Who we are
Virsa Matchmaking is a private, human-led matchmaking service for Sikh adults in the United Kingdom who are serious about marriage. We are the "data controller" for the information described in this notice, which means we decide what information is collected and how it is used.
Contact details
If you have any question about this notice, or you wish to exercise any of your rights, please contact us.
| hello@virsamatchmaking.co.uk |
What information we collect, use, and why
To provide our matchmaking service
This is the heart of what we do. To understand you well enough to introduce you thoughtfully, we collect or use:
- Your name and contact details
- Your date of birth
- The town or region where you live
- Your height
- Your family background
- Your faith and religious observance
- Your marital status, and whether you have children
- What you are hoping for in a partner, including your non-negotiables
- Your readiness for marriage, and what has brought you to us
- Health or accessibility information, where you choose to share it
- Free-text answers describing your circumstances and what you are seeking
- Photographs
- Identity documents
- Notes of our conversations with you, and of the decisions we make
- Your account and membership records
- Records of your consent
- Payment records, once you become a paying member
To run your membership account
- Your name and contact details
- The town or region where you live
- Your account and registration details
- Information used to keep your account secure and to verify you
- Your marketing preferences
- Payment and membership history
To verify identity and prevent fraud or misrepresentation
- Your name and contact details
- Your account and membership records
- Payment and transaction records
To send you service updates and news, where you have asked us to
- Your name and contact details
- The town or region where you live
- Your marketing preferences
- Records of your consent
- Website usage information, including IP address and how you moved through our site
To comply with the law and to safeguard our members
- Your name and contact details
- Identity documents
- Financial and transaction records
- Safeguarding information, including health information where there is a concern for someone's safety
- Any other information we are required by law to hold
To deal with questions, complaints or claims
- Your name and contact details
- Your account and membership records
- Our correspondence with you
- Payment and transaction records
- Information from any earlier matter, where it is relevant
- Faith and health information, where the complaint concerns it
Sensitive information and your explicit consent
Some of the information we hold is what the law calls special category data. It is given extra protection because of how personal it is. In our case, this includes:
- Your faith and religious observance. This is central to what we do. We could not introduce you thoughtfully within the Sikh community without it.
- Your ethnic origin, which may be revealed by what you tell us about your family background.
- Health or accessibility information, where you choose to share it.
- Information that may indicate your sexual orientation, since you tell us your own gender and the gender of the person you hope to meet.
To collect and use this information, the law requires us to rely on your explicit consent. This is a separate permission from any other agreement between us, and we ask for it clearly when you complete our questionnaire.
You may withdraw your consent at any time by emailing us. If you do, we will stop using that information and will delete it, unless we are required by law to keep it. Withdrawing consent does not affect anything we did lawfully beforehand.
Sharing health or accessibility information with us is entirely optional, and choosing not to will not affect your application. Faith and observance are necessary to the service itself, so we cannot match you without them — but you remain free to withdraw and ask us to close your account.
Lawful bases and your data protection rights
Under UK data protection law, we must have a "lawful basis" for collecting and using your personal information. You can read more about lawful bases on the ICO's website.
Your rights
- Your right of access — you may ask us for copies of your personal information, and for details of where we obtained it and who we have shared it with. Some exemptions apply, so you may not receive everything you ask for.
- Your right to rectification — you may ask us to correct or complete information you believe is inaccurate.
- Your right to erasure — you may ask us to delete your personal information.
- Your right to restriction of processing — you may ask us to limit how we use your information.
- Your right to object to processing — you may object to our use of your information.
- Your right to data portability — you may ask us to transfer the information you gave us to you or to another organisation.
- Your right to withdraw consent — where we rely on consent, you may withdraw it at any time.
You can read more about these rights, and the exemptions that may apply, on the ICO's website. If you make a request, we must respond without undue delay and within one month. To make a request, please use the contact details above.
Our lawful bases
| What we are doing | Our lawful basis |
|---|---|
| Providing our matchmaking service and introducing you to prospective matches | Contract — we need your information to enter into and carry out our agreement with you. Consent — for sharing your details with a particular prospective match, and for the sensitive information described above. |
| Running your membership account | Contract and legal obligation. |
| Verifying identity and preventing fraud or misrepresentation | Legitimate interests and legal obligation. |
| Service updates and news | Consent. You may withdraw it at any time. |
| Complying with the law and safeguarding members | Legal obligation, and vital interests where there is an urgent risk to someone's safety. |
| Dealing with questions, complaints or claims | Contract, legal obligation and legitimate interests. |
Our legitimate interests, explained
Verification and preventing misrepresentation. We verify that applicants and members are who they say they are, and that the information they give us is accurate, so that we can protect the safety and wellbeing of the people we introduce to one another. As an offline, human-led service, we introduce members to prospective partners in person. Detecting misrepresentation, impersonation or fraudulent applications is necessary to prevent harm to our members and to maintain the integrity of our service. Our members join precisely because they expect us to check the people we introduce them to.
Handling complaints fairly. We investigate and resolve questions, complaints and claims fairly and thoroughly, including those made by one member about another. Because we introduce members to one another in person, resolving a complaint may require us to consider information given to us by a member other than the person who raised it. This is necessary to establish what happened, to respond fairly to both parties, to protect the safety of our members, and to defend our own legal position where a claim is made against us. We use only the information genuinely needed to deal with the matter, and we do not disclose one member's answers to another.
If you would like more information about our use of legitimate interests, please contact us.
Where we get personal information from
- Directly from you, through our website forms, our questionnaire, and our conversations with you.
- From a member of your family, where you have asked us to speak with them, or where they have approached us on your behalf. Where someone contacts us about you before you have contacted us yourself, we will ask them to have you get in touch with us directly.
How long we keep information
We keep your information only for as long as we need it, and then delete it securely.
| Information | How long we keep it |
|---|---|
| Enquiries from people who do not go on to apply | 6 months |
| Applications we do not take forward | 6 months from the date we let you know |
| Members' information, while membership is active | For the duration of your membership |
| Members' information after membership ends | 12 months, in case you wish to return |
| Identity documents and verification photographs | Deleted as soon as verification is complete. We keep only a record that verification took place, and the date |
| Financial and payment records | 6 years, as required for tax purposes |
| Records of complaints and safeguarding concerns | 6 years, so that we can respond to any later claim |
| Marketing consents and preferences | Until you withdraw your consent, and for 12 months afterwards as a record that you did so |
If you ask us to delete your information sooner, we will do so wherever we are able.
Who we share information with
Organisations that handle information on our behalf
These are our "data processors". They act only on our instructions and may not use your information for their own purposes.
| Organisation | What they do for us |
|---|---|
| Netlify, Inc. | Website hosting and form submissions |
| Google LLC | Email, calendar, video calls and website analytics |
| Cloudflare, Inc. | Domain and DNS management |
Others we may share information with
- Other members, as described in the next section
- Organisations we need to share information with for safeguarding reasons
- Emergency services, where there is a risk to someone's safety
- Our professional or legal advisers
- Relevant regulatory authorities, such as the ICO or HMRC
- Organisations we are legally obliged to share information with
We do not sell your information, and we do not share it with advertisers.
Sharing information with other members
This is the part of our work that involves sharing your information, so we want to be precise about it.
Where we believe two members may be well suited, we share relevant details from each person's application with the other, so that each of you can decide whether you wish to be introduced. No introduction takes place unless both people have agreed to it.
What we share
Only what is relevant to that introduction. Typically this means your first name, your age, your town or region, your family background, your faith and observance, and what you are hoping for in a partner.
What we do not share
- Your contact details. These are never passed on without asking you first.
- Health or accessibility information, unless you have specifically agreed. If you have shared something with us that a prospective match may reasonably need to know before meeting, we will discuss with you how you would like it handled, and we will follow your wishes.
- Anything you have asked us to keep private. If there is something you would rather we did not pass on, tell us and we will not.
- Your full application. We never hand over your questionnaire.
Your details are never made public. There is no public profile, no searchable directory, and no way for anyone to browse our members.
Identity documents and verification
We ask members to verify their identity, because the people we introduce you to should be who they say they are.
To do this, we may ask to see a document such as a passport or driving licence, together with a photograph. We don't keep a record of the document. We keep only a note that verification took place and the date it happened. We do not hold copies of your identity documents on file, and we do not share them with other members.
Sharing information outside the UK
Some of the organisations that provide services to us are based in the United States, which means your information may be transferred outside the UK. Where this happens, we make sure appropriate safeguards are in place as UK data protection law requires.
| Organisation | Country | Safeguard |
|---|---|---|
| Netlify, Inc. Website hosting | USA | Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses, and the UK Extension to the EU–US Data Privacy Framework |
| Google LLC Email and technology | USA | Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses, and the UK Extension to the EU–US Data Privacy Framework |
| Cloudflare, Inc. Domain and DNS | USA | Addendum to the EU Standard Contractual Clauses, and the UK Extension to the EU–US Data Privacy Framework |
These organisations also use their own suppliers, who may be based outside the UK. Their agreements with us require any onward transfer to be made under equivalent safeguards.
How we keep information safe
- Access is limited to the two of us. Nobody else sees your application.
- Our accounts are protected with strong passwords and two-step verification.
- Information is held in secure, access-controlled services rather than on personal devices.
- Identity documents are deleted as soon as verification is complete.
- We collect only what we genuinely need, and delete it when we no longer need it.
Cookies
Cookies are small files stored on your device when you visit a website. We keep our use of them to a minimum. Nothing we set identifies you to us by name, and we do not use cookies for advertising.
Analytics cookies are not set unless you agree to them. When you first visit our site, you are asked to choose, and nothing is loaded until you do.
| Cookie | Purpose | How long it lasts |
|---|---|---|
| virsa_consent | Remembers the cookie choice you made, so that we do not ask you again on every page. Strictly necessary, and always set. | 6 months |
| _ga | Google Analytics. Distinguishes one visitor from another so that we can see how many people use the site. Set only if you accept analytics. | 2 years |
| _ga_7ZJDDBP13B | Google Analytics. Keeps track of a single visit to the site. Set only if you accept analytics. | 2 years |
Changing your mind
You can change your cookie choices at any time using the link below. You can also delete cookies through your browser settings, though this will mean we ask you to choose again.
Changes to this notice
We may update this notice from time to time. The date at the top shows when it was last changed. Where a change materially affects how we use your information, we will contact you directly rather than rely on you noticing.
How to complain
If you have any concern about how we have used your personal information, please tell us first. We would far rather hear from you and put it right.
| hello@virsamatchmaking.co.uk |
We will acknowledge your complaint within 30 days and tell you what we are doing about it.
If you remain unhappy after raising it with us, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office.
| Address | Information Commissioner's Office Wycliffe House, Water Lane Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9 5AF |
| Helpline | 0303 123 1113 |
| Website | ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint |