Privacy Policy

Last updated: 12 September 2026

This policy explains how Wigwam Nurseries Limited collects and uses personal information, both through this website and in the day to day running of our nurseries, and what your rights are.

Who we are

Wigwam Nurseries Limited is the data controller for the information described in this policy. That means we decide how and why your information is used, and we are responsible for looking after it.

  • Company name: Wigwam Nurseries Limited
  • Registered in England and Wales, company number: 04692859
  • Registered office: 59 Common Lane, Hemingford Abbots, Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, PE28 9AW
  • Registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office, reference: ZA363511
  • Data Protection Co-ordinator: David Wiggam, admin@wigwamnurseries.co.uk

Our nurseries are at Brampton, Ely, Huntingdon, Papworth, Barton Road in Cambridge and Mrs Cameron in Cambridge. Each nursery is part of the same company, and this policy applies to all of them.

Information we collect through this website

Browsing the website

You can read every public page on this site without telling us who you are. Our web server keeps standard technical logs, which include the IP address of the device making the request, the date and time, the page requested and the type of browser used. These logs are used to keep the site running and secure, and to investigate faults or attacks. They are not used to identify individual visitors and are held only for a short period.

Enquiries and prospectus requests

If you send us an enquiry or ask for a nursery prospectus, we collect your name, your email address, your telephone number if you give it, the nursery you are interested in and whatever you write in your message. We use this to answer you and to follow up if you would like to visit.

Registering a child

Our online registration form collects the information we need in order to care for your child safely and to meet our legal duties as an early years provider. This includes:

  • your child’s name, date of birth, address and photograph consent preferences
  • details of parents, carers and people with parental responsibility, including contact details
  • emergency contacts and people authorised to collect your child
  • your child’s health information, including allergies, dietary requirements, medical conditions, medication, immunisations, birth information and any neonatal care
  • information about special educational needs or disabilities, and any support already in place
  • your child’s GP and health visitor details
  • information relevant to funding and eligibility, including National Insurance numbers where a funding claim requires it
  • information relevant to safeguarding, including any court orders or agreements affecting who may collect your child
  • any documents you upload to support the above

Some of this is what data protection law calls special category data, meaning information about health, and in some cases about ethnicity or religion where you choose to tell us. We handle it with extra care and only use it for the purposes set out below.

Offers, onboarding and your registration record

When we offer a place, the website is used to send that offer, record your acceptance and work through the onboarding checklist. If you are given a link to review or update your child’s registration details, that link is unique to your record and should not be shared.

Job applications

If you apply for a role with us through this website, we collect your contact details, employment history, education and qualifications, referee details, your right to work in the United Kingdom, the declarations required for working with children, and any CV or supporting document you upload. We use this to assess your application and to meet our safer recruitment duties.

Staff access

Members of our team have accounts on this website that let them see the registrations and offers relevant to their own nursery. We keep a record of these accounts and of activity within the system so that access to children’s information is controlled and traceable.

Information we hold at the nurseries

Not everything we hold comes through the website. In running each setting we also keep:

  • accident, incident and existing injury records
  • learning journals, observations and development records for each child
  • attendance registers, medication records, sleep and nappy charts and outings consents
  • emergency contact details for children, parents and staff
  • staff records, including personnel files, contracts, training and qualifications, DBS information, supervision and appraisal records, holiday and working time records
  • payroll records
  • invoices and payment records
  • complaints records

Paper records are kept in locked cabinets in the nursery office. Electronic records are held on nursery computers, which are kept up to date and protected against malware, and are backed up to encrypted storage.

CCTV

All of our settings use CCTV. Cameras outside the building are there to protect the premises and the people in them. We also use cameras indoors to monitor children while they are sleeping, so that a child can be watched over continuously and safely without their sleep being disturbed.

Recordings are automatically overwritten after 10 days unless there is a specific reason to keep one, for example an accident or a safeguarding matter. Access is limited to management. Footage is not shared with anyone outside the nursery unless we are required to share it, for example with the police, social care or our insurers.

If you would like to know more about how CCTV is used at your child’s nursery, please speak to the nursery manager.

Photographs

Photographs of children are taken to record their learning and development, and sometimes for nursery publicity. We only use a photograph of your child where you have given permission, and you can change your mind at any time.

Photographs are stored on nursery computers. We do not post photographs of children on Facebook, Instagram or any other social media. Photographs used for publicity appear on this website only, and only with your permission.

Newsletters and keeping in touch

Each nursery sends a weekly newsletter by email to the parents of children currently attending. These are sent using our own email system and not through any marketing platform. If you would rather not receive them, tell your nursery manager and we will take you off the list.

Why we use your information, and our lawful basis

Data protection law requires us to have a valid reason, called a lawful basis, for using personal information. Ours are as follows.

  • Contract. We use your information to provide the childcare you have arranged with us, to manage your place, to invoice you and to communicate with you about your child.
  • Legal obligation. We are required to hold and in some cases share information in order to meet our duties under the Early Years Foundation Stage framework, our safeguarding duties, our duties to Ofsted and the local authority, and our obligations as an employer.
  • Legitimate interests. We use information to run our nurseries safely and efficiently, to answer enquiries, to protect our premises through CCTV, to keep our website and systems secure, and to keep proper business records. We only rely on this where your rights and interests do not override ours.
  • Consent. Some things are entirely your choice, such as whether photographs of your child may be used. Where we rely on consent you can withdraw it at any time, and doing so will not affect your child’s place.

For health, safeguarding and other special category information we rely on the additional conditions in the law that allow processing where it is necessary for the provision of care, for protecting someone’s vital interests, for safeguarding children, or for our obligations in employment.

Who we share information with

We do not sell personal information and we do not share it for marketing. We share it only where we need to, and only with:

  • The local authority, for funding claims, the early years census and where a child needs additional support
  • Ofsted, as our regulator
  • Safeguarding partners, social care and the police, where we have a duty to share information to protect a child
  • Health professionals, such as a health visitor or speech and language therapist, where this supports your child and normally with your knowledge
  • Schools and other settings, when your child moves on. A copy of your child’s learning and development summary and any relevant records is passed to the new setting, hand delivered where possible or otherwise sent by recorded delivery to a named member of staff
  • Our accountants and payroll providers, for invoicing, payments and staff pay
  • Our service providers, who act on our instructions only. These include our website hosting provider, our email provider and the software we use to run registrations, offers and staff access.

Where a supplier processes information for us, we have a written agreement in place requiring them to keep it secure and to use it only for the purpose we have specified. Where information is shared by email it is sent securely or the document is password protected.

Where your information is held

Our website and its data are hosted on servers in the United Kingdom. Nursery records are held at the settings, in locked cabinets and on nursery computers, and are backed up to encrypted storage. Some of the services we use to deliver email and to run our office systems are operated by providers based in the European Economic Area or the United States. Where information is transferred outside the United Kingdom, we rely on the safeguards permitted by data protection law, such as the UK International Data Transfer Addendum or an adequacy decision.

How long we keep it

We keep personal information only for as long as we need it, in line with our retention schedule. Our full schedule covers every type of record we hold and is available on request. The periods most likely to concern you are:

  • Enquiries and prospectus requests: up to 12 months if they do not lead to a registration
  • Children’s records, including attendance, medication and accident records: while your child attends and for at least three years after they leave
  • Child welfare and safeguarding records: passed to your child’s new setting or school when they leave. Where the new setting is not known, kept for six years from the last entry and then archived until your child reaches 25
  • Nursery education funding records: seven years
  • Complaints: at least three years from the last record
  • CCTV recordings: overwritten after 10 days unless a recording needs to be kept
  • Applications from unsuccessful candidates: at least one year
  • Staff personnel and training records: six years after employment ends
  • Payroll and accounting records: six years
  • Website server logs: a short rolling period, normally no more than three months

When information is no longer needed it is securely deleted or destroyed.

Keeping your information secure

Our website is served over an encrypted connection, so information you submit through it is protected in transit. Access to registration and offer information is limited to the staff who need it, and staff at each nursery can only see the records relevant to their own setting. Access is controlled by individual accounts rather than shared logins. Paper records are locked away, nursery computers are kept up to date and protected against malware, and data is backed up to encrypted storage.

No system can be guaranteed completely secure. If a breach were to occur that puts anyone at risk, we will act on it, record it, and tell the Information Commissioner’s Office and the people affected where the law requires us to.

Cookies

This website uses a small number of cookies and similar technologies. We do not use advertising cookies and we do not track visitors across other websites. Our Cookie Policy explains what is set, why, and how you can control it.

Your rights

You have the right to:

  • ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you or your child
  • ask us to correct anything that is wrong or incomplete
  • ask us to delete information, where we are not required to keep it
  • ask us to restrict how we use it while a question is resolved
  • object to our use of it where we rely on legitimate interests
  • ask us to transfer certain information to another provider
  • withdraw consent at any time, where consent is what we rely on

To exercise any of these, write to David Wiggam, our Data Protection Co-ordinator, at admin@wigwamnurseries.co.uk. The law allows us one month to reply. For a request to see your child’s records we aim to respond sooner, within 15 working days of receiving your written request. There is normally no charge.

We will only refuse a request for a child’s records if it is clear that the person asking does not understand what they are asking for, or if releasing the information would be likely to cause serious physical or mental harm to anyone.

Children have the same rights over their own information as adults. Where a child is too young to exercise those rights themselves, a person with parental responsibility can do so on their behalf.

Making a complaint

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your information, please tell us first so that we have the chance to put it right. You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office, which is the United Kingdom’s data protection regulator.

Changes to this policy

We review this policy at least once a year and whenever we change how the website works or how we handle information at the nurseries. The date at the top shows when it was last updated. Where a change materially affects how we use your information, we will tell you directly.

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