Terms and Conditions of Use
These terms and conditions of use along with the below “Privacy Notice: How we will use and share your personal data” notice explain your obligations when using this site and how we will process the personal data that you provide to us for the purposes of operating our recruitment procedures.
You can either accept these terms and continue with the application process, or decline in which case you will be returned to the career homepage and will not be able to apply for a vacancy through our recruitment portal.
If you are provided with a User id and/or password at any time by us, you are responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of that User id and/or password. You agree not to share those details, and to notify us of any unauthorised use of your User id and/or password. Your account information is password protected for your own privacy and security. Data transmissions are protected by industry standard SSL encryption.
We may amend these terms of use and our Privacy Notice at any time to reflect changes to the law or where we otherwise need to update our procedures.If we make any substantial changes, we will notify you of these by email and on our website.You may withdraw your application at any time if you wish.
Privacy Notice: How we will use and share your personal data
This notice explains how Mills & Reeve LLP, 24 King William Street, London, EC4R 9AT and Mills & Reeve Services Limited, 1 St. James Court, Whitefriars, Norwich, Norfolk, NR3 1RU will collect, use or otherwise process your personal data. If your application is successful, our Privacy Notice for prospective, current staff and partners, apprentices, interns, volunteers and similar individuals explains how your data will be collected, used or otherwise processed by us.
“Personal data” is information relating to you as a living, identifiable individual. Mills & Reeve LLP will process your personal data in accordance with data protection and privacy laws applicable to the firm (including, as applicable: the Data Protection Act 2018, the UK GDPR and the EU GDPR).
What information may we hold about you?
Please note that in addition to the information below, we may also hold information about you as a visitor to our website; for details please see our website privacy policy and our cookies policy.
If you register and sign up for vacancy alerts:
If you register for vacancy alerts, we will hold your name and email address.
We will also hold information that you provide to us concerning the types of vacancy that you are interested in, and any keywords you enter.
If you decide to apply for a vacancy, you will need to register as a user.
If you register and apply for a vacancy:
If you register and apply for a vacancy, in addition to providing your name and contact information, you will be asked to provide information about your:
Intended or preferred role with Mills & Reeve
Reasoning for applying to Mills & Reeve
Status regarding your current legal position to practise law (where relevant)
You will be required to upload your CV which may contain information such as:
Qualifications
Employment experience
Previous employment details (if applicable)
Relevant non-employment details (such as volunteering and charitable works)
You may also include details of referees that you would like the firm to approach for confidential references. It is your responsibility to ensure that you have asked referees for permission to use their details before applying, and you should not upload referee contact details where the referee has not agreed.
You will also be invited (but not required) to provide information about your disabilities, ethnicity, religion or belief, age, social mobility, whether you are a parent/guardian or carer and your sexuality, to enable us to monitor the diversity of applicants. Such data is not used in our assessment of your application. Instead, it is separated and forms part of an anonymised data set used by us to understand our recruitment demographics, identify areas for improvement of our recruitment processes, monitor our compliance with diversity and inclusion obligations, and determine the success of our recruitment campaigns.
We will generate information about you in the course of administering and evaluating your application. We may also receive information about you from any external providers/consultants involved in the recruitment process (see “Who will see your data and who might we share it with” below).
We may gather further information to complement our consideration of your application from public sources, including the SRA solicitor check for legal roles. We may also gather information from your LinkedIn profile.
Our legal basis for processing your personal data
Contract: To the extent that we have a contract with you (or one is in prospect), the primary legal basis for processing your personal data is that the processing is necessary for the performance of a contract with you, or to take steps at your request prior to entering into a contract.
Legal Obligation: Processing of your personal data may be necessary for compliance with our legal and professional obligations to third parties as an employer including, not limited to, right to work, tax and equality and inclusion.
Legitimate Interests: Further we may process your personal data in pursuit of our legitimate interests. In the recruitment context, we have legitimate interests:
in maintaining our relationships and communicating with prospective staff, partners, volunteers, and other applicants for roles within the firm;
in recruiting and retaining high quality staff and providing a supportive recruitment and onboarding process.
in undertaking client specified and contractually binding identity checks and other verification;
in protecting the safety and wellbeing of everyone whilst on our premises,
in maintaining the security of the systems, premises, equipment and information to prevent cyber or physical incidents;
in workforce and availability planning, to deliver an appropriate level of service to clients;
in responding to prospect and client tenders and requests for diversity and inclusion information; and
in seeking confidential legal advice when necessary and/or establish or defend legal claims.
Public Task: We may process your data in furtherance or support of specific tasks that are in the public interest.
Vital Interests: We may also use your personal information, typically in an emergency, where this is necessary to protect your vital interests, or someone else’s vital interests.
Consent: In a small number of cases, where other lawful bases do not apply, we may process your data on the basis of your consent. At present, we do not use consent as our basis for processing in relation to the personal data of prospective, current or ex-staff members.
Our purposes for processing your personal data
The table below sets our main uses for personal data and connects them to our usual legal bases for doing so.
Purpose for which data is processed | Legal basis for that processing |
To make decisions about your recruitment and appointment, including determining any applicable contractual terms and sponsorship, carrying out background checks, checking your qualifications and references, and sharing relevant information with clients where needed. | Contract Legal Obligation Public Task Legitimate Interests |
To meet immigration and employment law requirements. | Legal Obligation |
To set up and/or administer the financial aspects of your relationship with us, including (as applicable) payment of expenses, and engaging in business management and planning (e.g. accounting and auditing tasks). | Contract Legal Obligation Legitimate Interests |
To understand our applicants and our recruitment demographics,. | Legitimate Interests |
To monitor our compliance with diversity and inclusion obligations, and to meet equalities law requirements | Legal Obligation Legitimate Interests |
To improve our recruitment processes and determine the success of our recruitment campaigns. | Legal Obligation Legitimate Interests |
To monitor your use of our information and communication systems to ensure compliance with our IT policies. Ensuring network and information security, including preventing unauthorised access to our computer and electronic communications systems and preventing malicious software distribution. | Legitimate Interests |
To conduct workforce analysis and planning. | Legitimate Interests |
To engage with complaints and possible legal disputes involving you. | Legal Obligation Legitimate Interests |
To enable a merger, acquisition, change of control, joint venture or other similar arrangement involving our business. | Legal Obligation Legitimate Interests |
If you register for vacancy alerts, we will use your personal data to keep you informed of vacancies meeting your search requirements. You will be responsible for managing these and their frequency through ‘Your account’ via the site.
The consequences if you decide not to provide your data
If you decide not to supply personal data that we have requested, we may decide to reject your application.In the case of vacancy alerts, you will be unable to register for alerts.
Our use of your special category personal data and details of criminal offences if you apply for a vacancy
Sensitive personal data is personal data consisting of information as to:
(a)your racial or ethnic origin;
(b)your political opinions;
(c)your religious beliefs or other beliefs of a similar nature;
(d)whether you are a member of a trade union
(e) your physical or mental health or condition;
(f)your sexual life;
(g)the commission or alleged commission by you of any offence, or
(hany proceedings for any offence committed or alleged to have been committed by you, the disposal of such proceedings or the sentence of any court in such proceedings.
When you apply for a vacancy, it may be necessary for us to process some sensitive personal data in order to comply with our relevant employer, legal or regulatory obligations, (including making reasonable adjustments for colleagues with disabilities, or to fulfil our obligations to the Solicitors Regulation Authority), or if we need to do so in order to seek confidential legal advice, or establish or defend legal claims. Processing may also be necessary to fulfil legal obligations or exercise legal rights, to enable a merger, acquisition, change of control, joint venture or other similar arrangement involving our business.
As explained under “What information may we hold about you” above, we may also use anonymised data to monitor the diversity of our applicants, to support our Diversity and Inclusion strategy and policy. It may be necessary for us to process some special category personal data for purposes of identifying or keeping under review the existence or absence of equality of opportunity between specified groups by monitoring specified diversity and inclusion data (ethnic/racial origin, religious/philosophical belief, physical/mental health, sex life and sexual orientation).
Special category data may also be processed during internal processes, as well as in relation to the establishment, exercise or defence of legal claims. Special category and/or criminal offence data may also, in rare cases, need to be shared on a confidential basis with public sector clients of the firm, where required by their own vetting and authorisation processes.
We do not base our processing of special category data on your consent. You may on occasion be requested to consent to participate in specific processes, such as referrals to Occupational Health, but such consent is to participation, not to the processing of personal data. If you accept an offer of employment, our grounds for processing your data after you become an employee are set out in Mills & Reeve’s data protection policy for employees, our Privacy Notice for prospective, current staff and partners, apprentices, interns, volunteers and similar individuals, and in your employment contract.
Who will see or use your data and who might we share it with?
Your personal data will be seen and used by staff administering and making decisions in the recruitment process.
For some roles we ask applicants to take relevant tests (for example psychometric tests or typing accuracy assessments); these assessments may be administered by external providers and we may pass your contact details to them for this purpose.
In the case of some senior roles, we may also ask applicants to attend face to face assessments/interviews with an external consultant who provides assistance to us with the recruitment process. For those roles we will send your personal data (e.g. a copy of your CV and/or application form) to the external consultant before the assessment/interview.
Exceptionally we might need to share relevant personal information to obtain necessary confidential legal advice or to comply with our insurance, legal or regulatory obligations. This may for example require us to provide relevant information to our insurers, legal advisors or to a court/tribunal.
We might need to share or transfer your data confidentially with relevant parties and/or their professional advisers if there is a merger, acquisition, change of control, joint venture or other similar arrangement involving Mills & Reeve LLP. Exceptionally, we might need to share your personal information to comply with our insurance, legal or regulatory obligations. For example, we may have to provide information to the Solicitors Regulation Authority.
Will we transfer your data to other countries?
In the course of carrying out the activities referred to above we may transfer your data to other countries, which may not have the same legal protections for your data as the UK.
Where data is being transferred outside of the UK and/or the European Economic Area, we will take steps to ensure that your data is adequately protected in accordance with UK legal requirements and the EU GDPR (as applicable).Where we are in a contractual relationship with the recipient, such protection will normally consist at minimum of appropriate contractual protections agreed between us and the recipient.
Otherwise for example we may transfer your data because we have other legal obligations to transfer the data, or it is necessary for important reasons of public interest.If you require further detail about the protections in connection with any particular relevant transfer or jurisdiction please ask us
How long will we keep your data?
If you accept an offer of employment with us, your personal data will be held on your personnel file, processed and stored in accordance with our policies applicable to staff records.
If you apply but later decide to withdraw your application, are unsuccessful or if you decide not to accept an offer of employment with us, we expect to retain your personal data for a period of 12 months from the date that the vacancy is closed. If you do not wish us to do this, you have the option to submit a Right to erasure (also known as Right to be forgotten) request through the site: My account>My Requests>Request Right to Erasure. Your request will be considered and we will respond back to you within 28 days.
Further, if you register for vacancy alerts we will retain your personal data and send you alerts until such time that you amend your subscription to them. These along with the frequency are managed by you through the site: My Account>Vacancy Alerts.
This policy is reviewed periodically and the periods for storage specified in it may alter depending on the requirements of law and regulation and best practice.
We may be obliged to suspend any planned destruction or deletion where legal or regulatory proceedings require it or where proceedings are underway such as require the data to be retained until those proceedings have finished.
We may retain anonymised diversity monitoring data and anonymised data about where applicants saw vacancies for a longer period to assist with our diversity monitoring and recruitment procedures, but you cannot be identified from such data.
Your rights over your data
You have the right to request copies of the personal data we hold about you. If you wish to obtain a copy of your personal data, you may contact us through the site where you have the option to submit a Subject Access Request: My Account>My Requests>Request Subject Access Right.
You also have the right to ask for inaccuracies in your data to be corrected, and in certain circumstances for us to stop processing your data or for your data to be erased. Some of these rights are not automatic, and we reserve the right to discuss with you why we might not comply with a request from you to exercise them.
If you have any questions about this privacy statement, please use the following contact point: [email protected]
If you believe that we have not complied with any of our obligations under data protection laws in the UK, please let us know. You have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Commissioner’s Office.
Published July 2024 (v9)