Privacy & Cookie Policy

Last Updated: August 2026

At Single Steps Nurseries, we believe that providing exceptional early childhood education begins with establishing complete trust with our families. While we spend our days nurturing curiosity, wonder, and essential early development, behind the scenes we take the security and privacy of your personal data every bit as seriously. And while data protection legalities can sometimes feel a bit dry and stuffy, we are committed to being completely transparent, open, and straightforward about how we handle your information.

This Privacy Policy explains how Single Steps Nurseries (‘we’, ‘our’, or ‘us’) collects, uses, stores, and protects your personal data when you visit http://www.singlestepsnurseries.com, submit an online enquiry, or complete a nursery registration form.

Lawful basis & information we collect

We only collect personal information that is genuinely necessary to deliver our educational services, fulfill our legal and safeguarding obligations, or communicate with you effectively. This includes:

  • Parent & child personal data: When you submit an enquiry, request a prospectus, or complete a Registration Form (for Liss or Medstead), we collect parent/guardian contact details (names, home addresses, email addresses, phone numbers), child personal details (forename, surname, date of birth, gender, nationality, religion, language, ethnicity), emergency contacts, and medical/health notes (allergies, doctor details, medical conditions).
  • Media & photography: With your explicit consent, we may capture photographs or videos of children for nursery updates, learning journeys, marketing, publicity, or professional development. Consent is entirely voluntary and granular.
  • Website usage data: Technical logs, IP addresses, browser types, and usage analytical data gathered via our website (subject to your cookie choices).

Our processing rests on four primary lawful bases under UK GDPR:

  • Contractual performance: Necessary to fulfill our agreement with you regarding your child’s nursery place and care.
  • Legal & safeguarding duties: Complying with strict statutory obligations under Ofsted, the Department for Education (DfE), Local Authority funding requirements, and Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) safeguarding duties.
  • Legitimate interests: Operating an efficient, informative website and delivering high-quality early years communication.
  • Consent: Where you have given explicit consent (e.g. optional marketing photography or inclusion on social contact lists). You may withdraw consent at any time.

How we use your data

Your personal data is used solely for legitimate, defined purposes:

  • To assess, process, and confirm nursery place registrations for our Liss or Medstead settings.
  • To deliver tailored early childhood education, meet dietary and medical needs, and maintain mandatory developmental records.
  • To process Early Years Education (EYE) funding claims with Hampshire County Council / Local Authority.
  • To communicate critical operational announcements, emergency closures, and monthly fee invoicing.
  • To ensure absolute safety and safeguarding compliance in accordance with UK law.

Data sharing & third parties

We will never sell, rent, or trade your personal data to third parties for marketing purposes. Full stop. We only share personal data with trusted third parties under strict confidentiality and legal obligations:

  • Ofsted, Hampshire County Council / Local Authority, and the Department for Education (DfE) to comply with statutory educational and funding mandates.
  • Emergency medical professionals if urgent care is required and parents cannot be reached immediately.
  • Vetted IT service providers, secure nursery management software platforms, and accounting providers operating under data processing agreements.

Data retention & international transfers

We retain personal information only for as long as necessary to fulfill the purpose for which it was collected, or to satisfy legal, statutory, and accounting retention periods (for instance, child safeguarding and accident records are retained in line with statutory Early Years regulations). All data is stored securely within the UK or European Economic Area (EEA).

Your legal rights

Under the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR) and Data Protection Act 2018, you possess explicit rights regarding your personal data:

  • The right to request access to the personal data and educational records we hold about you or your child.
  • The right to request correction of inaccurate or incomplete information.
  • The right to request erasure of your data (‘right to be forgotten’) where processing is no longer legally required.
  • The right to restrict or object to certain types of processing.
  • The right to withdraw consent at any time where processing is based on consent (such as promotional photography).

 

Data protection complaint handling procedure

Mandatory Compliance Framework (Section 165, Data Protection Act 2018 & UK GDPR Standards)

At Single Steps Nurseries, we strive to maintain the highest standards in everything we do—from our early education settings to how we safeguard your personal information. However, if you ever feel that we have not handled your personal data correctly or if you have concerns regarding your privacy rights, we want to know about it immediately so we can put things right.

How to submit a data protection concern or complaint

In the first instance, all data protection queries, formal Subject Access Requests (SARs), or privacy complaints should be directed to our Data Protection Lead:

  • Contact title: Data Protection Lead, Single Steps Nurseries
  • Email:
  • Telephone: 01420 562125 (Medstead) / 01730 893472 (Liss)
  • Postal address: Single Steps Nurseries, High Street, Medstead, GU34 5LL / 71 Station Road, Liss, GU33 7AD

Our internal resolution timeline & procedure

When you submit a data complaint or privacy request, we follow a strict, mandatory internal process:

  • 1. Immediate acknowledgment: We will formally acknowledge receipt of your complaint or enquiry in writing within 5 working days.
  • 2. Thorough investigation: Our Data Protection Lead will investigate the matter thoroughly, reviewing our internal processing logs, systems, and staff procedures.
  • 3. Written resolution (30 Days): We will provide a full written response detailing our findings and any corrective actions taken within 30 calendar days of receiving your complaint. In exceptional circumstances involving highly complex enquiries, we may extend this period by up to two additional months, notifying you of the extension within the initial 30 days.
  • 4. Fee-Free process: No fee is charged for submitting a privacy complaint or exercising your data rights.

Escalate to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO)

We sincerely hope that our internal team can resolve any concerns to your complete satisfaction. However, if you remain dissatisfied with our response or believe we are processing your personal data unlawfully, you have the right to lodge a formal complaint with the UK’s independent data protection regulator:

  • Address: Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF
  • Helpline: 0303 123 1113
  • Website: http://www.ico.org.uk/concerns

 

Cookie policy & prior-consent banner

What are cookies? As with almost all professional websites, this site uses cookies—which, apart from being delicious sugary baked treats enjoyed during special nursery celebrations, are also tiny text files downloaded to your computer or mobile device to improve your browsing experience. This policy describes what information they gather, how we use it, and why we sometimes need to store these cookies. We can assure you that your cookies will never be stored in a biscuit tin, and if you’d rather not have them stored at all, we can certainly fix that (though it might make our website a bit less helpful!).

How we use cookies

We use cookies for a handful of practical reasons outlined below. Unfortunately, in most cases, there are no industry standard options for disabling non-essential cookies without completely disabling the cool functionality and features they add to our site. So, if you’re unsure whether you need them, we’d suggest leaving them on—think of them as ’emergency treats’ for your web browser!

The cookies we set

  • Strictly necessary / essential cookies: These cookies are strictly necessary for the technical operation of our website (e.g. secure enquiry form submissions, page navigation, and load balancing). Under PECR and ICO exemptions, essential operational cookies do not require prior consent because the website simply cannot function without them.
  • Form-related cookies: When you submit data to us via contact forms, registration downloads, or enquiry pages, functional cookies may be set to remember your details for easy future correspondence.
  • Third-party analytics cookies: We use analytics cookies (provided by trusted third parties like Google Analytics) to help us understand how parents discover and navigate our website—such as which nursery pages are visited most often and how long is spent exploring our curriculum. These friendly ‘Matrix-style doughy bits of code’ collect anonymous, aggregated statistics only. They fire ONLY if you click ‘Accept All’.

Disabling & managing your cookies

You can prevent the setting of non-essential cookies at any time by clicking the ‘Manage Cookie Preferences’ link in our website footer, or by adjusting the settings on your web browser. Be aware that disabling essential cookies may affect the functionality of this and many other websites you visit. And just to be clear—when we talk about ‘disabling cookies’, we definitely don’t mean dunking them in tea until they go floppy and eating them in one bite! Although we do recommend that with real biscuits.