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Waterford City & County Council Privacy Statement

Who we are
This is the website of Waterford City & County Council, Waterford, Ireland.  We are the authority responsible for local government administration in the City & County of Waterford, Ireland. Our website address is: https://waterfordcouncil.ie 

This privacy notice provides information about the ways in which Waterford City & County Council (WCCC) collects, stores, processes, shares or keeps personal information provided by our customers.

Our Contact Details
Telephone : 0818 10 20 20
Email : contact@waterfordcouncil.ie
Website issues : website@waterfordcouncil.ie
Press / Communications : communications@waterfordcouncil.ie

Opening Hours: Monday – Friday: 9:30 AM to 4 PM (open through lunch)
Postal Addresses: Waterford City & County Council, City Hall, The Mall, Waterford X91 PK15 or Civic Offices, Davitt’s Quay, Dungarvan, Co. Waterford X35 Y326

Online customer applications, payments, queries or complaints

  • Forms
    WC&CC provides a wide range of services; on this website we have a number of online forms which allow customers to submit an appeal (e.g. parking fines), query an application (e.g. planning), a payment, contribute to a public consultation, or a query/complaint.  On our forms, among the personal information collected is: name, address, telephone number & email address.  If appropriate, these details are logged into our CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system which facilitates staff in service areas of the Council to log and resolve queries / complaints, escalate to relevant departments, and respond to customers with updates or to seek further information. 
  • Payments
    Our customer payments, e.g. rent, loans, rates etc. are handled at a central level by the MyCoCo service.  On that site, you can make payments, view your transaction history, download invoices, statements and receipts.  That website’s usage is tracked to ensure that customers supplying payment information can do so in a safe and secure manner. For MyCoCo’s privacy statement, see this page.
  • Leaving a Comment: Our News page allows users to comment on posts.  When visitors leave comments on the site, we collect the data shown in the comments form, and also the visitor’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection.
  • We do not market or send alerts to members of the public who contact us using the above forms. We do, however, operate a separate opt-in free SMS based alerts service called MapAlerter – see www.mapalerter.ie/waterford and sign up for geographically targeted free alerts on weather, road issues, traffic issues, bridge lifts etc.

Searching Our Website
The search facility on our website is an internal search function and only returns information that appears on the website.  Search terms are collated in our website statistics in order to better provide and tailor information to the public.

Website Analytics
This website uses the Matomo analytics engine to track website usage statistics.  No personal information is tracked.

For our statistics, technical information about your visit to our website is tracked, including: date & time of visit, pages viewed, device & operating system used, refererr information and website engagement.

Cookies
This website uses the CookieYes service for control and regulation of cookies required to administer our online services.  Users of the website will be presented with a Cookie Banner from where they can grant, deny and customise cookie consent.  “Necessary” cookies are required to enable the basic features of this site. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable data.

Calling our Customer Service Centre
Customer contacts by phone are either responded to directly or logged into our CRM (Customer Relationship Management) System so that tasks/queries can be allocated across the Council service areas.

Emailing us
Any emails sent to our general email contact@waterfordcouncil.ie are handled by our internal Customer Service Centre and are either responded to directly, or logged to our CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system. Some messages do not require a response and so are not logged.  In general, such emails are held on our systems for the statutory period of 2 years and then deleted.

Any emails sent to other emails related to Council services (e.g. planning@waterfordcouncil.ie or finance@waterfordcouncil.ie) are handled by Council staff in that specific department. The sender’s email address will remain visible to all staff tasked with dealing with the query.

Social Media
Private Facebook messages, using the Messenger application, Facebook inbox messages, or ‘Direct Messages’ on X (DMs), are handled similarly to our email process, as above.

Where appropriate, comments on social media that require and/or necessitate a reply, are responded to directly on that channel. Our social media pages do not track or identify individual visitors but may collect aggregated engagement data for analytics purposes.

Please be aware that it is the sender’s responsibility to ensure that the content of social media interractions is within the bounds of the law. Unsolicited material of a criminal nature will be reported to the relevant authorities, channels and users may be reported/blocked.

Surveillance Technology
Waterford City & County Council uses a number of methods of surveillance technology. The operation of this equipment is covered by the following policies:

CCTV Audit

In October 2020, the Data Protection Commission issued a Final Decision to Waterford City and County Council in respect of a CCTV audit which had commenced in 2018.

Background

In June 2018, the Data Protection Commission commenced an audit (own volition inquiries) of surveillance technology (such as CCTV, Body Worn Cameras and Drones) in use by public bodies. All 31 Local Authorities plus An Garda Síochána were subject to the audit. The CCTV audit commenced in Waterford City and Council in June 2018 and final decision was issued by the Data Protection Commissioner in October 2020.

Since the introduction of GDPR in May 2018, the Council has implemented an ongoing programme of work across a large range of services in relation to data protection compliance. Substantial work has been undertaken in the course of this CCTV audit to enhance policies and procedures around the use of surveillance technology and improve compliance in line with the audit findings.

The audit has brought to light some issues which can only be addressed at national level through changes in legislation (eg. Use of covert CCTV and Dashcams for enforcement purposes under the Litter Pollution Act and Waste Management Act).

Efforts are ongoing in relation to a small number of other outstanding items including:

  • The Council is working closely with An Garda Síochána at local level to obtain approval from the Garda Commissioner for some Community CCTV cameras.
  • The audit has given very close scrutiny to the privacy impacts of Body Worn Cameras introduced some years ago under Health & Safety for the protection of Traffic Wardens who can be subject to serious threats of violence and aggression.

Any queries in relation to this Final Decision should be directed to dataprotection@waterfordcouncil.ie

Disclosure
As far as possible, we will not disclose personal data without consent. We will not disclose your personal data to third parties except in instances where an individual has consented to the disclosure, or we are obliged by law to disclose the data.

General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) – see gdprandyou.ie
Under the General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) customers have the following rights:

  • obtain details about how their data is processed by WCCC
  • obtain copies of personal data that WCCC holds on them
  • have incorrect or incomplete data corrected
  • have their data erased by WCCC, where, for example, the Council has no legitimate reason for retaining the data
  • obtain their data from WCCC and to have that data transmitted to another organisation (Data Portability)
  • object to the processing of their data by WCCC in certain circumstances
  • not to be subject to (with some exceptions) automated decision making, including profiling

Any requests should be directed to the Data Protection Officer – contact details below.

Customers have a right to lodge a complaint with the Data Protection Commission
If a customer is unhappy with how their personal data query is handled by Waterford City and County Council, they are entitled to lodge a complaint with Data Protection Commission.

The Data Protection Commission provides an online form for the submission of such complaints. Alternatively, a complaint can be submitted in writing to :

Data Protection Commission
21 Fitzwilliam Square South
Dublin 2
D02 RD28
Ireland

Changes to our Privacy Statement
This is a live document, under regular review. This statement was last updated in November 2024.

How to contact us
If you require further information regarding our Privacy Statement, you can contact us at dataprotection@waterfordcouncil.ie or write to us at: Data Protection Officer, Waterford City & County Council, City Hall, The Mall, Waterford, X91 PK17. Tel: 0818 10 20 20.

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