Privacy

YHA (England and Wales) Privacy Statement

YHA (England and Wales) Ltd respects your right to privacy. This statement describes the privacy practices for YHA's website.

What information do we collect?

Automatic Information:
The YHA website collates such information as the IP address (location of your computer on the internet), what pages were accessed and file downloads from the site. Monitoring of such information helps YHA determine the activity on the website and which pages are most accessed etc. All of this information is used to develop and improve our services online.

The Data we collect:
Certain parts of our site require you to submit personal information within a form, to allow us to fulfil a request.

These include:

  • applications for Membership;

  • requests for Accommodation;

  • online Donations; and

  • online Surveys.

This information may include name, address, email address, country of residence, gender, age. In addition when ordering services we will need to know your Credit Card details and expiry date. All of which are processed through a 'Secure Server'. You are under no obligation to provide such information. However if you should choose to withhold requested information, we may not be able to provide you with certain services.

How do we use it?

YHA will use the information you provide to us to:

  • process orders or applications submitted to us;

  • verify financial transactions;

  • investigate and resolve any problems with any services supplied to you;

  • improve the content of our web pages; and

  • carry out research on our visitors demographics, interests and behaviour.

In addition, YHA may occasionally wish to use this information to send you newsletters or details of special offers which we believe may be of interest to you. This will only come from us (or our agents) and only if you have indicated that you do not object to these offers.
At points where personal information is collated, an 'Opt In' question set will appear, giving you the opportunity to tick the box if you do want to allow YHA to use your information for charitable events and fundraising.

Sharing Information

If you ‘Opt-in’ we may share this information with others with whom YHA works and whom we believe may have offers or information to send to you that are of interest to you. We do not sell this information to third parties. You will be considered as having ‘opted-out’ of sharing your information if you do not tick the ‘Opt-in’ box.
YHA may also disclose aggregate statistics about our site visitors, customers and sales in order to describe our services to other reputable third parties and for other lawful purposes, but these statistics will include no personally identifying information.
YHA may disclose personal information if required to do so by law or if it believes that such action is necessary to protect or defend the rights, property or personal safety of YHA, the site or its visitors.

Security

Sensitive data, such as credit card details submitted on the YHA website is encrypted using the latest SSL (Secure Socket Layer) technology. The encryption certificate is issued by Thawte. Our certificate of authenticity can be accessed by clicking on the Thawte logo, located at the bottom of each web page. Alternatively, it can be accessed by double clicking on the padlock at the bottom right hand side of the browser screen when you visit a secure page on the YHA website. While we cannot ensure or guarantee that loss, misuse or alteration of data will not occur, we use our best efforts to prevent this.

Links to third party sites

Our site contains links to other websites. YHA is not responsible for the accuracy, content or the privacy practices of third party websites.

Other important information

If you wish to contact the Youth Hostels Association to see a copy of all the personal information held by YHA about you or to amend your personal information please contact YHA's Membership Department:
Address: YHA Customer Services
PO Box 6029
Trevelyan House
Dimple Road
Matlock
Derbyshire
DE4 3XN
Telephone: 0870 770 8868
Email: membership@yha.org.uk

YHA Membership

As part of your membership service, YHA will issue your YHA membership pack and various offers, information and news of our fundraising activities that we believe may be of interest to you, via the post as well as biannual issues of Discover: YHA's membership magazine received by certain membership categories. This is the standard level of contact made by YHA when you become a YHA member and will remain, unless requested otherwise.