Privacy notice - East Sussex Registration
Overview
This notice explains how the information East Sussex Registration collects about you is used and your rights in relation to that information.
East Sussex County Council takes data protection seriously. Please be assured that your information will be used appropriately, in line with data protection legislation, will be stored securely and will not be processed unless the requirements for fair and lawful processing can be met.
East Sussex County Council has a duty to register all:
- births
- deaths
- stillbirths
- civil marriages and civil partnerships
- notices of intent to form a civil marriage or civil partnership
that occur within the county and issue certificates based on those register entries. We also provide:
- change of name deeds
- citizenship ceremonies
- non-statutory ceremonies
- verification of life for foreign pension redemption
- Tell Us Once (TUO)
- document certification
What information is being used?
To provide these services we make use of information provided by the NHS, local GP practices, General Register Office, the Coroner’s office, UK Visas and Immigration, other local authority registration services, the clergy and members of the public.
This information may include your:
- name and any alternative or former names used
- gender
- date and place of birth
- address
- phone number
- email address
- parent’s names and addresses
- spouse or civil partner’s name and address
- children’s names and addresses
- passport and driving licence numbers
- National Insurance number
For some services, we may need to process the following ‘special category data’:
- personal data revealing racial or ethnic origin
- personal data revealing political opinions
- personal data revealing religious or philosophical beliefs
- genetic data
- biometric data (where used for identification purposes)
- data concerning health
- data concerning a person’s sex life
- data concerning a person’s sexual orientation
How will your information be used?
The data we hold about you is used for the following purposes:
- statutory registration of births, deaths, stillbirths, marriages and civil partnerships
- display of notices of the intention to marry/form a civil partnership
- correcting information contained in a register entry
- provision of certified copies of register entries
- updating district and borough electoral roll and council tax records
- detection and prevention of crime including immigration offences
- safeguarding of vulnerable adults and children
- updating government pension scheme records
- releasing bodies for burial or cremation
- statistical analysis
- booking and administering registration service appointments
- booking and administering ceremonies
- creating, issuing and storing records of changes of name
- provision of citizenship ceremonies
- administration of Tell Us Once accounts including extraction and sharing of personal data with authorised local government departments
- administration of photographic services
- customer feedback and service improvement
- issue of a Ceremonies Newsletter to subscribed customers
- identification of an individual’s right to access statutory services
We aim to maintain high standards, adopt best practice for our record keeping and regularly check and report on how we are doing. Your information is never sold for direct marketing purposes.
The information you provide will be held and processed by registration officers for East Sussex. Our staff are trained to handle your information correctly and protect your confidentiality and privacy.
With exception of customers subscribed to our Ceremonies Newsletter, your information is processed in the UK or in a country with an adequacy agreement with the UK. Information relating to customers subscribed to our Ceremonies Newsletter is processed by MailChimp outside of the European Economic Area. MailChimp commit to processing in compliance with the necessary Standard Contract Clauses and East Sussex County Council will be made aware if this changes.
What is the legal basis for processing your information?
Personal information collected from you in order to register an event is required by law.
Your data is processed where necessary for the delivery of registration and associated services and in line with provisions set out by the following legislation.
Births and deaths
- Population (Statistics) Act 1938
- Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953
- The Registration of Births Deaths and Marriages Regulations 1968
- The Registration of Births and Deaths Regulations 1987
- The Social Security (Notification of Deaths) Regulations 2012
- Immigration Act 2014
- The Medical Certificate of Cause of Death Regulations 2024
Marriages and civil partnerships
- Marriage Act 1949
- The Registration of Births, Deaths and Marriages Regulations 1968
- Registration of Marriage Regulations 1986
- The Reporting of Suspicious Marriages and Registration of Marriages (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2000
- Civil Partnership Act 2004
- Civil Partnership (Registration Provisions) Regulations 2005
- The Reporting of Suspicious Civil Partnerships Regulations 2005
- Immigration Act 2014
- Civil Partnerships, Marriages and Deaths (Registration etc) Act 2019
- The Registration of Marriages Regulations 2021
- Victims and Prisoners Act 2024
Citizenship
- British Nationality Act 1981
- Immigration and Asylum Act 1999
- Immigration Act 2014
- Immigration Act 2016
Other legislation
- Representation of the People Act 1983
- Representation of the People (England and Wales) Regulations 2001
- Social Security Administration Act 1992
- Local Government Finance Act 1992
- Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992
- Education Act 1996
- National Health Service Act 2006
- Children and Young Persons Act 2008
- The Welfare Reform Act 2012
You may be legally obliged by these acts, and other pieces of legislation, to provide certain pieces of information. If you fail to provide information you are required to give us you may, amongst other things, be liable to a fine, or we may not be able to provide the service you are applying for, such as a marriage or a civil partnership.
For the Ceremonies Newsletter and other services, we will ask for your consent to process your personal data.
How long your information will be kept
Registration information is retained indefinitely as required by law. The following retention timelines apply to the data we hold about you:
| Information type | Retention period |
|---|---|
| Information entered into registers of births, deaths, stillbirths, marriages and civil partnership | Indefinite |
| Copy certificate applications | 2 years |
| Registrar General’s Authorities For registration of deaths after 12 months | 2 years |
| Declarations made by applicants for certificates for disposal (no liability to register) | 5 years |
| Notice of intent to marry or form a civil partnership | 5 years |
| Caveats against the grant of a superintendent registrar’s certificate or certificate and licence or Registrar General’s licence for marriage | 2 years |
| Notifications of and Registrar General’s licences for marriage, Notifications of the issue of the Registrar General’s licence for marriage and Registrar General’s licences for marriage | 2 years |
| Requisitions to persons liable to register who have failed to do so | 1 year |
| Routine correspondence relating to appointment and conduct of officers | 2 years |
| Routine correspondence relating to registration of births, marriages and deaths, correction of errors, birth re-registrations not made (Forms LA1 and GRO 185) and copy documents, issue of certificates under certain Acts of Parliament irregular burials | 3 years |
| Routine correspondence relating to false information given to registration officers, falsification and forgery of certificates of birth, marriage or death; marriage of foreigners and persons divorced abroad | 3 years |
| Formal objection against the issue of the civil partnership schedule | 2 years |
| Change of name deeds | Indefinite |
| Home Office citizenship ceremony documentation | 5 years |
| Information relating to the booking of ceremonies and registration appointments | 2 years |
| Information relating to complaints or objections to marriage venue licenses | 3 years |
| Name and email address of customers subscribed to the Ceremonies Newsletter | Until unsubscribed |
| Photos required for marriage/civil partnership notice | 7 days after the ceremony date |
At the end of the retention period personal data is destroyed as confidential waste and deleted from our systems.
Sharing your information
A copy of any register entry will be provided by this office in accordance with the law to any applicant, provided they supply enough information to identify the entry concerned and pay the appropriate fee. The copy may only be issued in the form of a paper certified copy (a 'certificate'). An application for a certificate may also be made to the General Register Office.
Indexes for events registered at this office are publicly available in order to help members of the public identify the registration record they might need. Indexes are available at East Sussex Register Offices.
Aside from the above provisions, any sharing of personal data is always made:
- on case-by-case basis
- using the minimum personal data necessary
- with the appropriate security controls in place
- in line with legislation
Information is only shared with those agencies and bodies who have a 'need to know' or where you have consented to the sharing of your personal data to such persons.
We may use the information we hold about you to assist in the detection and prevention of crime or fraud. We may also share this information with other bodies that inspect and manage public funds.
We will not routinely disclose any information about you without your express permission. However, there are circumstances where we must or can share information about you with other organisations owing to a legal or statutory obligation. These include:
- General Register Office
- The Office for National Statistics
- Department for Work and Pensions
- Department of Health
- National Health Service
- Local Districts and Boroughs (fraud departments, electoral roll and council tax billing authorities)
- Child Safeguarding Board
- Adult Safeguarding Teams
- Coroner’s Office
- Other Local Authority Registration Services
- Home Office (United Kingdom Visas and Immigration/Immigration and Enforcement)
Alternatively, staff at our offices will be able to provide the information.
Use of third party organisations
East Sussex County Council may share your information with trusted external organisations to process your data on our behalf.
This is done to enable us to operate appointment booking and case management services.
Any organisation commissioned by the Council will be under contractual obligation to comply with data protection legislation.
Your rights
Under data protection legislation, you have the right:
- To be informed why, where and how we use your information
- To ask for access to your information
- To ask for your information to be corrected if it is inaccurate or incomplete (where the law permits)
- To ask for your information to be deleted or removed where there is no need for us to continue processing it
- To ask us to restrict the use of your information
- To ask us to copy or transfer your information from one IT system to another in a safe and secure way, without impacting the quality of the information
- To object to how your information is used (in certain circumstances)
- To challenge any decisions made without human intervention (automated decision making)
Please visit: data subject rights for further details.
How to find out more or complain
The Superintendent Registrar is a data controller for birth, marriage and death registrations and can be contacted at:
East Sussex Register Office
Hookstead
Goldsmith’s Avenue
Crowborough
TH6 1RH
Email: Registrar
The local authority is a data controller for civil partnership registrations and other services and can be contacted at:
The Data Protection Officer
East Sussex County Council
County Hall
St Anne’s Crescent
Lewes
BN7 1UE
Email: FOI
The Registrar General for England and Wales is a joint data controller for birth, marriage, death and civil partnership registrations and can be contacted at:
The General Register Office
Trafalgar Road
Southport
PR8 2HH
To complain about the use of your information, please contact our: Customer Services Team or our: Data Protection Officer.
Further information on making a complaint.
You can also contact the ICO for further information or to make a complaint:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF
Phone: 0303 123 1113 (local rate)
Email ICO
Report a concern on the ICO website