Privacy policy

Cosmetic Safety Solutions Limited operates this store and website, including all related information, content, features, tools, products and services, in order to provide you, the customer, with a curated shopping experience (the "Services"). Cosmetic Safety Solutions Limited is powered by Shopify, which enables us to provide the Services to you. This Privacy Policy describes how we collect, use, and disclose your personal information when you visit, use, or make a purchase or other transaction using the Services or otherwise communicate with us. If there is a conflict between our Terms of Service and this Privacy Policy, this Privacy Policy controls with respect to the collection, processing, and disclosure of your personal information.

Please read this Privacy Policy carefully. By using and accessing any of the Services, you acknowledge that you have read this Privacy Policy and understand the collection, use, and disclosure of your information as described in this Privacy Policy.

Personal Information We Collect or Process

When we use the term "personal information," we are referring to information that identifies or can reasonably be linked to you or another person. Personal information does not include information that is collected anonymously or that has been de-identified, so that it cannot identify or be reasonably linked to you. We may collect or process the following categories of personal information, including inferences drawn from this personal information, depending on how you interact with the Services, where you live, and as permitted or required by applicable law:

  • Contact details including your name, address, billing address, shipping address, phone number, and email address.
  • Financial information including credit card, debit card, and financial account numbers, payment card information, financial account information, transaction details, form of payment, payment confirmation and other payment details.
  • Account information including your username, password, security questions, preferences and settings.
  • Transaction information including the items you view, put in your cart, add to your wishlist, or purchase, return, exchange or cancel and your past transactions.
  • Communications with us including the information you include in communications with us, for example, when sending a customer support inquiry.
  • Device information including information about your device, browser, or network connection, your IP address, and other unique identifiers.
  • Usage information including information regarding your interaction with the Services, including how and when you interact with or navigate the Services.

Professional Services Data

We may collect and process information supplied by clients in connection with cosmetic product safety assessments, regulatory compliance services, product information files (PIFs), cosmetic notifications, and related consultancy services. Such information is processed for the purpose of providing professional services and fulfilling our contractual obligations.

Personal Information Sources

We may collect personal information from the following sources:

  • Directly from you including when you create an account, visit or use the Services, communicate with us, or otherwise provide us with your personal information;
  • Automatically through the Services including from your device when you use our products or services or visit our websites, and through the use of cookies and similar technologies;
  • From our service providers including when we engage them to enable certain technology and when they collect or process your personal information on our behalf;
  • From our partners or other third parties.

How We Use Your Personal Information

Depending on how you interact with us or which of the Services you use, we may use personal information for the following purposes:

  • Provide, Tailor, and Improve the Services. We use your personal information to provide you with the Services, including to perform our contract with you, to process your payments, to fulfill your orders, to remember your preferences and items you are interested in, to send notifications to you related to your account, to process purchases, returns, exchanges or other transactions, to create, maintain and otherwise manage your account, to arrange for shipping, to facilitate any returns and exchanges, to enable you to post reviews, and to create a customized shopping experience for you, such as recommending products related to your purchases. This may include using your personal information to better tailor and improve the Services.
  • Security and Fraud Prevention. We use your personal information to authenticate your account, to provide a secure payment and shopping experience, detect, investigate or take action regarding possible fraudulent, illegal, unsafe, or malicious activity, protect public safety, and to secure our services. If you choose to use the Services and register an account, you are responsible for keeping your account credentials safe. We highly recommend that you do not share your username, password or other access details with anyone else.
  • Communicating with You. We use your personal information to provide you with customer support, to be responsive to you, to provide effective services to you and to maintain our business relationship with you.
  • Legal Reasons. We use your personal information to comply with applicable law or respond to valid legal process, including requests from law enforcement or government agencies, to investigate or participate in civil discovery, potential or actual litigation, or other adversarial legal proceedings, and to enforce or investigate potential violations of our terms or policies.

Marketing Communications

We may send marketing communications relating to our products and services where:

  • you have provided your consent;
  • you have purchased services from us and we are permitted to rely on the "soft opt-in" provisions under UK law; or
  • another lawful basis permitted under UK data protection and electronic marketing laws.
  • You may withdraw consent or unsubscribe from marketing communications at any time by using the unsubscribe link in our emails or by contacting us.

Withdrawal of consent will not affect the lawfulness of processing carried out before consent was withdrawn.

Lawful Basis for Processing

Under UK data protection law, we must have a lawful basis for processing your personal information. Depending on the circumstances, we rely on one or more of the following lawful bases:

Purpose

Personal Information Used

Lawful Basis

Processing orders and providing services

Contact details, payment information, transaction information

Performance of a contract

Managing customer accounts

Account information, contact details

Performance of a contract

Responding to enquiries and customer support requests

Contact details, communications

Legitimate interests and/or performance of a contract

Fraud prevention and website security

Device information, account information, transaction information

Legitimate interests and legal obligations

Maintaining accounting and tax records

Transaction information, payment records

Legal obligation

Improving our website and services

Usage information, device information

Legitimate interests

Sending marketing communications

Contact details and marketing preferences

Consent where required, or legitimate interests where permitted by law

Complying with legal requirements and enforcing our rights

Relevant personal information

Legal obligation and legitimate interests

Where we rely on legitimate interests, we ensure that our interests do not override your rights and freedoms.

 

How We Disclose Personal Information

In certain circumstances, we may disclose your personal information to third parties for legitimate purposes subject to this Privacy Policy. Such circumstances may include:

  • With Shopify, vendors and other third parties who perform services on our behalf (e.g. IT management, payment processing, data analytics, customer support, cloud storage, fulfillment and shipping).
  • With business and marketing partners to provide marketing services and advertise to you. For example, we use Shopify to support personalized advertising with third-party services based on your online activity with different merchants and websites. Our business and marketing partners will use your information in accordance with their own privacy notices. Depending on where you reside, you may have a right to direct us not to share information about you to show you targeted advertisements and marketing based on your online activity with different merchants and websites.
  • When you direct, request us or otherwise consent to our disclosure of certain information to third parties, such as to ship you products or through your use of social media widgets or login integrations.
  • With our affiliates or otherwise within our corporate group.
  • In connection with a business transaction such as a merger or bankruptcy, to comply with any applicable legal obligations (including to respond to subpoenas, search warrants and similar requests), to enforce any applicable terms of service or policies, and to protect or defend the Services, our rights, and the rights of our users or others.

Relationship with Shopify

The Services are hosted by Shopify, which collects and processes personal information about your access to and use of the Services in order to provide and improve the Services for you. Information you submit to the Services will be transmitted to and shared with Shopify as well as third parties that may be located in countries other than where you reside, in order to provide and improve the Services for you. In addition, to help protect, grow, and improve our business, we use certain Shopify enhanced features that incorporate data and information obtained from your interactions with our Store, along with other merchants and with Shopify. To provide these enhanced features, Shopify may make use of personal information collected about your interactions with our store, along with other merchants, and with Shopify. In these circumstances, Shopify is responsible for the processing of your personal information, including for responding to your requests to exercise your rights over use of your personal information for these purposes. To learn more about how Shopify uses your personal information and any rights you may have, you can visit the Shopify Consumer Privacy Policy . Depending on where you live, you may exercise certain rights with respect to your personal information here Shopify Privacy Portal Link.

Third Party Websites and Links

The Services may provide links to websites or other online platforms operated by third parties. If you follow links to sites not affiliated or controlled by us, you should review their privacy and security policies and other terms and conditions. We do not guarantee and are not responsible for the privacy or security of such sites, including the accuracy, completeness, or reliability of information found on these sites. Information you provide on public or semi-public venues, including information you share on third-party social networking platforms may also be viewable by other users of the Services and/or users of those third-party platforms without limitation as to its use by us or by a third party. Our inclusion of such links does not, by itself, imply any endorsement of the content on such platforms or of their owners or operators, except as disclosed on the Services.

Children's Data

Our Services are intended for adults and business customers. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe a child has provided personal information to us, please contact us and we will take appropriate steps to delete that information.

Retention of Personal Information

We retain personal information only for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which it was collected, including satisfying legal, accounting, tax, regulatory, and reporting requirements.

Typical retention periods include:

Record Type

Retention Period

Customer account information

While account remains active and up to 2 years afterwards

Order and transaction records

6 years from the end of the financial year in which the transaction occurred

Customer service enquiries

Up to 2 years after resolution

Marketing records

Until consent is withdrawn or up to 24 months after the last meaningful interaction

Website analytics information

Up to 26 months

Cosmetic safety assessment, regulatory compliance and consultancy records

Retained for as long as necessary to provide ongoing services, maintain historical assessment records, comply with regulatory obligations, and establish, exercise or defend legal claims

Legal claims and dispute records

Up to 6 years after resolution or longer where required

Where retention is required by law or necessary to establish, exercise, or defend legal claims, we may retain information for longer periods.

Due to the nature of cosmetic safety assessment and regulatory compliance services, certain professional records may be retained for extended periods where clients require access to historical assessments, formulations, compliance documentation, or related consultancy records.

Your Rights and Choices

Depending on where you live, you may have some or all of the rights listed below in relation to your personal information. However, these rights are not absolute, may apply only in certain circumstances and, in certain cases, we may decline your request as permitted by law.

  • Right to Access / Know. You may have a right to request access to personal information that we hold about you.
  • Right to Delete. You may have a right to request that we delete personal information we maintain about you.
  • Right to Correct. You may have a right to request that we correct inaccurate personal information we maintain about you.
  • Right of Portability. You may have a right to receive a copy of the personal information we hold about you and to request that we transfer it to a third party, in certain circumstances and with certain exceptions.
  • Managing Communication Preferences. We may send you promotional emails, and you may opt out of receiving these at any time by using the unsubscribe option displayed in our emails to you. If you opt out, we may still send you non-promotional emails, such as those about your account or orders that you have made.

If you reside in the UK or European Economic Area, and subject to exceptions and limitations provided by local law, you may exercise the following rights in addition to the rights outlined above:

  • Objection to Processing and Restriction of Processing: You may have the right to ask us to stop or restrict our processing of personal information for certain purposes.
  • Withdrawal of Consent: Where we rely on consent to process your personal information, you have the right to withdraw this consent. If you withdraw your consent, this will not affect the lawfulness of any processing based on your consent before its withdrawal.

You may exercise any of these rights where indicated on the Services or by contacting us using the contact details provided below. To learn more about how Shopify uses your personal information and any rights you may have, including rights related to data processed by Shopify, you can visit https://privacy.shopify.com/en.

We will not discriminate against you for exercising any of these rights. We may need to verify your identity before we can process your requests, as permitted or required under applicable law. In accordance with applicable laws, you may designate an authorized agent to make requests on your behalf to exercise your rights. Before accepting such a request from an agent, we will require that the agent provide proof you have authorized them to act on your behalf, and we may need you to verify your identity directly with us. We will respond to your request in a timely manner as required under applicable law.

Complaints

If you have concerns about how we handle your personal information, we encourage you to contact us first so we can investigate and attempt to resolve your concerns.

You may contact us using the details provided below.

We aim to:

  • acknowledge complaints within 5 working days;
  • investigate complaints promptly;
  • provide a substantive response within 30 calendar days where reasonably possible.

If you remain dissatisfied with our response, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection matters.

Information Commissioner's Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire
SK9 5AF

Telephone: 0303 123 1113

Website: https://www.ico.org.uk

Automated Decision-Making and Profiling

We do not carry out solely automated decision-making that produces legal effects or similarly significant effects on individuals.

We may use limited profiling and analytics to better understand customer preferences and improve our products, services, and marketing communications. Such processing does not result in decisions being made solely by automated means that significantly affect you.

Cookies and Similar Technologies

We use cookies and similar technologies to operate our website, remember your preferences, analyse website traffic, improve performance, and support marketing activities.

Cookies may be categorised as:

Strictly Necessary Cookies – required for website functionality.

Analytics Cookies – help us understand how visitors use our website.

Functionality Cookies – remember user preferences and settings.

Advertising Cookies – help us deliver relevant advertisements.

Where required by law, we will obtain your consent before placing non-essential cookies on your device. You may manage your cookie preferences through our cookie banner or your browser settings.

International Transfers

Some of our service providers, including Shopify and other technology providers, may process personal information outside the United Kingdom.

Where personal information is transferred internationally, we ensure appropriate safeguards are in place, including:

  • UK International Data Transfer Agreements (IDTAs);
  • UK Addenda to Standard Contractual Clauses;
  • transfers to countries recognised by the UK Government as providing an adequate level of protection; or
  • other lawful transfer mechanisms permitted under UK data protection law.

Copies of relevant safeguards may be requested by contacting us.

Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time, including to reflect changes to our practices or for other operational, legal, or regulatory reasons. We will post the revised Privacy Policy on this website, update the "Last updated" date and provide notice as required by applicable law.

Data Protection Contact

For any privacy-related enquiries, data subject rights requests, or complaints regarding our handling of personal information, please contact:

Data Protection Contact

Privacy Officer

Cosmetic Safety Solutions

14 Westlea Avenue

Bishop Auckland

County Durham

DL14 6HE

United Kingdom

Email: info@cosmeticsafetyassessment.com