COOKIE POLICY
Introduction
This site uses cookies to help us improve your browsing experience. The easiest way to view the site is to agree to their use by clicking ‘OK’ in the consent bar that appears when you first visit.
Whilst it’s possible to view the site without using cookies, the method for doing so will vary from one device (and browser) to another (please see the ‘disabling’ cookies section for more information).
We’d generally recommend that you simply hit the ‘OK’ button and carry on with your visit, but if you’d like to know more about the cookies we use (and why we use them) we’ve covered this in detail below.
What are cookies?
Cookies are tiny files that are downloaded to your computer, tablet or smartphone.
When you visit a website, the process of reading and writing cookies usually takes place in the background (in fact there’s a good chance that websites you have visited in the past have used cookies without you even realising).
Cookies are almost as old as the internet itself and many reputable websites (e.g. www.bbc.co.uk) use them to help improve your browsing experience.
Why do we need to notify you about cookies?
In short, it is for us to comply with UK (and at the time of writing) EU law.
Businesses operating in the UK need to adhere to the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR). These regulations sit alongside the Data Protection Act (DPA) and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and give people specific privacy rights in relation to electronic communications.
The PECR covers the use of cookies and similar technologies for storing information, and accessing information stored, on a user’s equipment such as a computer or mobile device. The regulations are designed to protect online privacy, by making consumers aware of how information about them is collected and used online, and give them a choice to allow it or not.
The cookies we use
This site uses cookies for a variety of reasons. The cookies used will depend on how you interact with the site (such as the pages you visit, whether you complete an enquiry form or whether you place an order).
Account related cookies
If you create an account with us then we will use cookies for the management of the signup process and general administration. These cookies will usually be deleted when you log out however in some cases they may remain afterwards to remember your site preferences when logged out.
Login related cookies
We use cookies when you are logged in so that we can remember this fact. This prevents you from having to log in every single time you visit a new page. These cookies are typically removed or cleared when you log out to ensure that you can only access restricted features and areas when logged in.
Email newsletters related cookies
This site offers newsletter or email subscription services and cookies may be used to remember if you are already registered and whether to show certain notifications which might only be valid to subscribed/unsubscribed users.
Orders processing related cookies
This site offers e-commerce and payment facilities and some cookies are essential to ensure that your order is remembered between pages so that we can process it properly.
Surveys related cookies
From time to time we offer user surveys and questionnaires to provide you with interesting insights, helpful tools, or to understand our user base more accurately. These surveys may use cookies to remember who has already taken part in a survey or to provide you with accurate results after you change pages.
Forms related cookies
When you submit data to through a form such as those found on contact pages or comment forms cookies may be set to remember your user details for future correspondence.
Site preferences cookies
In order to provide you with a positive user experience on this site we provide the functionality to set your preferences for how this site runs when you use it. In order to remember your preferences we need to set cookies so that this information can be called whenever you interact with a page is affected by your preferences.
Third party cookies
In some cases we may also use cookies provided by trusted third parties. The following section details which third party cookies you might encounter through this site.
Google Analytics
This site uses Google Analytics (one of the most widespread and trusted analytics solution on the web) for helping us to understand how you use the site and ways that we can improve your experience. These cookies may track things such as how long you spend on the site and the pages that you visit. This helps us to ensure the information contained on the site is both engaging and relevant. For more information on Google Analytics cookies, please visit the Google Analytics website.
From time to time we test new features and make subtle changes to the way that the site is delivered. When we are still testing new features these cookies may be used to ensure that you receive a consistent experience whilst on the site whilst ensuring we understand which optimisations our users appreciate the most.
As we sell products and services it’s important for us to understand statistics about how many of the visitors to our site actually make a purchase and as such this is the kind of data that these cookies will track. This is important to you as it means that we can accurately make business predictions that allow us to monitor our advertising and product costs to ensure the best possible service.
Google Adsense
The Google AdSense we use to serve advertising uses a DoubleClick cookie to serve more relevant ads across the web and limit the number of times that a given ad is shown to you. For more information on Google AdSense see the official Google AdSense privacy FAQ.
Social media
We also use social media buttons and/or plugins on this site that allow you to connect with your social network in various ways. For these to work the following social media sites including; facebook, twitter and instagram, will set cookies through our site which may be used to enhance your profile on their site or contribute to the data they hold for various purposes outlined in their respective privacy policies.
Disabling cookies
Disabling cookies may downgrade your browsing experience or even ‘break’ this site’s functionality. Unless you have a specific reason for doing so, we generally recommended that you click on the ‘OK’ button to accept all cookies.
If you would still like to proceed, then please be aware that the method for disabling cookies will vary according to the device and web browser you are using. Most browsers will allow you to:
- delete all cookies
- block all cookies
- allow all cookies
- block ‘third party’ cookies
- clear all cookies when you close the browser
- open a ‘private browsing’ / ‘incognito’ session
- install add-ons and plugins that manage cookies
We’re unable to cover instructions for every browser here, so we suggest you refer to your browser’s help section/page for details on how to manage cookies. Please bear in mind that if you disable or delete cookies in your browser this may also affect the functionality of other websites you visit.
Further information
You can find further information on cookies at the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) website and on also on Wikipedia. Please note that we are not responsible for the content of external websites.
https://ico.org.uk/your-data-matters/online/cookies/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_cookie
Finally, if you have any questions you’d like to ask us about cookies, please contact us.
