Privacy

Privacy

The Association of Teachers of Singing intends its protection of your data to be as least as good as specified by the General Data Protection Regulation (2018).

1.        Cookies

This site uses cookies — small text files that are placed on your computer to help the site provide a better user experience by doing such things as saving your preferences. They also let us improve the site by seeing how it is used: cookies cannot identify you, but they provide anonymous tracking data to third-party applications like Google Analytics.

As a rule, cookies will make your browsing experience better. But if you prefer not to have them, the best way is disable cookies in your browser. See the Help section of your browser or take a look at the About Cookies website for more guidance.

2.        Booking for events

Places on our events may be booked by members or non-members.

Information you give may be shared between the Administrator and the members of the AOTOS Council who are organising the event.

We will email you to confirm your booking; to give you extra information before an event if necessary, and to send you material related to the event afterwards, such as copies of presentations.

3.        Booking for training courses

Students on our training courses may be members or non-members, and extra information is requested so that the training can be tailored to students’ needs.

When you apply for a training course, you agree:

  • to allow the training team to keep on record your contact details and the information that you give about your development as a singing teacher for the purposes of the course
  • to give permission for the information to be shared with the faculty on the course, to enable them to give you the best advice possible for your future training.

The training team undertake not to share this information with anyone else without permission. Information is not shared by email but on secure servers, which may be outside the European Union.

At the end of a course, a member of the team will discuss with you whether you wish your details and the information you have given to be kept for use in future training, or if you would like them deleted.

4.        Joining AOTOS

When you join AOTOS, you give us this information:

  • your name
  • address details
  • phone numbers
  • email addresses
  • website URL if you have one
  • information about your teaching skills.

You choose which of this information you want to make public in our online directory of singing teachers at aotos.org.uk/directory.

Your information is stored on secure servers, which may be outside the European Union. We make regular back-ups, and if there is any data breach we will try to contact you within 72 hours.

4.1.   Making changes

You can change the information we have and your preferences about how we use it at any time by:

4.2.   Deleting your data

If you stop being a member of AOTOS, we will email you to let you know that we have put your membership into limbo. This means that we keep your data but do not use it, so that we have a record of past members, and so that if you rejoin you do not need to enter it again.

If you would prefer your data to be deleted, you can contact the administrator (administrator@aotos.org.uk) to request this.

If you give us your information but do not go on to pay, your membership is kept as pending. We will email you once to ask if you wish to complete your application. If you do not reply within one calendar month, we will delete your information.

5.        How we use members’ data

If someone contacts us to ask for details about you that are not in the online directory, we will forward that enquiry to you. We will never reveal information that members have chosen not to make public.

5.1.   Address

When you join, we use your address to send you a printed Welcome letter and a copy of the AOTOS Members’ Handbook.

Members receive our annual Review magazine, and we may also send you fliers or leaflets about AOTOS events.

5.2.   Phone number

We may try to contact you by phone if your email address stops working, or if you have contacted us with an enquiry.

5.3.   Email

Most of the information relating to your AOTOS membership will be sent by email:

  • a receipt and details of your area and pod when you join
  • a newsletter around once a month (replacing our twice-yearly Singing magazine)
  • details of events that you joined AOTOS to take part in – our two annual conferences and four or five area days – and reminders of booking deadlines
  • the agenda for our AGM and the documents related to that meeting
  • a reminder when your subscription is due and a receipt when you have paid.

Opting out of these emails would mean that we could not fulfil our legal obligations and that you would get no benefit from membership, so this is not an option.

5.3.1.   Non-AOTOS emails

You can choose whether to get emails about information that our members and corporate members want to share with you, and emails from non-members about things such as job vacancies and special offers on concerts or courses. This will only be information that we consider is relevant to you as a singing teacher.

You can opt out of these at any time by:

6.        How we share members’ data

6.1.   Online directory

Our online Directory (at aotos.org.uk/directory) is one of the benefits of membership – it is intended to advertise our members’ services to anyone who is looking for a singing teacher.

When you join, you choose the fields you want made public, and you can change this or edit the information at any time by logging into Your Profile (secure.aotos.org.uk/yourprofile) or by contacting the administrator (administrator@aotos.org.uk).

You may choose to have shown:

  • your full address, or just your town
  • any of your phone numbers
  • an email address, which can be different from the one you use for correspondence with us
  • a link to your website, if you have one.
  • your location on a map.

Or you can choose not to appear in the Directory at all.

You can see what information is shown for you by going to aotos.org.uk/directory and searching for your own name. Please note that if you choose not to have an email address or phone number shown, people will not be able to contact you.

6.2.   Members’ Handbook

Our printed Members’ Handbook gives members all the contact details for other members: addresses, emails, phone numbers and websites.

A handbook is sent to every new member so that they can see what information is included, except student members and those outside the UK and Ireland, who are sent a link to the PDF in the Member resources section of the website.

Any member can ask not to be included in the next handbook by contacting the administrator (administrator@aotos.org.uk), and this preference is stored in the database.

Please take care of your handbook. You must not share it, or any of the information in it, with non-members: please direct them instead to our online directory, where they can see the information that members have chosen to make public.

6.3.   Members in your area

When you join AOTOS, we allocate you an area – in the UK, North, Central, South West or South East; or Overseas, and send you an email that is copied to your Area Representative at their AOTOS email address. They will get in touch to welcome you to AOTOS.

Future communications from your Area Representative will be through the AOTOS database. If for any reason you do not want them to contact you, please tell the administrator (administrator@aotos.org.uk).

6.4.   Members near you

Pods are a vital way for members to connect with the members nearest them, so when you join AOTOS we allocate you to a pod. The same email that tells you your area also includes details of your nearest pod, and is copied to the pod co-ordinator.

If you think that another pod would work better for you, or if for any reason you do not want to get involved with your pod or to get emails from the pod co-ordinator, please tell the administrator (administrator@aotos.org.uk).

We are investigating a better way for pod members to email each other easily without anyone outside the pod being able to use or share members’ email addresses. While that is being developed, we ask all pod members to follow our guidelines – see 7.2 below.

6.5.   Online community

When you join AOTOS, we send you an invitation to join our members-only group on Facebook. This is a secret group that is not visible to any Facebook user except its members. Nobody outside the group can see who is a member or see any of the discussions.

Any member can contact the administrator to request an invitation to join the group. If you use an email to log in to Facebook that is not the same as your AOTOS email, you will need to let the administrator know what it is.

If you want to join Facebook in a way that means nobody except members of the secret group can see you, our webmaster has written advice on how to do this.

7.        Members and non-members using members’ data

7.1.   Emailing AOTOS members

When contacting a member who is not a personal friend, please use the online Directory so that you know what information they have chosen to make public.

When you are emailing a group of members, please think about whether they already know each other’s email addresses. If they do not, you should not share them unless you are sure they will not mind. To avoid sharing them, use bcc not cc to those email addresses. If that means there is nobody you can put in the to field, send it to yourself – the address you are emailing from will work, if you do not have another email address you can use.

7.2.   AOTOS pods

Please be considerate when emailing members of your pod.

Do not email pod members about anything other than pod meetings.

  • If there is a local event such as a course or workshop that you think pod members might want to hear about, please email details to the administrator to share them with yours and nearby pods, contacting only those members who have said that they would like to hear about non-AOTOS events.

Do not share members’ email addresses with anyone else.

  • If your email about a pod meeting includes non-members, use bcc for all the email addresses.
  • If you have been invited to a pod event and are not a member of AOTOS, please do not email the pod members; send any emails just to the pod co-ordinator.

7.3.   Sending bulk emails to AOTOS members

In any calendar year, AOTOS members can send up to two emails to members who have opted to get emails from members; corporate members can send up to four emails.

We will only send emails that we consider are relevant to singing teachers. Event dates must not clash with any AOTOS event, and we will only email members in areas near enough to get to events.

If you would like to send an email, please check that your subscription is up to date and then use the online form or contact the administrator.

With the same conditions, non-members, and members who have used up their yearly allowance, can pay £40 to email our members, using the online form and paying by PayPal.