Discovery Library Privacy Policy

What will we do with your personal information?

Your library registration form says, "I have read the privacy policy and agree to this data being held in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation (2018) for use in the library management system shared by NHS libraries in the South West, Thames Valley and Wessex.”

What does this mean?

The SWIMS library management system (South and West Information Management System) is used by the Discovery Library at University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust. SWIMS is used:

• to record contact details for the purposes of loaning of library stock

• to record loans of stock to users

• to send notifications to users about their loans

• to provide management information for library staff on usage and membership

We store your contact data so that we can contact you if we need to:

• inform you when items you have reserved have become available.

• inform you when items you have borrowed will become or have become due for return or renewal.

• let you know when new resources or services have become available to you.

Staff may contact you individually about a resource or service they think will be of particular interest to you.

We may send these updates by email, phone call or text.

We will keep your record as up to date as possible; please inform us if any of your details change.

We may occasionally contact you about a non-library issue, e.g. an item of lost property.

If you wish to stop receiving communications from us about your library loans, please contact us.

We won’t disclose your personal library circulation or usage to a third party (this also means we can’t tell you who currently has the book you have reserved); all activity statistics that are collected are anonymous.

We won’t sell or pass on your information to any other company or body for any purpose, including advertising.

How we store your data.

We enter the data you provide on your registration form into the SWIMS system. If you notify us of a change to your data, we update the SWIMS system accordingly.

Your data is stored within the EU. Technical safeguards are in place to help ensure that your data is kept safe and only disclosed to people who are authorised to view it.

All Discovery Library staff receive training in data protection and information governance, and each member of staff is issued with a secure personal logon to the library system.

Your paper record is retained in a secure environment in a staff only area

Who may have access to your data.

Your data is visible to other NHS library staff in the South of England who use the SWIMS system, but only a library that you have registered at or have requested services from will edit your information or use it to contact you.

In addition your data is accessible to the SWIMS system supplier and system manager.

Staff at all organisations work in compliance with our network Privacy Policy, and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures.

We will share your data with others where required to do so by law. We will never sell your data to anyone, or share it in a way not described in this notice without your permission.

How you can find out what data we have regarding you.

To see limited data that we hold regarding your borrowing, you can log in to the public interface of our library management system using the number on your library card.

If you are registered at this library, contact us to request a copy of the full data.

How long your data is retained

If you provide us with an end date for your contract or placement we will use this as the expiry date for your account, otherwise the default period for SWIMS library memberships is three years. If you update your information with us the expiry date will be amended accordingly.

Your account will be deleted from SWIMS and the paper copy confidentially destroyed two years after your account has expired, providing there are no outstanding borrowing issues.

All accounts and paper forms will be deleted a maximum of five years after expiry date.

If you transfer to another library within SWIMS we will destroy our paper registration form.