Privacy Policy

We value all our visitors, supporters and customers, and strive to meet the highest standards in managing your personal data. This privacy notice explains how and why we collect and manage personal data, what your data protection rights are and how you can exercise them. We have a separate privacy notice for job applicants.
One of our responsibilities is to ensure that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed at [email protected] if your personal data changes during your relationship with us.

Who we are

The Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) is the world's leading museum of art, design and performance.
It is a public body linked to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and it is a charity exempt from registration under the Charities Act of 2011. It is governed by a Board of Trustees appointed by the Prime Minister.
The V&A is supported by:
a trading company, V&A Enterprises, which is the business face of the museum;
and a charity that looks after our financial endowments, the V&A Foundation, which is registered with the Charity Number 1144508.
Young V&A (formerly the Museum of Childhood) and V&A East are covered by this privacy notice. V&A Dundee has a separate privacy policy.
In this privacy notice and in the privacy statements that you will see when we collect your personal data, 'the V&A' and 'we' (or 'us' or 'our') refer to the Board of Trustees of the Victoria and Albert Museum, together with V&A Enterprises Limited and the V&A Foundation. We share personal data responsibly between these three components of the V&A.

Personal data we collect

We collect and process a range of personal data, that is, information about an identifiable individual. We only collect data that is necessary to provide you with services requested, to keep you informed and to carry out our business. There are occasions where you can limit the information you provide to us, but please bear in mind this may limit the service or level of personalisation we can offer.

Information we collect directly from you

We collect certain information directly from you. This may be via our website (for example data that you provide by filling in forms on our websites, including data provided at the time of requesting our newsletters, buying from our shop or tickets to an exhibition or event), when you enter a competition, when you make a request or query, whether by email, via our websites or on the telephone, when you register to use our free Wi-Fi service, or when you RSVP to an invitation-only event. You may provide some of this data to us when visiting one of our galleries, exhibitions, study rooms, learning facilities, our shop, or to one of our staff, or you may choose to complete comments cards, membership forms or surveys.
Examples of the types of personal data we may collect from you are as follows:
contact details (for example, name, telephone number, email)
demographic information (for example, date of birth or nationality)
information relating to other members of your party and/or participants at any event
your credit card details or other details that may be required to process a BACS transfer for a donation or a direct debit payment for a membership
your preferences, interests and previous activities with the V&A, such as events you have attended and donations you have made, as well as purchases from the shop and tickets purchased for our exhibitions and events
details of your declaration if Gift Aid is applicable to any donation that you make
your views, opinions, questions and comments
details of any current memberships, gift memberships you have purchased on behalf of someone, and previous memberships you may have or had with the V&A
records of your correspondence with us
your image when you visit as we operate CCTV for your security and that of our staff and other visitors; visitors may be photographed at security desks when entering non-public areas
vehicle registration, if your vehicle will be entering any V&A sites
details of your visits to any of our websites and the resources you access
data entered on our websites including non-submitted (or abandoned) data
If you purchase a Membership for yourself or as a gift, there are more specific details about the data we collect and the way in which we use it in our Membership terms.

Information we collect from third parties about you

Some of the information we hold about you may be provided to us via third-party sources (i.e. from someone who is not part of the V&A). For example:
you may post reviews or other content relating to the V&A or similar organisations via third-party social media platforms and channels, such as Twitter, Facebook, Tripadvisor or Instagram
there may be publicly available information about you from trusted sources that we may use to help us to tailor our communications, and the experiences and events we offer to you (please see below)
we are sometimes required to undertake checks on the sources of funds for large donations and other contributions from supporters, and this may include information obtained from third parties such as, for example, Companies House
we sometimes run events or competitions with other companies and organisations, and they may pass some personal information about participants or entrants to us
if you are a guest of someone who has been to an invitation-only event, they may be asked to provide us with your name for the guest list
We recommend that you check the privacy policy/notice and statements of any third parties that you provide information to, as we are not responsible for the way in which they use, share or make available your personal data.
Sometimes we may use third parties to assist us in how we try to increase support and identify new supporters – please see below.
Sometimes we may collate personal data that you have provided to us via multiple direct interactions with us with information from third parties or the analytics data referred to below so that we can use this to try to improve the services and information we provide to you.

Information collected by us automatically about you

As you interact with our websites, we may automatically collect analytics data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns, to provide you with the best experience and help you to make use of certain functionality such as online shopping. We collect this data by using cookies, server logs and other similar technologies. We may also receive data about you if you visit other websites employing our cookies. Please see our cookie policy for further details about what cookies are and how we use them.
You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when websites set or access cookies. If you disable or refuse cookies, please note that some parts of our websites may become inaccessible or not function properly.
We use Google Analytics and retargeting via Google Ads, and have implemented Google’s latest update, Consent Mode v2, which ensures user consent settings are respected in accordance with data protection legislation. We have implemented Consent Mode v2 to support our marketing efforts and collection of visitor metrics while still protecting your privacy. If you choose not to accept targeting cookies, only anonymised data about interactions with our website and adverts will be sent to the Google server. Data modelling on anonymised and identifiable interactions using Google AI enables the V&A to more accurately measure website visitor metrics to make data-driven decisions, and to develop more cost-effective and efficient marketing strategy to provide you with the most relevant advertising if you have chosen to receive it.

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