaints

If you are unhappy with how we have used your personal data, you have the right to complain to us. Please email privacy@awsmdriving.co.uk. We will acknowledge your complaint within 30 days, look into it without undue delay and keep you informed of our progress.

You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK's independent data protection regulator: ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint.

Changes to this notice

We may update this notice from time to time to reflect changes to our services, business practices or the law. The latest version will always be published on this page, with the date it was last updated.