Privacy Notice

This privacy notice explains how Metropress Limited, trading as Auction Technology Group, uses personal data in connection with the following websites operated by us:

• BidSpotter.co.uk
• I-Bidder.com
• the-saleroom.com

Auction Technology Group Germany GmbH operates as our European representative under EU GDPR.

1. How to contact us

   We are here to help you with any questions or concerns you may have about our use of your personal data.

   If you require further information or wish to make a request:

   1. Contact us by phone on +44 203 725 5500
   2. Contact us electronically via the Contact Us forms on this website.
   3. Contact us by post via the address provided on this website.
   4. Send us a message via your account.
   5. Escalate the matter to our independent Group Data Protection Office at
      • Email: DPO@AuctionTechnologyGroup.com
      • Phone: +44 (0)203 725 5500
      • Letter: 65 Southwark Street London SE1 0HR, UK.

2. How do we use personal data?

   Our use of personal data depends on which services you are using as outlined below:

   1. If you visit our websites

   If you visit our websites, we will process details of your IT device and website usage, to help manage website security and performance, as a reasonable and legitimate business interest.

   Our websites contain links to and from other external websites, such as those of auctioneers, our partner networks, advertisers and affiliates. If you follow a link to any external websites, please note that these websites have their own processes and privacy notices and that we do not accept any responsibility or liability for these notices, for data you give to those organisations, nor for their processing. Please check their notices before you share any personal data with those websites or organisations.

   Our websites also use cookies to store data on your IT device related to your use of our websites. Further details can be found on our Cookie Notice page, which can be accessed here  or via the link at the bottom of our webpages.

   2. If you contact us

   We will use the information you provide, including your user and contact details, to help us address the matter you have raised, as a reasonable and legitimate business interest.

   3. If you subscribe to our communications

   If you subscribe to our newsletters, promotional communications, and updates, we will process your user and contact details to provide the requested information, as a reasonable and legitimate business interest. You can unsubscribe from those communications at any time by:

   • Contacting us via contact details provided on this website;
   • Using the “unsubscribe” link in emails or “STOP” number in texts; or
   • Updating your marketing preferences via the preference center for your account.

   We do not conduct unsolicited direct marketing.

   4. If you participate in a survey, competition, webcast or promotion

   We will process the data you provide for that specific activity, including user and contact details.

   Some activities will also provide the option to opt-in to marketing updates and offers, if you provide your consent.

   5. If you register on our site and/or as a bidder in any auctions

   If you register on our websites and watch list a lot, we send a watch list update via SMS and email as a reasonable and legitimate business interest for items that have been watch listed to support purchasing decisions. Site registrants can unsubscribe from these updates at any time.

   If you register as a bidder for one or more auctions via our website, we will process the personal data that is necessary for us to provide our services to you, including sign-up, identification, safeguarding, service updates, product updates, bidding, winning, payment, any payment defaults, shipping, feedback, legal compliance and bidder support, under our contractual obligations.

   Over time, as necessary for the fulfilment of the contract, this will include user contact details, IT device, website usage, bid, purchase and payment histories.

   We will perform risk-based analysis of bidder data for fraud prevention purposes (preventing and detecting crime) and to determine your eligibility to bid, during sign-up and once you have become a customer.

   We contact bidders directly, via email, for communications that are necessary for contractual or legal reasons, such as operational issues, delivery information or payment updates. We send auction updates via SMS and email to bidders who have registered for auctions as a reasonable and legitimate business interest and to support purchasing decisions. Bidders can unsubscribe from these updates at any time.

   Targeted adverts will also be presented on other websites that you visit.

   We also use anonymised data to analyse aggregated customer trends and business performance over time.

   Bidding

   If you register to bid in an auction via one of our websites, we will share your contact details and bid, purchase and payment histories via our website with the relevant auctioneer in order to enable the auctioneer to determine whether to approve you to bid in their auction.

   Winning Bids

   If you win a bid, we will share your contact details, purchase and payment details (as a tokenised version of your payment card via our PCI compliant gateway) with the auctioneer for that auction, for them to fulfil the order. That auctioneer is responsible for confirming your winning bid and delivering the goods you have purchased from them. Where we are shipping the product, we will also process your details as necessary for the delivery, including the necessary sharing of your data with shipping companies.

   Those auctioneers and shipping companies will be operating as an independent data controllers for the purpose of processing that data. We have no control or liability for the use of data by those auctioneers, and their own policies and notices apply.

   Any issues with the goods you have purchased must be raised directly with your auctioneer.

   Payments

   Where financial transactions require bank account details to be processed, we will only use those details for the purpose of agreed payments.

   Credit card payment services for customers are provided by specialist third parties, who operate as independent data controllers. Their policies, notices and controls apply. We will retain partial information, such as a “credit card transaction token”, so that we can identify the transaction, but that the information cannot be used to initiate further transactions.

   Protecting Our Auction Community

   We take reasonable proactive steps to help protect all parties that we work with, from illegal, unfair, or inappropriate behaviours.

   We will monitor positive and negative account activities, including user contact details, IT device, website usage, bid, purchase and payment histories. We share such information between other relevant partners, such as auctioneers, to help parties manage their commercial risks under our collaborative auction service.

   Users, accounts and services may be suspended, blocked or closed where behaviours are thought by us in our sole discretion to be inappropriate or create a commercial risk. You will be directly notified of any such action, if applicable to you. To dispute an account action, contact our customer services team.

   We reserve the right to take legal or debt collection actions against organisations or individuals where relevant, and will share data with necessary parties, such as law enforcement, debt collection agencies and credit bureaus, in order to do so.

   White Labelled Auction IT Platforms

   Where we are providing technological services to an auctioneer, such that you are direct customer of the auctioneer, the auctioneer is the data controller and we are their data processor for this processing. The auctioneer is responsible for the use of your data. Any requests you wish to raise must be raised directly with the auctioneer for that auction.

3. Your Rights

   If we are processing your personal data, you have the right to ask that we:

   • Tell you how your data is being used, including how data is processed by third parties on our behalf.
   • Send you, or a nominated third party, a copy of your data.
   • Stop or suspend processing of your data, or opt out of consent that you have provided, including our use of data for marketing.
   • Correct or erase your data.
   • Explain and manually review any automated decision making or profiling of your data.

   We also respect your right to not be discriminated against by us because you exercised any of your rights under applicable data protection legislation. This means we will not, among other things, on the basis of your data subject request:

   • Deny goods or services to you;
   • Charge different prices or rates for goods or services, including through the use of discounts or other benefits or imposing penalties;
   • Provide a different level or quality of goods or services to you; or
   • Suggest that you will receive a different price or rate for goods or services or a different level or quality of goods or services.

   Before responding, we will need to take steps to verify your identity for reasons of security.

   Once your identity is verified, responses will typically be completed within one month and at no cost to you.

   We will endeavour to fulfil your request, but may be subject to limitations in our responses, for legal or contractual reasons. For example, we will not delete data if there is a legal or contractual obligation for us to retain that data. We will provide specific details of these limitations, as relevant to your request, if and when applicable.

   If you exercise any of these rights, we will not discriminate against you, nor limit your access to our services as a result of your request.

   To exercise any of these rights, please contact our Customer Service teams, using the contact details provided on this website, highlighting that you are raising a Data Subject Request.

   If you are ever not happy with the way we have handled your data, you have the right to escalate the matter to our Group independent Data Protection Office (DPO@AuctionTechnologyGroup.com), to our supervisory authority (the Information Commissioner's Office at ico.org.uk) or to initiate legal action. However, if you ever have any problems, we ask that you contact our Customer Service teams first, so that we can help to resolve the issue directly, using the contact details provided above.

4. Data Retention

   If you register on our website but do not bid in an auction, we will retain your personal data for up to 3 years from your last login before closing and deleting your account.

   If you bid in an auction via our website, we will retain your personal data for up to 5 years from your last login, to respond to any queries or complaints, to prevent and detect crime, and to comply with tax law.

5. International Data Protection Law

   ATG entities operate globally under the highest legal standards, incorporating legislation such as the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and California Consumer Privacy Act CCPA where those legal obligations can be consistently applied, so that all data subjects gain the same rights, irrespective of their geography.

   We believe this is a fair and ethical approach.

   We do not sell personal information or aggregated personal information. We do aggregate personal data for the purpose of internal management reporting.

   If you do not provide personal information we ask for, it may delay or prevent us from providing associated services to you.

   We only collect personal data directly from the data subject, via our electronic platforms. We do not purchase personal data from third parties.

6. Categories of Personal Data

   Where categories of personal data are referenced, the following types of personal data are included.

   Categories of Personal Data	Specific Types of Personal Data Collected
   User details	Name (First, Last) Username and Password Passport Number and Issuing Country (Verification of auctioneer business owners) Communication preferences (e.g. marketing) Complaints, issues, queries, comments, feedback Event participation flag (e.g. surveys or competitions) Risk indicators (e.g. feedback, blocks or bans initiated by ourselves or auctioneers, payment issues, defaults, bidding issues, device issues, location issues, etc)
   Contact details	Postal address Phone number Mobile phone number Email address
   IT Device details	IP Address Login credentials Type of operating system and browser Type of device and operating system Geographical location Preferred language
   Website usage details	Pages viewed Links clicked (webpages and emails) Date and time of visit Webpage performance, errors and debugging data Duration of visit
   Bid details	Search criteria  Items viewed Auctions Registered Items bid on, amount, date and time.
   Purchase details	Product  Date and time of winning bid Amount of winning bid Delivery address Auctioneer comments and feedback
   Payment details	Sort code and bank account Credit card token Timing and status of payments

    

   Our processes are not designed to process health data, education data, sensitive characteristics or biometric data of customers. We request that you refrain from providing such data.

7. Other Matters

   We routinely transfer personal information to external processing organisations, who help us provide our services under written contractual agreement, such that they are only authorised to use the information for our purposes. External organisations include:

   • Our affiliates, including companies within the Auction Technology Group;
   • Service providers we use to help deliver our products and services to you, such as payment service providers, warehouses and delivery companies;
   • Other third parties we use to help us run our business, such as marketing agencies or website hosts;
   • Third parties approved by you, including social media sites you choose to link your account to or third-party payment providers;
   • Credit reporting agencies, if applicable;
   • Our insurers and brokers, if applicable;
   • Our payment providers and banks.
   • External auditors.

   We will share personal data with governmental or law enforcement authorities where required to do so, to comply with legal obligations or to prevent, detect, investigate or prosecute crimes, losses or damages.

   We may also need to share your data with other parties, such as potential buyers of some or all of our business or during a re-structuring. We will typically anonymize information, but this may not always be possible. The recipient of the information will be bound by confidentiality obligations. If your data is transferred to a third-party organisation as a result of corporate merger or acquisition activities, this privacy notice will still apply unless fair notice is provided by the third party.

   We engage third party processors, including the other ATG entities, under contractual agreement, to process data on our behalf.

   Other than stated in this Privacy Notice, we will not share, trade, sell or rent data to other third parties.

   Where data is transferred internationally, appropriate safeguards will be applied, such as transfers to countries approved as having adequate data protection legislation, necessity for contract, or approved contractual clauses.

   We use extensive operational, technical, physical and organisational measures to help protect personal data from unauthorised access, loss, unlawful processing, damage or destruction.

   Individuals must not share any data relating to the special categories under GDPR, such as health data or religious beliefs, for any reasons, as in doing so that data will be deemed manifestly made public. Only share payments data via secure portals, which are directly processed by our payment providers as independent data controllers.

   Our services are not for use by minors or children.

   This privacy notice has been written to help you easily understand how we use personal data. If you have any further questions or comments, or would like more detail, please contact our Customer Services team directly.

   We reserve the right to update this information at any time. If we make material changes to this privacy notice, we will take reasonable steps to notify affected data subjects.

   This privacy notice was last updated January 2023.