Making GDPR a Slick operation

What is GDPR?

In essence, GDPR is a new legislation that aims to strengthen data protection laws and protect the privacy of clients.

If we look at the EU’s GDPR website, the new legislation has been "designed to harmonise data privacy laws across Europe, to protect and empower all EU citizens’ data privacy, and to reshape the way organisations across the region approach data privacy”. In essence, GDPR is a new legislation that aims to strengthen data protection laws and protect the privacy of clients.

For salon purposes, personal data includes any details related to your client, for example, name, date of birth, address, contact information and allergies or medical details. Photographs that can identify an individual are also considered personal data.

There are a number of things you need to do to stay complaint. GDPR requires your salon to have a clear privacy policy explaining to employees, current clients and even prospective clients what information you are collecting and why, how you plan on using the information, who, if anyone, it will be shared with, as well as when and why it will be deleted.

We have created the below checklist, highlighting various actions for you to complete to ensure your salon meets the requirements:

You should -

• Assign a Data Protection Officer (someone that is in charge of looking after all data you collect and someone clients can speak to if they have questions)
• Define an age range of consent
• Ask clients to opt in. We are currently updating the client profile to include a toggle function that records permissions, date asked and member of staff who received the permission.
• Allow clients to opt out and give them the right to be removed from your database
• Remove outdated customer data (anything that has been inactive for 3+ years)
• Be prepared for data requests

High penalties can apply when you fail to comply, which means if your business doesn’t meet the requirements you may be liable to pay damages or be subject to fines of up to 4% of your salon’s turnover.

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How can Slick help?

Slick is GDPR compliant, helping to store your data safely and securely, so you can enjoy peace of mind in the knowledge that your vital business information is protected.

GDPR is all about how you store client information, which means the stack of client record cards in the back, or the piles of outdated appointment books in your garage could be costly to your business.

Creating an account with Slick takes less than 20 minutes allowing you to start storing client data in line with GDPR regulations, quickly and easily. Have data on a computer? We can make switching over a pain-free experience with our complimentary data upload service.