Privacy Policy

1. Who We Are

The Federation of Awarding Organisations (“FAO”, “we”, “us”, “our”) is an independent support and coordination organisation headquartered in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. FAO operates as a gateway and federation body connecting training providers, colleges, employers and government organisations with regulated UK awarding bodies and qualifications.

FAO is the data controller responsible for your personal information processed in connection with this website and our services. For data protection enquiries, please contact us using the details in Section 11 below.

2. Information We Collect

We collect personal information in the following ways:

Information you provide directly

When you use our contact form, submit an enquiry or communicate with us, we may collect:

• Your name and job title
• Your organisation name and type
• Your professional email address and telephone number
• The country in which you are based
• The nature of your enquiry and any information you include in your message
• Your consent preferences (for example, consent to receive further information from FAO)

Information collected automatically

When you visit our website, we and our service providers may automatically collect:

• Your IP address and approximate geographic location
• Browser type, version and operating system
• Pages visited, time on site, and referring URL
• Device type and screen resolution
• Cookie identifiers and similar tracking technologies (see Section 8)

Information from third parties

We may receive information about you from publicly available professional sources, such as LinkedIn, where this is relevant to our B2B activities and you have made such information publicly available.

3. How We Use Your Information

We use the personal information we collect for the following purposes:

• Responding to enquiries: To process and respond to contact form submissions and questions about our services, partnerships and accreditation pathways.
• Service delivery: To provide the information, guidance and support services that you request as a prospective or existing partner, centre or stakeholder organisation.
• Communications: Where you have provided consent, to send you information about FAO’s services, news, events and updates relevant to your sector.
• Relationship management: To maintain records of our professional relationships with partner organisations, centres and stakeholders.
• Website improvement: To analyse website usage, diagnose technical issues and improve the performance and content of our website.
• Legal compliance: To comply with applicable legal obligations, including anti-money laundering, sanctions screening and data protection requirements.

4. Legal Basis for Processing

We process your personal data on the following legal grounds:

• Legitimate interests: For the purposes of responding to professional enquiries, managing business relationships and improving our website. We have assessed that our legitimate interests in these activities are not overridden by your privacy rights.
• Contract performance: Where processing is necessary to fulfil a service agreement or pre-contractual arrangement with your organisation.
• Consent: Where you have given us explicit consent to contact you for marketing or information purposes. You may withdraw consent at any time by contacting us at contactus@federationaos.com.
• Legal obligation: Where processing is required for us to comply with applicable laws and regulations.

5. Data Sharing

We do not sell, rent or trade your personal information to third parties. We may share your information in the following limited circumstances:

Service providers

We engage trusted third-party service providers to support our website and operations, including hosting providers, email delivery services and analytics platforms. These providers process data on our behalf and are bound by appropriate data processing agreements.

Partner organisations

Where you have explicitly requested an introduction to, or information from, a specific UK awarding body within the FAO network, we may share your contact information with that organisation to facilitate that introduction. We will always make this clear at the point of sharing.

Legal requirements

We may disclose personal information where required to do so by law, court order, regulatory authority or where we believe disclosure is necessary to protect our legal rights or the rights and safety of others.

International transfers

FAO operates internationally from Dubai. If your data is transferred outside of the UK or European Economic Area, we ensure appropriate safeguards are in place, including standard contractual clauses or other mechanisms approved under applicable data protection law.

6. Data Retention

We retain personal information only for as long as is necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, or as required by applicable law. Our general retention periods are:

• Enquiry and contact data: Up to three years from last contact, unless you have entered into a formal partnership or service arrangement with FAO.
• Partner and centre records: For the duration of the relationship and for up to seven years thereafter, for legal and compliance purposes.
• Website analytics data: Typically 26 months, in accordance with standard analytics platform settings.
• Consent records: For the duration of the consent period plus a further two years, to demonstrate compliance.

When data is no longer required, it is securely deleted or anonymised in accordance with our internal data management procedures.

7. Your Rights

Subject to applicable law, you have the following rights in relation to the personal information we hold about you:

• Right of access: To request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
• Right to rectification: To request correction of inaccurate or incomplete personal data.
• Right to erasure: To request deletion of your personal data in certain circumstances.
• Right to restriction: To request that we limit the processing of your personal data in certain circumstances.
• Right to data portability: To receive your personal data in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format in certain circumstances.
• Right to object: To object to processing based on our legitimate interests, or for direct marketing purposes.
• Rights relating to automated decision-making: We do not make solely automated decisions that have significant legal or similar effects on individuals.

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at contactus@federationaos.com. We will respond within one month of receiving your request. If you are based in the UK or EU, you also have the right to lodge a complaint with the relevant supervisory authority (in the UK, the Information Commissioner’s Office: ico.org.uk).

8. Cookies

Our website uses cookies and similar technologies to provide functionality and to understand how visitors use our site. Cookies are small text files stored on your device when you visit a website.

Types of cookies we use

• Strictly necessary cookies: Required for the website to function. These cannot be disabled.
• Analytics cookies: Used to collect anonymised information about how visitors use the site, which helps us improve performance and content. We use this data in aggregate form only.
• Functional cookies: Used to remember your preferences and improve your experience.

We do not use advertising or tracking cookies that follow you across other websites.

Managing cookies

You can control and delete cookies through your browser settings. Please note that disabling certain cookies may affect the functionality of our website. Most browsers provide instructions in their Help menus on how to manage cookies.

9. Third-Party Links

Our website may contain links to the websites of our UK awarding body partners and other third parties. These external sites are operated independently and have their own privacy policies. We are not responsible for the privacy practices or content of external websites and encourage you to review the privacy policy of any site you visit.

10. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices, technology or legal requirements. When we make significant changes, we will update the “Last Updated” date at the top of this page. We encourage you to review this policy periodically.

Your continued use of our website following any update constitutes your acceptance of the revised policy, subject to your rights under applicable data protection law.

11. Contact Us

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy, wish to exercise your data protection rights, or have a concern about how we handle your personal information, please contact us: