Privacy Policy

AFC DONScast (“we”, “us”, or “our” is committed to protecting and respecting your privacy when you use our services.

This Privacy Policy explains:

• What personal data we collect from you when you use our website, apps, contact us or book online;
• How we collect and use that information;
• How we keep information secure; and
• How you can contact us if you wish to exercise any of your rights in relation to the information or make a complaint;

• Information we may collect from you;
• How we use your information;
• Sharing or disclosure of your information;
• Types of information we collect, e.g. website visits and purchases;
• Where we store your personal information;
• Information security
• Your rights

We may collect and process information about you when you:

• Buy membership online;
• Use our website or apps;
• Buy a products from us;
• Contact us;
• Enter a competition;
• Sign up to receive updates or marketing;

We collect information such as your contact details, online purchases, payment and refund details.  We may require additional details for some services, such as your age.  This information is generally provided by you.

Sometimes we obtain details from third parties, for example Aberdeen Football Club.

This may include:

• Your season ticket number (for the award of loyalty points for tickets purchased through the supporters club);
• Your Dons ID (for the award of loyalty points for tickets purchased through the supporters club);

We will only use the information you provide as permitted by data protection law.  Our reason(s) for using your data will vary depending on: how you contact us, how you use our services, the consent you have given, our legitimate interests, or legal obligations we may have.  Reasons for use of your data include:

• To provide you with the service – things like carrying out our obligations arising from any contracts like making and taking payments.  We mostly rely on the legal ground of contractual performance to process your data, but sometimes the data is also used for our legitimate interests of customer service, improving our services and other legal obligations, like providing information (where we are legally obliged) to local law enforcement;
• To provide you with details of our services, information about travelling on our supporters buses and customer service – this is based on our legitimate interests, to run supporters buses and associated services;
• To provide you with details of promotions and offers – which we feel may interest you; this is based on our legitimate interests to provide you information about the AFC DONScast when you have given consent for us to contact you.  This may include serving relevant advertisements via email, SMS, post, telephone, social media and 3rd party websites.  You have an absolute right to ask us to stop sending and serving marketing messages to you.
• To handle complaints etc – we will use your information and respond to any complaints, requests or enquiries you make of us.  We have a legitimate interest in responding to complaints, requests or enquiries and handling them efficiently and fairly;
• To enhance your experience of our website – as described in our cookie policy and in the section on website visits and purchases.  We also rely on our legitimate interests more generally to ensure that our technology operates efficiently and without error and to assess which of our services might be of interest to you and to tell you about them;
• To run competition and conduct surveys and research – we run competitions to promote the supporters club.  If you enter a competition we will use your information to facilitate your participation in accordance with the competition rules.  We may also conduct surveys and research to learn more about our support and feedback and to improve our services;

In addition to legitimate interests identified elsewhere, we have a general legitimate interest in running the AFC DONScast in a safe and socially and environmentally responsible manner, efficiently, to provide sustainable and high quality, improve and expand the services we offer and to provide and improve customer service.

We will only share or disclose your information as set out in this Policy or in accordance with data protection law and will obtain your consent where we are required to do so.  We will only use third parties to process information where we are satisfied that they comply with these standards and can keep your data secure.  Due to the nature of the services we provide, we process a large range of data, in a manner of ways, across a number of solutions.  Accordingly, it is impractical to set out the details of all the third parties that we may share your data with below.  You can find out more about the information we collect and how we use, share or disclose below or by contacting us at contact@afcdonscast.co.uk.

We may share or disclose information for the following reasons:

• We use data processors to provide or assist with some of our services, for example, the processing of membership applications.  Where we do so, they must agree to strict contractual terms and to keep your data secure;
• To process payment card transactions by sharing transactional information with payment service providers;
• To comply with requests from the police or other law enforcement agencies for the purposes of crime prevention or detection, these are dealt with on a case-by-case basis to ensure that any disclosure is lawful;
• To comply with other legal obligations for example, relating to crime and taxation purposes or regulatory activity;
• To protect our legitimate interests, as outlined above;
• In respect of information provided to us for marketing purposes only (including freely given consent), to any successor operator of the supporters club in order that they may contact you for marketing purposes in the event we cease to operate;
• If you have agreed (via freely given consent) to receive information for competition, promotion, survey or research purposes, we may share your contact details with a limited number of parties, but only for the reasons you have agreed to in the terms and conditions of the purpose; and
• Where you have consented, to share with other members of the AFC DONScast and RedTop InterACTIVE, promotions and offers which we may feel may interest you;

At our discretion, we may disclose personal data in response to valid requests from the police and other statutory law enforcement agencies.

Before we authorise disclosure, the police have to demonstrate that the personal data is necessary to assist them in the prevention or detection of a specific crime, or in the apprehension or prosecution of an offender.

Requests from the police are dealt with on a case-by-case basis to ensure that any such disclosure is lawful in accordance with the data protection law.

This section shows the information we collect when you use our website.  Before providing us with your details, please read the following important information regarding:

• Collection of visitor information;
• Hyperlinks;
• Cookies;
• Other techniques;

We only use the information that we collect about you lawfully, in accordance with data protection law.

The details you provide about yourself and any other information which identifies you (‘Personal Information’) is held by the AFC DONScast on this website https://afcdonscast.co.uk (the “Site”) for operational purposes, for example membership registration or processing payments.  We may also use your Personal Information to personalise your experience on the Site by informing you of new products or services we may think are of interest to you.

The AFC DONScast gathers general information about users, for example, what users access the most and which areas of the AFC DONScast website are most frequently used.  Such data is used in the aggregate to help us understand how the AFC DONScast  website is used.  We gather this information so that we can continue to improve and develop our services to the benefit of our users.  We may make this aggregated information available to users of the Site and to auditors.  These statistics are anonymous and contain no personal information and cannot be used to gather such information..

When you register with the AFC DONScast, set up any alerts, enter a competition, by services or products via the online shop, we ask for personal information such as your name, contact details and other details.  Once you register with the AFC DONScast and accept our Terms and Conditions, you are not anonymous to us.  We may contact you regarding Site changes or changes to AFC DONScast products or services that you use.  We may use information that you provide to alert you to our own products and services or those of Aberdeen Football Club.

If you purchase something via our online shop, we will record your personal details and send you a confirmation email.  Your personal information will be use principally to communicate with you with reference to your request.

You may opt-in to receive newsletters, offers and other marketing communications from the AFC DONScast- including emails, SMS, social media, mail and telephone.  You may unsubscribe at any time by emailing us at contact@afcdonscast.co.uk to update your preferences.

We may provide hyperlinks from the Site to third party websites.  No liability is accepted for the contents of any site operated by a third party which may be accessed via links from the Site.  These links are provided for your convenience only and do not imply that the AFC DONScast approves or recommends the content of such sites.  We encourage our users to be aware when they leave our Site to read the privacy statements of each and every website that collects personal data.  This Privacy Policy applies solely to information collected by the AFC DONScast.

Our website uses cookies to help us to provide you with a good experience when you browse our website and also allows us to improve our website.

So what is a cookie?
A “cookie” is a small text file that is placed on your equipment when you visit a website (equipment like a computer, phone and tablet).

There are several types of cookies:

Functional cookies/Session cookies
The functional or session cookies are use to provide services or to store your preferred settings. For example for:

• Remembering the products your purchase during online shopping;
• Memorising and passing on the information that you enter during the log-in process or that you leave behind on various web pages during the ordering process, so that you do not have to enter the same data every time;
• Saving your preferences;
• Detecting abuse of our website;

Analytical cookies
These cookies are used to analyse your visit to our website. For example, we analyse the number of visitors visiting our website, the duration of the visits, the order of the pages visited and whether the pages of a website need to be adjusted.

With the help of this information we collect using analytical cookies we can make our websites more user-friendly as well as identify and solve possible technical problems on the website. Once such tool we use to gather analytical information is Google Analytics. On the web, you can choose to opt-out of Google Analytics by installing Google’s opt-out browser add-on.

Marketing and tracking cookies
Only if you have given us permission in advance will we use tracking cookies.
These cookies, often placed by third parties, help us to be able to offer you personalised content. Third parties can follow your internet behaviour with tracking cookies. The AFC DONscast uses a Tag Management System from Google Tag Manager to manage the choice of cookies. This way we can guarantee that no cookies are processed that you have not explicitly given permission for.

JavaScript and Pixels
In addition to cookies, we use JavaScript and Pixels.

By using JavaScript in your browser, we can make sites interactive and develop applications for the web.

A Pixel is a small graphic image on our site. By means of this image, we can, for example, determine how many visitors saw the page at which times. These techniques can also be used for marketing and tracking purposes. We use two types of Pixel; a Facebook Pixel, which analyses visits to our website from Facebook and DoubleClick Pixel, which analyses visits to our website from our advertising across the internet.

Cookies from external parties
Some of the cookies are used by third parties with our consent with the aim to bring certain products and services to your attention or to give you direct access to social media. These third parties include:

• Google Maps
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Google AdWords
• DoubleClick
• Facebook
• WordPress / Automaatic
• Square

For the cookies that these external parties place, the information they collect with them and the purpose for which that information is used, please refer to the privacy statements of these parties on their respective websites.  These statements can change regularly and we have no control whatsoever.

Would you like to know more about cookies?  Go to http://www.allaboutcookies.org/

Privacy options

If you would prefer us not to set cookies on our Website, you can disable them by changing your internet browser settings.  How to do this will depend on your browser you are using, but the following is a step-by-step guide to the most popular browsers:

Microsoft Internet Explorer

1. Click on the “Tools” menu;
2. Select “Internet Options”;
3. Click on the “Privacy” tab;
4. Select the desired setting

Google Chrome

1. Click on the Customisation menu at the top right of the page;
2. Select “Settings”;
3. Select “Show Advanced Settings” and then “Content Settings”;
4. Select the desired settings under the “Cookies” heading;

For all other browsers, please follow the instructions provided by the relevant browser, usually located within the “Help”. “Tools” or “Edit” facility.

If you only disable third party cookies, you will still be able to use this Website, but some of its content will not be as relevant to you. If you disable all cookies, this will result in our Website not working properly.

If you do choose to disable cookies, this choice will only apply to the device you are using at the time. If you want to stop cookies being set on other devices, you will need to follow the relevant steps on each device. Please note that disabling cookies does not delete cookies from your browser, you will need to do this from within your browser.

Access to our database containing personal information on registered users of the Site is restricted.  In order to increase security we ask you to input a password when you register as a user of the site.  Please keep this password secret.  In addition, we encrypt your financial information using SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) technology so that no one else can access your credit card details as they travel through the internet.  SSL is certified by Verisign and is recognised as a secure way to pay on-line.  As you may be aware, no data transmission over the Internet can be entirely secure.  As a result, while we will always use reasonable endeavours to protect the personal information you provide to us, we cannot guarantee the security of your information and the use of our facilities (e.g. email) is at your own risk.  If you have any questions about paying for services or products through the Site, please email contact@afcdonscast.co.uk.

When you buy an AFC DONScast product online we keep a record of this on a database.  We keep the following details:

• Name, address and telephone number;
• Email address
• Date of Birth
• The method of payment used, but not any payment card details
• Your Dons ID or Aberdeen FC Season Ticket client reference number

How we use your personal data
We use this information to meet our obligations, maintaining our customer relations with you, and administration, customer research, marketing and fraud prevention.

We will only send you information about offers and promotions if you chose to receive it and you can change your marketing preferences at any time.

Why we retain your information
We retain your information to allow us to contact you, i.e. should there be any issues with products purchased or a query regarding your order.

Length of time records are kept
Records are kept for the duration of the season.

Sharing data with third parties
If you have agreed to receive information for survey or research purposes, we may share your contact details with limited number of third parties, but only for the reasons you have agreed to.

The information that we collect from you will only be stored in the European Economic Area (“EEA”) or, where it is necessary to disclose it to our processors located outside the EEA, other jurisdictions which are acceptable according to guidance provided by the Information Commissioner and/or where appropriate legal and security safeguards are in place.  Please contact us if you wish to find out more about the safeguards.

We use a range of appropriate technical and organisational measures to safeguard and access to and use of, your personal information and to ensure it retains its integrity and availability.  These include structured access controls to systems, network protection, intrusion detection, physical access controls and training.  We also consider anonymising and pseudonymising personal data where practical.

Unless stated otherwise we will aim to satisfy your instruction, or inform you as to why we are unable to, without undue delay and within 30 working days.  If we anticipate that we will not meet with this timeframe we will let you know within 30 working days and explain what the problem is.

From the date of launch of our new website (1 September 2023 at 9pm), you are entitled to request a copy of the personal information we hold about you.

Please contact us at contact@afcdonscast.co.uk

We may need to ask some further information, such as checking who you are.

Please let us know in what format you wish to receive your information.

Sometimes we may hold information that we don’t have to provide, for example it would prejudice a police investigation or if the disclosure would cause harm to another person whose personal data is inseparable from your data.

In most cases we provide the copy of your data to you for free.  You will be notified if we are unable to do this.

If you believe the information we hold about you is inaccurate or incomplete you can contact us and ask us to correct it.  You may also request any data processing we are carrying out on your data is halted whilst a request for rectification, objection or a dispute over the lawfulness of processing in being considered.  We will provide a response confirming the action we have take or disagree with taking.

This is also known as the “Right to be forgotten”.  You can request deletion or removal of personal information in some circumstances, such as where there is no compelling reason for its continued processing.  We will also take reasonable steps to notify third parties of your instruction and request that they act upon it, in a similar manner.

If we relied on consent as the ground for processing your personal data, you can withdraw this content at any time.  Withdrawing your consent does not affect the processing carried out beforehand.  You can withdraw consent by contacting as using the contact information above.

We’ll store your information for as long as we have to by law or regulatory requirement.  If there’s no legal or regulatory requirement, we’ll only store it for as long as we need it.  We’ll also keep some personal information or a reasonable period after your last contact with us.

We may also keep your personal data for the purposes of our legitimate interests in running the Site.