Legal

Redbourn Eyecare is a registered Corporate Body with the 

General Optical Council (CO-5447)

The Directors and Optometrists at Redbourn Eyecare are registered with:

• The General Optical Council
• The College of Optometrists
• Association of Optometrists

  Do You Have a Complaint? 

If you wish to complain about our services or products, please let us know as soon as possible. Whether you are a patient receiving General Ophthalmic Services under the NHS or you are a private patient, we hope that most problems can be sorted out quickly and easily. The sooner you tell us about the problem, the quicker it can usually be resolved. 

If your complaint is about a NHS sight test or other NHS service, you should tell us - verbally, electronically or in writing - within 12 months of the incident itself or 12 months of you becoming aware of the problem. 

Please raise your concern with any of our staff or please contact: 

Sai Karan Malik

Redbourn Eyecare

78 High Street

Redbourn

St. Albans

AL3 7LN

01582965575

info@redbourneyecare.co.uk

 Opening hours:

Mon-Fri: 9am to 5:30pm

Saturday: 9am to 1pm

Alternatively you can complain to NHS ICB. They will tell you how they intend to deal with your complaint: 

You can do this by:  

Telephone:    01992 566122 

E-mail:  hweicbwe.patientfeedback@nhs.net

Writing to them at:   The Forum, Marlowes, Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire HP1 1DN    

They will acknowledge receipt of your complaint within three working days; and, if you wish, they will explain to you in person how and when they will investigate and resolve the complaint. If the investigation takes longer than expected, they will keep you informed. Although they undertake to resolve complaints within six months, most complaints are dealt with much more quickly than that. 

You can be sure that they will treat your complaint in strict confidence. If you are complaining on behalf somebody else, they will need that person’s permission to respond to you. 

If your complaint is not about NHS sight testing or other NHS services but about spectacles or contact lenses only and we are not able to resolve it to your satisfaction, further help is available from: http://www.opticalcomplaints.co.uk/  

Optical Consumer Complaints Service 

6 Market Square, Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire, CM23 3UZ 

Telephone: 0344 800 5071 

PRIVACY NOTICE FOR PATIENTS OF REDBOURN EYECARE

Why we collect and process your personal data 

Redbourn Eyecare is a registered data controller. This privacy notice sets out our privacy policy.

We collect and process patients’ personal data for the purposes of healthcare and marketing. 

Our legal bases for processing personal data for healthcare purposes, including appointment reminders, include public task or legitimate interests. 

· When we provide services under the NHS General Optical Services contract (such as a sight test funded by the NHS), our legal basis for processing personal data in respect of that service is public task

· Otherwise our legal basis is legitimate interests

Our condition for processing special category data is the provision of health or social care.

We process our patients' personal data for marketing purposes with their consent or to meet a legitimate interest. This means we can tell you about eye care products and services that may be relevant to you. If you do not want us to process your personal data for marketing purposes, please let us know and we will stop.

The data we may collect and process

The personal data of patients that we may collect and process includes:

· Your name, contact details and personal identifiers (such as date of birth and NHS number)

· Your general and ocular health history, your family medical and ocular history, and any relevant signs or symptoms you tell us about

· Details of medicines, spectacles and contact lenses prescribed for you

· Details of examinations and other healthcare checks and treatments we provide

· Information relevant to your continued care from other people who care for you or know you well, such as other health professionals and relatives

How we hold and share your personal data

We process your personal data in strict confidence. We keep your personal data securely in our filing and electronic systems. Patient records are only accessible to the healthcare professionals working at the practice and those under their supervision.

We will usually keep any personal data we hold about you for ten years after our last contact with you before we delete it. This is the period recommended as good practice by the College of Optometrists. If we collected the data when you were aged under 18 we will keep it until your 25th birthday, in line with NHS requirements. In exceptional cases we may need to retain personal data for a longer period, and will explain our reasons for doing so on request.

In the course of processing your personal data we may share it with:

· The healthcare professionals working at this practice and those under their supervision

· Healthcare professionals and those under their supervision at other optical practices, but only if you have specifically asked us to pass your personal data (such as your prescription) to them 

· Your GP, ophthalmologists and other healthcare providers and commissioners, and suppliers of optical appliances or similar products, in connection with your ongoing healthcare treatment 

· Software providers for our patient record and invoicing systems, and financial institutions, so that we can keep patient records up to date and arrange payment for services provided to you

Your rights

You have legal rights in respect of the personal data we hold about you. The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has published guidance on the full range of rights. The rights that are most relevant to the way in which we use your personal data include:

· The right to be informed about how we use personal data – this privacy notice gives that information

· The right to object – if you object to us processing your data for marketing purposes, or for healthcare purposes where our legal basis is legitimate interests (see ‘why we collect and process your personal data’, above), we will then stop doing so, unless we are processing the data in respect of a legal claim or can otherwise show that our legitimate interest in processing the data overrides your rights and interests

· The right of access – if you ask us for the personal data we hold about you we will provide it within a month, free of charge (unless we have already provided it to you, in which case we may have to charge you the administrative cost of providing it again).

· The right to rectification – if you ask us to correct personal data about you that is inaccurate or incomplete, we will do so within a month (unless we need longer, in which case we will discuss this with you)

· The right to erasure – also known as the ‘right to be forgotten’. If you ask us to delete your personal data, we will do so if there is no compelling reason to continue processing the data. We will not usually delete healthcare data before our usual time limit (see ‘how we hold and share your personal data’ above) where we have a duty to keep accurate records – for example, to comply with a legal obligation, or in connection with a legal claim. If you ask us to delete such data we will discuss this with you

Contacting us and the ICO about your personal data

Please speak to us first if you have any questions or concerns about the way in which we process personal data. 

You have the right to complain to the ICO if you have a concern about our handling of your personal data which you do not think we can resolve. You can contact the ICO here. 

 This document complies with the requirements of the Information Commissioner’s Model Publication Scheme for Redbourn Eyecare in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and fulfils the obligations on opticians’ practices under the Act.

Introduction

This is a complete guide to the information routinely made available to the public by Redbourn Eyecare. It is a description of the information about our NHS services that we make publicly available. It will be reviewed at regular intervals.    

How is the information made available?

The information within each Class is available in hard copy from:   78 High Street, Redbourn St Albans, Hertfordshire, AL3 7LN   www.redbourneyecare.co.uk   

This guide information 

We will publish any changes we make to this guide or relevant information. We will also publish any proposed changes or additions to publications already available.

Cost of Information : For the most part, we will only charge for hard copies, or copies onto media. Charges are as follows and will be reviewed regularly.   

· Single hard copies – free of charge · As the Freedom of Information Act applies to the provision of information, a request for multiple hard copies does not fall within the provisions of the Act and will attract a charge for retrieval, photocopying and postage. We will inform you of the cost of these charges that will have to be paid in advance. 

· E-mail will be free of charge.                  

Your rights to Information

· The Freedom of Information Act 2000 is designed to promote openness and accountability amongst all organisations that receive public money.    

· Like all NHS contractors, since 1 January 2005 there has been a FOI obligation on optical practices to respond to requests about the NHS related information that they hold, and a right of access to that information has been established in law.    

· These rights are subject to exemptions (see below) that have to be taken into consideration before releasing information.   

· In addition to accessing the information identified in this guide, you are entitled to request information about our NHS services under the NHS Openness Code 1995.   

· Under the Data Protection Act 2018, you are also entitled to access your clinical records or any other personal information held about you and you can contact any practice where your records are held to do this.   

Feedback

If you have any comments about the operation of the Publication Scheme, or how we have dealt with your request for information from the scheme, please write to:   78 High Street, Redbourn St Albans, Hertfordshire, AL3 7LN 

Classes of Information

All NHS information at Redbourn Eyecare is held, retained and destroyed within NHS guidelines. Our commitment to publish information excludes any information that can be legitimately withheld under the exemptions set out in the NHS Openness Code or Freedom of Information ACT 2000, the main reasons being the protection of commercial interests and personal information under the Data Protection Act 2018. This scheme has been written in accordance with those exemptions. The information on this Scheme is grouped into the following categories:

1) Who we are and what we do  

We are an independent practice owned by Mr S K Malik & Mrs R Malik. Our contact telephone number is 01582 965575. Details of the opticians and optometrists employed in our practices can be obtained by contacting us directly. Alternatively, details of all opticians and optometrists registered in the UK are available from the General Optical Council Tel: 0207 580 3898. · Company Registration number: 10600471     

2) Financial and funding information: what we spend and how we spend it

  For every sight test performed on behalf of the NHS the practice receives a set fee, which is fixed nationally. The fees paid by the NHS for each service are available from the practice on request. They include a contribution towards optometrists’ and staff salaries, equipment costs and other practice overheads. Information in this class will be published only where it is unlikely adversely to affect the commercial position of the firm or practice     

3)  Our Priorities 

To provide our patients with high quality eye care   

4)  Decision Making  

Any decisions made about the provision of NHS-funded services will be reflected in the services we provide and in the contract(s) held with the NHS England and Herts Valleys CCG.    

5) Our policies and procedures

  · Complaints · Data protection  · Health and safety    They are available on request from 78 High Street, Redbourn St Albans, Hertfordshire, AL3 7LN   

Complaints If you have a complaint about any of our products or services, please do discuss any problems with the manager at Redbourn Eyecare in the first instance. We find that most issues can be put right at this stage.    If the matter cannot be resolved in this way or you are unsatisfied with the response you receive please contact the company director via email to info@redbourneyecare.co.uk. A full copy of our complaints policy is available on request.   

6)  Lists and Registers 

We don’t keep lists and registers. Our patient records are confidential.   

7) The Services We Offer 

Redbourn Eyecare provides NHS-funded sight tests for those who are eligible. Patients may also be entitled to NHS vouchers that can be used against the purchase of spectacles or contact lenses as required. To find out if you are eligible for this assistance please follow this link http://www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/Healthcosts/Pages/nhs-voucher-values.aspx 

  Appointments for sight tests can be booked over the phone, www.redbourneyecare.co.uk or by dropping into the practice. 

To find the address or phone number, please visit www.redbourneyecare.co.uk. 

Opening times are Monday – Friday 9am to 5:30pm and Saturday 9am to 1pm

   Regular publications and information for the public 

Information about optical and ocular conditions, sight tests, spectacles, and contact lenses, can be found on www.redbourneyecare.co.uk and www.college-optometrists.org     

Some of this information is also available in patient leaflets. These are freely available from our practice. To request a set of leaflets by post, please write to:   78 High Street, Redbourn St Albans, Hertfordshire, AL3 7LN   

Useful Resources

Websites: 

· Information Commissioner  www.ico.gov.uk 

· Ministry of Justice  http://www.justice.gov.uk/whatwedo/freedomofinformation.htm        

Publications: 

· NHS Openness Code  www.doh.gov.uk/nhsexec/codemain.htm 

· Freedom of Information Act 2000  www.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/20000036.htm      

Copyright:   Material available through this publication scheme is copyright unless otherwise indicated. Unless expressly indicated to the contrary, it may be reproduced free of charge in any format or medium, provided it is done so accurately in a manner that will not mislead. Where items are re-published or copied to others, you must identify the source and acknowledge copyright status. This permit does not extend to third party material, accessed through the scheme.    

For HMSO Guidance notes on FOI publication schemes see www.hmso.gov.uk/guides.htm.