Privacy Statement for RS Malta

Privacy Policy


Who is collecting information?

RS Components Ltd (“RS”) is committed to safeguarding your privacy. Please read the following privacy statement to understand how your personal information will be treated when you use or register on the RS Malta site, speak to a member of customer services or otherwise interact with RS.

The personal information you provide to this site, to which this privacy notice relates, is collected by RS Components Ltd. RS Components Ltd is a company registered in England under number 1002091, whose registered office is at Birchington Road, Weldon, Corby, Northamptonshire NN17 9RS. RS Components Ltd is notified in the United Kingdom under the Data Protection Act 1998. Please be aware that RS Malta has links to other sites which may collect personally identifiable information about you. The information practices of those web sites linked to RS Online are not covered by this privacy statement.



What personal information does RS collect from me?

RS collects personal information from you when you provide it to us directly, or through your use of the website, or through a distributor, for example:
  • Username, Password, Security Password, your name, telephone number, fax number, email address, company name, address, company's area of business, job technology, job function, purchasing influence, number of employees in your company, your primary product interest;
  • Transaction, billing and delivery information, transactions record;
  • Responses to customer surveys or competition entries;
  • How you heard about the site;
  • How you use the site, such as the website you came from or are going to, your device’s unique ID, your IP address and operating system, adverts you click on, products you search for, products you purchase, and information you download. Marketing emails we send you may also automatically detect whether you have received or opened the email or clicked on a link in our marketing materials. We use this information for our own performance management, but also so that we can tailor our promotional messages and advertising to you.


In addition, we keep copies of information you submit when you send email feedback to the site, ask a technical question, or report a problem. If you contact RS in writing we may keep a record of that correspondence. RS also occasionally asks users to complete surveys that we use for research purposes.



With whom does RS share my information?

The company named on this site is a distributor of RS for your country, and RS operates this site on behalf of that distributor. Therefore all personal information collected by this site which is necessary for the distributor to fulfil your order will be passed to the distributor, and all other personal information collected by this site may be passed to the distributor. Any other sharing of information by RS's distributor will be notified to you by the distributor in accordance with local law.

In the event that RS's distributor for your country changes, your personal information may be disclosed to the new distributor.

RS needs to share information with certain selected third parties in order to operate our business:
  • Electrocomponents Group: RS Components Ltd is a member of a world-wide group of companies, of which Electrocomponents plc is the parent company. For full details of the Electrocomponents Group of companies, please visit www.electrocomponents.com. RS shares personal information with other members of the Electrocomponents Group as necessary to support our services and to improve our customer insights.
  • Service Providers: We provide information to our service providers acting on our behalf (for example to companies that provide digital marketing services like product recommendation, statistical analysis, business & operational insight, website optimization), as well as to those third parties involved in the delivery chain (for example freight forwarders, couriers and delivery companies). On occasion, we also share personal information with our professional and legal advisors.
  • Government Authorities: We may need to share information with customs authorities. We may also share personal information with law enforcement or other governmental authority, e.g. to report a fraud or in response to a lawful request.
  • Credit & Fraud Checking: We may share information with credit reference agencies and with third parties engaged in fraud prevention and detection.
  • Media: From time to time, we may release aggregated and anonymised marketing statistics to business partners, or may use these in press releases, advertising, or published reports. We would only personally identify you or any other customer in such press releases, advertising, or reports with your prior consent.
  • Business or Asset Sale: In the event that we sell any business assets, the personal information of our customers may be disclosed to a potential buyer. In this event, we will make reasonable attempts to ensure the buyer will be bound by the terms of this privacy statement.


RS may need to disclose your information to organisations working on our behalf anywhere in the world, but will never sell, rent, or give away information that personally identifies customers to third parties. RS may also disclose user information in special cases when we believe that disclosing this information is necessary to identify, contact or bring legal action against someone who may be causing injury to or interference with RS's rights or property, other RS users, or anyone else that could be harmed by such activities. In addition, RS may disclose user information when the law requires it.



How do the distributor and RS use my information?

RS's distributor will use your information for the purposes of order fulfilment:
  • To fulfil your order and/or provide you with the services you have contracted for.
  • To maintain your online account with us.
  • To manage and respond to any queries or complaints to our customer service team.
  • To personalise RS to you and show you content we think you will be most interested in, based on your account information, your purchase history and your browsing activity.
  • To improve and maintain RS, and monitor its usage.
  • For market research, e.g. we may contact you for feedback about our products and services.
  • To send you marketing messages and show you targeted advertising, where we have your consent or are otherwise permitted to do so.
  • For security purposes, to investigate fraud and where necessary to protect ourselves and third parties.
  • To comply with our legal and regulatory obligations.

Any other use by RS's distributor will be notified to you by the distributor in accordance with local law.

RS collects your personal information to provide you with customised and relevant information on your home page when you visit the site. RS also does research on our users' demographics, interests, and behaviour based on the information provided to us through registration, from our server log files or from surveys. We do this to better understand and serve our users. This research is compiled and analysed on an aggregated and anonymous basis.

We rely on the following legal bases, under data protection law, to process your personal information:
  • Because the processing is necessary to perform a contract with you, or take steps prior to entering into a contract with you (e.g. where you have made a purchase with us, we use your personal data to process the payment and fulfil your order).
  • Because it is in the legitimate interests of RS and your company, where you are submitting orders on your company’s behalf.
  • Because we have obtained your consent (e.g. where you contact us with a query, where you add optional information to your account profile, or if you consent to receive marketing from us).

Because it is in RS’ legitimate interests as an e-commerce provider to maintain and promote our services. We are always seeking to understand more about our customers in order to offer the best products and customer experience. We use information about you to tailor your view of RS, to make it more interesting and relevant in respect of the products and offers on view.



Where does RS store my personal information, and how long for?

RS uses distributors and/or service providers based around the world. Consequently, your personal information may be processed in countries outside of Europe, including in countries where you may have fewer legal rights in respect of your information than you do under local law. If we transfer personal data outside the European Economic Area we will, as required by applicable law, ensure that your privacy rights are adequately protected by appropriate safeguards. Please contact us if you would like more information about these safeguards.

We keep your personal information for as long as we need it for the purposes set out above, and so this period will vary depending on your interactions with us. For example, where you have made a purchase with us, we will keep a record of your purchase for the period necessary for invoicing, tax and warranty purposes. We may also keep a record of correspondence with you (for example if you have made a complaint about a product) for as long as is necessary to protect us from a legal claim. For more information about the duration of cookies please refer to the cookie policy.

Where we no longer have a need to keep your information, we will delete it. Please note that where you unsubscribe from our marketing communications, we will keep a record of your email address to ensure we do not send you marketing emails in future.



What does RS do to protect your personal data online?

RS always aim to deliver the highest level of service and security to our customers. In order to ensure the security and protection of your personal details whenever you submit any sensitive information such as credit card number and account details, we use the following security methods:
  • 128 bit Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption - the latest technology to encode and protect your data - which is your guarantee for a safe and secure transaction.
  • The RS VeriSign Security Guarantee pops up whenever you submit sensitive information as an indication that the current information will be encrypted. This means that your information is protected and safe to submit.
  • Sensitive credit card information stored on our in-house systems is also held in encrypted format.
  • Your RS Account Information and RS Personal Profile are password-protected so that you and only you have access to this personal information. You may edit your RS Account Information and RS Personal Profile by using your RS Malta user name and password and by clicking on the Update My Details button on your home page navigation bar. We recommend that you do not divulge your password to anyone. We will never ask you for your password in an unsolicited phone call or in an unsolicited email.
Note: If you rely upon the graphical indication on your browser screen (such as the padlock icon in Internet Explorer) this may not always indicate that a secure communication is taking place. This is because RS uses frames to display certain information and the security icon may not always detect that a secure connection has been established in another frame.



What security precautions are in place to protect the loss, misuse, or alteration of my information?

Your RS Account Information and RS Personal Profile are password-protected so that you and only you have access to this personal information. We recommend that you do not divulge your password to anyone. RS Malta will never ask you for your password in an unsolicited phone call or in an unsolicited email. Also remember to close your browser window when you have finished your work. This is to ensure that others cannot access your personal or business information if you share a computer or are using a computer in a public place.


What are my choices regarding collection, use, and distribution of my information?

RS's distributor may, from time to time, contact you regarding it and its products. The distributor will let you know what to do if you do not want to be contacted by the distributor.
Unless you opted-out during your account registration and purchase, RS may send you emails, call or text you regarding RS products and services. In addition, we may occasionally send you direct mail about products that we feel may be of interest to you.

It is likely that some or all of these marketing messages may be tailored to you, based on what we know about you and/or your company, for example from your Online Personal Profile, your previous searches and browsing history on RS, and your purchase activity.

If you no longer want to hear from us, at any time you can:

  • Edit your preferences in the 'My Profile Update Details' area of My Account, which you can access anytime through the link in the navigation bar.
  • Unsubscribe from emails by clicking on the link in each email
  • Contact us by email to: [sales@thetccgroup.org].


You may also see adverts for RS on third party websites, including on social media. These adverts may be tailored to you using cookies (which track your web activity, to enable us to serve adverts to customers who have visited RS Online). Where you see an ad on social media, this may because we have engaged the social network to show adverts to our customers, or users who match the demographic profile of our customers. In some cases, this may involve sharing your email address with the social network. If you no longer want to see tailored ads you can change your cookie and privacy settings on your browser and these third party websites.


What is RS Malta's policy on allowing me to update, correct, or delete my personally identifiable information?

You can view and edit your Personal Profile information at any time by clicking on the 'My Profile -Update Details' section in My Account, which you can access anytime through the link in the navigation bar. Please note it may take up to 30 (thirty) days for any updates to be effective.

If you have forgotten your password, or have any other problems accessing the RS Malta website, please contact your local distributor.

If you have a query regarding your personal information which you cannot resolve via your Online Personal Profile, please contact us using the details below. Under EU data protection law, you have the right to access (including in a machine-readable format), correct, and request the erasure of your personal data, and RS will comply with any requests to exercise these rights in accordance with applicable law. Please be aware, however, that there are a number of limitations to these rights, and there may be circumstances where we are not able to comply with your request.

Cookies
RS uses cookies and similar technologies to provide the functionality of RS Malta, improve website, and to personalise RS Malta. For more information about cookies, please read our Cookie Policy.

Contact Us
Questions regarding this privacy notice should be directed by e-mail to: sales@thetccgroup.org



What are cookies and how does RS Malta use them?

If you use the Data Library on the site to locate and download data sheets, your browser may alert you to the fact that a cookie is being sent to your PC. Unlike most cookies this will not be stored on your hard drive. The purpose of the cookie is merely to identify you to the data sheet server for the time you are using it. Once you have finished using the library, the cookie will be deleted.



Additional Information

If you have any queries about how the RS distributor is using your information, all such queries must be addressed to the distributor at the address set out on this site. Any questions regarding RS Malta's use of your information should be directed to:

RS Components Malta
TCC Industrial Technologies Ltd.
Technologies House,
74/76, Triq Santa Maria,
Mosta
MST 4135
Malta.
or email [sales@thetccgroup.org]



Updates to this Privacy Statement

We may change this privacy statement from time to time in order to reflect changes in the law, regulatory guidance or our data privacy practices in compliance with the law. When this happens and where required by law, we will provide you with a new or an updated notice detailing how the use of your personal information is changing and, if necessary, obtain your consent for the further processing.

This Privacy Statement was last updated in April 2018.



The Electrocomponents Group
Electrocomponents plc is the publicly quoted parent company which owns RS Components Ltd. For full details of the Electrocomponents Group of companies, please click on the link.