Privacy and cookies policy

The College of Optometrists is the professional body for optometry. It qualifies the profession and delivers the guidance and training to ensure optometrists provide the best possible care. We promote excellence through the College’s affixes, by building the evidence base for optometry, and raising awareness of the profession with the public, commissioners, and health care professionals. 

The College is a Royal Charter body. We are the data controller for the purposes of the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and the Data Protection Act 2018. 

For general membership and data queries, please contact us at membership@college-optometrists.org. For data protection escalations or formal requests, please contact Bill Scott, Director of Finance, at bill.scott@college-optometrists.org or at data.protection@college-optometrists.org, or by calling 020 7839 6390. 

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your personal data, you have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk or by calling 0303 123 1113. 

This policy explains how the College of Optometrists collects, uses, shares and retains personal information. It covers information we collect: 

• through our websites 
• by phone, email, post, SMS and in person 
• when you join or renew your membership 
• when you register for events, training or qualifications 
• when you use our online learning platforms 

This policy also covers our use of cookies and similar technologies on our websites. 

Our websites contain links to third-party websites. Those websites have their own privacy policies, and we are not responsible for their data practices. Use of those websites is at your own risk. 

We process personal data in line with the following legislation: 

• UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) 
• Data Protection Act 2018 (DPA 2018) 
• Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 (DUAA 2025) 
• Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 (PECR), as amended by the DUAA 2025 

These are referred to collectively in this policy as “data protection law”. 

UK GDPR requires us to have a lawful basis for every type of processing we carry out. We rely on the following bases: 

Contract: where processing is necessary to provide you with membership services, qualifications or other services you have signed up to. 

Legal obligation: where we are required to process data by law, for example sharing information with the General Optical Council (GOC). 

Legitimate interests: where we have a legitimate interest in processing your data and that interest is not overridden by your rights. This includes contacting lapsed members about rejoining, carrying out wealth screening to support our philanthropic fundraising, contacting users of our learning platforms including Docet to offer appropriate follow-on courses, and some marketing communications. 

Consent: where you have given us clear, specific consent, such as opting in to receive communications from event sponsors. 

Where we rely on legitimate interests, we carry out a Legitimate Interests Assessment (LIA) to balance our interests against your rights. You can request a copy of any relevant LIA by contacting data.protection@college-optometrists.org. 

Depending on your relationship with the College, we may collect the following categories of personal data: 

• name, title, and contact details (address, email, phone number) 
• professional details including GOC registration number, practice details, and membership category 
• assessment and examination data, year of joining the profession, sex, gender, age and health information relating to the need for special circumstances in assessments or examinations 
• payment and billing information 
• training, qualification, and CPD records 
• Scheme for Registration assessment data 
• communications preferences 
• records of calls to the Clinical Advice Line 
• details of event attendance and webinar participation 
• website usage data (see the Cookies section below) 
• financial wealth indicators, where identified through our wealth screening programme (see section 8) 

We use member data to: 

• administer your membership, including processing renewals and payments 
• send you membership communications by email, post, phone and SMS, including renewal reminders, College news, CPD opportunities and Acuity journal 
• provide access to member benefits, online learning and resources 
• contact trainees, supervisors and assessors regarding Scheme for Registration assessments 
• contact facilitators about events and training in their area 
• list your details in the member directory on our website, if you have opted in to this 
• share your name and contact details with event sponsors, where you have specifically opted in as a delegate to receive information from them 
• carry out research and analysis to improve our services 
• keep records of calls to the Clinical Advice Line for training, monitoring and follow-up purposes 

Where members have opted in, the College’s Acuity email newsletter may include relevant content from trusted third parties. You can unsubscribe at any time using the link in the footer of those emails.

Where you resign or do not renew your membership, we will ask for your communication preferences for subsequent communications. Unless you opt out, we may continue to contact you where we have a legitimate interest in doing so, for example, to inform you of significant developments affecting the profession or to invite you to rejoin. Our lawful basis for this processing is legitimate interests. You have the right to object to this processing at any time (see section 10). 

We may contact non-member optometrists to advise them of resources and services from the College where we consider there is a legitimate interest in doing so. If you have raised a query with us, we will use your details to respond. 

If you contact us with a query, we will use your details to respond. This also includes data captured on Look After Your Eyes, the College’s patient eye health information website.

The College manages and administers Docet, and both use a shared database. If you update your details through either the College or Docet, this will be reflected across the shared database. If you are not a College member but use Docet, the College may contact you about relevant events, services and follow-on courses where we have a legitimate interest in doing so.

We will contact you about College member resources, services and opportunities in accordance with your stated preferences. We will not pass your contact details to third parties for their own marketing purposes, except where you have specifically opted in as an event delegate to receive information from event sponsors. 

You can update your communication preferences at any time by contacting data.protection@college-optometrists.org. 

The College carries out wealth screening of its member database to support our philanthropic fundraising programme. This helps us identify members who may have the capacity and interest to support the College’s purposes through a major gift or legacy. 

We do this by sharing a subset of member data, ie name, contact details and membership status, with a specialist prospect research agency. They cross-reference this data against wealth intelligence databases to identify members who may be high-net-worth individuals. 

Our lawful basis for this processing is legitimate interests. The College has a legitimate interest in securing philanthropic income to advance its purposes. We have completed a Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) and a Legitimate Interests Assessment (LIA) for this processing. You can request copies of these documents at data.protection@college-optometrists.org. 

Where a member is identified as a potential major donor, the College may use that information to inform how we communicate with them about philanthropic opportunities. We will always do this in a considered way, consistent with their preferences. 

Your right to object: You have the right to object to your data being used for wealth screening at any time. To do so, contact data.protection@college-optometrists.org. We will stop processing your data for this purpose on receipt of your objection and delete your details from the screening list.

We keep your data within the College except where we need to share it with third-party providers to deliver services. All third-party processors are subject to a Data Processing Agreement and are required to handle your data securely and only for the purposes specified. Where required by law, we may also share data with legal or regulatory authorities. 

Our website hosting providers record interactions with our websites in server logs. These logs capture your IP address, the pages accessed, the date and time of access, and browser information. This data is retained for up to 12 months for security auditing purposes and for analysis to improve website performance and target communications. 

All personal data shared with third-party processors is transferred securely and subject to contractual data security obligations that comply with UK law when data is held or processed outside of the UK. Data shared with Prospecting for Gold for wealth screening purposes remains within the UK at all times. 

Our website hosting provider names have been withheld to protect system integrity. To request this information, contact data.protection@college-optometrists.org with your reasons for requesting it.