Privacy policy
Website Privacy Policy
- Parties
- This privacy policy is issued by and on behalf of The Bridge Chambers (Pty) Ltd (“The Bridge Group of Advocates”).
- The use of terms like ‘we’, ‘us’, or ‘our’ must be understood as references to the Bridge Group of Advocates and its affiliated structures.
- The privacy policy set out herein includes any additional documents incorporated by reference (“privacy policy”), and applies to any person who uses, accesses, refers to, or views any part of this website (“you” or “your”, including cognitive terms).
- PURPOSE
- the Bridge Group of Advocates is committed to protecting your personal information. We promise to use your personal information only in ways that are compatible with this privacy policy.
- We understand the importance of protecting your personal information and as such we subscribe to the principles, outlined in section 51 of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act 25 of 2002.
- All information collected on our website is treated as confidential. Information is primarily collected by engaging with you through i.e. subscriptions to our newsletters, mailing list, email or contacting us directly.
- The Bridge Group of Advocates believes that it is an important responsibility to protect all of your personal information. To better protect your privacy, the Bridge Group of Advocates provides the following policies that apply to this website, in terms of which the Bridge Group of Advocates undertakes to prevent any leakage, misuse or alteration of your personal information to the best of our ability.
- The aim of this privacy policy is to give you notice and inform you how the Bridge Group of Advocates collects and processes your personal data through your use of this website.
- INTERPRETATION
- This privacy policy is not to be read and interpreted in isolation – it is to be read in line with the terms and conditions located on our website, the terms of use located on our website, and any other further notices which we may post on our website from time to time.
- This privacy policy must be interpreted as supplemental to other notices located on this website and must not be understood as overriding.
- WHAT IS PERSONAL INFORMATION?
- Personal information includes your name, address, age, telephone number, e-mail address, any information that personally identifies you, or any information that is specific to you, and must be understood so as to include, inter alia, your name; email and/or physical address; fixed or mobile phone number; location; online identifier; race or ethnic origin; gender; age; religious or philosophical beliefs; health or biometric information; culture; language; education; medical, financial, criminal or employment history, including allegations of the commissioning of offences and proceedings in respect of these allegations; your personal opinions, views or preferences; and another person’s views or opinions about you.
- WHAT INFORMATION DO YOU COLLECT AND HOW ARE YOU COLLECTING IT?
- Every computer connected to the internet is given a domain name and a set of numbers that serve as its IP address. When you visit a page on any website within our network, our web servers recognise your domain name and IP address.
- The Bridge Group of Advocates automatically receives your IP address, cookie information or information on any web pages that you review and records this information onto our server. This information is gathered to be used in the process of customising our website contents.
- We use this information to examine our traffic in aggregate, but do not collect and evaluate the data of individuals.
- When the Bridge Group of Advocates collects the personal information you submit to this website, the Bridge Group of Advocates clearly indicates its purpose, and so does within its necessary limitation.
- If you prefer not to provide your personal information to the Bridge Group of Advocates, you can deny the submission on your own decision. However, please note that by denying your personal information submission, you may not be able to utilise some of the services on this website that require the submission of your personal information.
- We also collect, use, and share aggregated data, such as statistical data, for any purpose deemed necessary by the Bridge Group of Advocates or its affiliated structures.
- Aggregated data refers to data that is incapable of revealing your personal information, and is used for the purposes of answering various market-related questions. We undertake to never mass your personal data, i.e. data which can reveal your exact identity, with aggregated data.
- HOW WE USE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION
- the Bridge Group of Advocates only uses your personal information within the specific purpose that is indicated to you. We will inform you beforehand if an occasion arises where we will need to use your personal information beyond the purpose originally indicated to you. If you do not agree, you can deny the usage of your personal information.
- We will treat your personal information with the utmost confidentiality and will only share your information with our officers, directors, members, employees, agents and services providers required to be given access to the information. We will not share, rent or sell this information to any other third parties.
- Information which we may collect from you may be used for, inter alia, the following:
- to compile a broad profile of visitors who access and transact via the website.
- to establish general demographics, statistics or market information of website users;
- to identify you, verify your identity, create a user account for you and enter into a contract with you;
- to notify you about any changes to our websites, systems, services, privacy policies and notices, products, terms and conditions of sale, terms of use, or any other relevant change that in any way alters the relationship existent between you and the Bridge Group of Advocates;
- to provide you with a catalogue of our new products and services from time to time;
- to tailor our products and services to you, including our marketing solutions, based on the information we receive;
- to provide you with information related to any competitions and promotions and to market our products and services, subject to your right to refuse direct marketing communications; and
- responding to queries you may have asked us through the website.
- We may receive other information about you that is publicly or commercially available and combine it with the information we have collected about or received from you in other ways.
- NON-DISCLOSURE OF YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION TO THIRD PARTIES
- The Bridge Group of Advocates does not disclose, transfer or lend the personal information you submit to our website to any third parties, save:
- when we obtain your permission;
- when we find it necessary to disclose it to the Bridge Group of Advocates-affiliated companies, subsidiaries or agencies in order to answer any inquiries from you;
- when we find it necessary to disclose information to other companies or persons with which the Bridge Group of Advocates contracts, that have confidentiality agreements with the Bridge Group of Advocates, in order to implement what was indicated to you;
- when such information is required to protect our legitimate business interests, such as the processes of recording-keeping or debt collection;
- when such information is processed into non-personally identifiable information as statistical data;
- in cases of urgent circumstances to protect people’s life, body, or property.
- in cases of being required by law to disclose such information or to conform to the edicts of the law or comply with a legal process served on the Bridge Group of Advocates;
- to protect and defend the rights or property of the Bridge Group of Advocates’ network of websites.
- to identify people who may be violating the law, a legal notice or the rights of third parties; and
- to co-operate with the investigation of purported unlawful activities.
- We use reasonable precautions to keep the information disclosed to us secure. When you submit your personal information on this website, we will use SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) or other equivalent methods to protect the transmission of data.
- Accordingly, you submit your personal information at your own risk and we are not responsible for any breach of security or the actions of any third parties that receive such information.
- Be aware that the security measures we take cannot be guaranteed to be safe from intrusion by all unauthorised persons and the Bridge Group of Advocates can take no responsibility for unauthorised, unintended access to your personal information by third parties.
- The Bridge Group of Advocates does not disclose, transfer or lend the personal information you submit to our website to any third parties, save:
- YOUR LEGAL RIGHTS
- You have the right to:
- Request access to your personal data (commonly referred to as a ‘data subject access request’). You have the right to receive a copy of your personal information, which is held by us, so as to enable you to ensure that we are lawfully processing it.
- Request the correction of the information we hold about you. You have the right to request the correction of any incomplete or inaccurate data that we hold about you, subject to our right to request the verification of such corrected data.
- Request the transfer of your data to a third party or yourself. You have the right to request that we transfer to yourself or a designated third party, any personal information we hold about you. This excludes the transfer of aggregated data, or data that cannot be used to reveal your identity.
- Withdraw your given consent which allows us to keep and process your data. You have the right to inform us that you no longer consent to the holding and processing of your personal information. This right entitles you, inter alia, to erasure of your personal data. This excludes the erasure of data that has been aggregated, as described above, with the aim of providing market-related information, or data that cannot be used to reveal your identity.
- Object to how we are processing data about you. You have the right to object to any use of your personal data, subject to the terms of this privacy policy.
- Request restriction of how we are processing data about you. You have the right to request that we restrict how we use your personal data, subject to the terms of this privacy policy.
- Request the erasure of your personal data. You have the right to request that we erase permanently all personal data which can be used to identify you, subject to the terms of this privacy policy. We endeavour to erase, in a timeous manner, any personal information as described above, upon receipt of a request for erasure.
- You have the right to:
- USE BY VISITORS UNDER THE AGE OF 18 YEARS
- The Bridge Group of Advocates is also committed to protecting personal information of any website visitors who are under the age of 18.
- The Bridge Group of Advocates recommends guardians to review the website when website visitors under the age of 18 access this website.
- If you are under the age of 18, please provide your personal information with the consent of your guardian.
- COOKIES AND STORAGE INFORMATION
- Cookies are IDs consisting of alphabets and numbers that this website sends to your computer hard drive through your web browser. The system on this website uses Cookies to recognise your browser and can provide functions such as storing your access information until your next website visit.
- The Bridge Group of Advocates or its advertisers may from time to time make use of cookies. Cookies allows a web-server to collect information about the User for purposes amongst others to identify which areas of the Bridge Group of Advocates’ network of websites you have visited or customised, so the next time you visit, those pages are easily accessible.
- You can set up the browser not to receive new Cookies, to arrange a warning to appear on the screen when Cookies are received or to void the cookie functions (please refer to help in your browser’s toolbar).
- It will solely be on the discretion of the User to either accept or refuse cookies through the settings on its internet web browser or alternatively use a programme or application to control the use of cookies by any website.
- If you choose not to accept these cookies, your experience at our website may be diminished and some features may not work as intended.
- Information collected through the website is stored in a secure operating environment that is not available to the public.
- OTHER INFORMATION WE MAY REQUEST
- We may request your email or postal address or phone number for the purpose of conducting a survey or to provide additional services.
- Whenever we request your identity, we will indicate the purpose of the enquiry before the information is requested.
- We maintain a strict “no-spam” policy – we will not give your email address to a third party without your consent. In addition, we will not send you an email that you have not agreed to receive, although we may from time to time send you an email announcing new products and services.
- Wherever we collect information, we make an effort to include a link to this privacy policy on that page.
- THIRD-PARTY WEBSITES AND HYPERLINKS
- The Bridge Group of Advocates website may contain links to other websites. We are not responsible for the privacy policies adopted by these websites.
- The inclusion of any links on our website does not imply recommendation or endorsement by us or any of our affiliates. Use of or reliance by you of any links on the website is at your own risk.
- You are prohibited from creating any links to the website without the prior written consent from the Bridge Group of Advocates.
- PROMOTIONAL EMAILS
- In the event that you elect to be added to the Bridge Group of Advocates mailing list or subscribe to a the Bridge Group of Advocates newsletter we use the information we collect to better meet your needs by sending you information on latest news and new services which may be of interest to you.
- From time to time we will email you information about us or our affiliates, if you do not wish to receive this e-mail you can opt out by unsubscribing or e-mailing us. Please refer to our contact e-mail addresses below.
- FRAUDULENT EMAILS
- The Bridge Group of Advocates will never request you to provide personal information such as credit card or debit card or banking details, ATM Pins, password etc, or ask you to verify or confirm your information by clicking on a link.
- In the event that you receives an unsolicited e-mail that appears on the face of it to be from the Bridge Group of Advocates which requests you to provide personal information such as credit card or debit card or banking details, ATM Pins, password etc, or asks you to verify or confirm your information by clicking on a link, it is not from the Bridge Group of Advocates.
- The Bridge Group of Advocates would never ask for such information via an email, we strongly urge that you do not respond to these emails and does not click on any links to such an email.
- Responding to such an email places your personal information at risk.
- The Bridge Group of Advocates shall not be held liable from any consequences arising from such fraudulent emails.
- SOCIAL MEDIA
- Please note that on the website we have links to our social media pages.
- You must be aware that any information or material you may post on our social media pages will become public information.
- You must be careful of the material or information you post on our social media pages.
- The Bridge Group of Advocates shall not be held liable for any information or material you publish on our social media pages through our website.
- WHAT ELSE SHOULD I KNOW ABOUT MY PRIVACY WHEN ONLINE?
- We do not share with any of the websites to which we link any of the individual information you provide to us, although we may share aggregate data with such websites, such as data on how many people use our website. Please check with those websites to determine their privacy policies.
- Keep in mind that whenever you voluntarily disclose personal information online, that information can be collected and used by others. In short, if you post personal information that is accessible to the public, you may receive unsolicited messages from other parties in return.
- Ultimately, you are the one responsible for maintaining the secrecy of your personal information. Please be careful and responsible whenever you are online.
- YOUR CONSENT TO THIS AGREEMENT
- By using our websites, you consent to the collection and use of information by the Bridge Group of Advocates as specified above.
- We reserve the right without notice to change, modify, amend, add to, or remove portions or whole parts of this Privacy Policy from time to time permanently or temporarily.
- All updates and/or amendments to this Privacy Policy are effective on the date we publish them on the website.
- The responsibility is on you to determine whether any updates and/or amendments have been made to this Privacy Policy.
- Any major policy revisions will be posted on our website in an easy-to-find and timely manner.
- The continued use of the website by you after the updates or amendments have been made to the Privacy Policy has the effect of you agreeing to be bound by the new terms of the Privacy Policy.
- INQUIRES, CORRECTIONS OR DELETIONS OF PERSONAL INFORMATION
- If you would like to inquire, make any corrections, or request deletion of your personal information, please place your request by contacting us via email at admin@bridgegroup.co.za
- WHOLE AGREEMENT
- The terms and conditions expressed above constitutes the whole agreement and the Bridge Group of Advocates and you are bound by this privacy policy.
- SEVERIBILITY
- If only part of the terms of this Privacy Policy are found to be invalid, unlawful or unenforceable, such terms shall be severable from the remaining terms in this privacy policy, which shall remain valid and enforceable.
- INDULGENCE
- Any indulgence, leniency or extension of time which the Bridge Group of Advocates may give to you shall not operate as an estoppel or in any way prejudice the Bridge Group of Advocates or preclude the Bridge Group of Advocates from exercising any of its rights.
- QUERIES AND DISPUTES
- If you have any queries in relation to this Privacy Policy, including requests for the deletion of your personal information, please contact us. Our contact details are as follows:
- Address:
The Bridge Group of Advocates, Sandown Chambers, Sandown Village Office Park, 81 Maude Street, Sandown, South Africa
Telephone: 011-263-8900
- Email: admin@bridgegroup.co.za
- Address:
- If you are dissatisfied with our resolution of your complaint, you have the right to refer it to the Information Regulator, the supervisory authority for data protection issues in South Africa. The Information Regulator’s contact details are:
- Address: SALU Building, 316 Thabo Sehume Street, Pretoria, 0002.
- Telephone: 012 406 4818
- Email: inforeg@justice.gov.za
- If you have any queries in relation to this Privacy Policy, including requests for the deletion of your personal information, please contact us. Our contact details are as follows: