Client Privacy Policy

 

Client Privacy Policy

 

 

This translation is available for your convenience. You agree that the original text in German shall take precedence in the case of a dispute.

 

Frehner Law Office appreciates your interest in our services. This declaration regulates which personal data we collect, for which purposes we process it and which data subject rights you have regarding your personal data. It is information about the nature, scope and purpose of the use of personal data by Frehner Law Firm.

 

1. Preliminary Remarks on the Attorney’s Activity

“Lawyer’s activity” refers to the activity performed by an attorney at law in his capacity as an attorney, i.e. forensic as well as advisory activity, including the practice of executor mandates. Lawyer’s activity takes place within the framework of legal advice (advisory mandate) or within the framework of a legal conflict (litigation mandate), with representation of clients before courts and authorities (legal enforcement), negotiation and conclusion of specific legal transactions, drafting legal documents, giving legal advice, as well as mediation by a mediator SBA. Only the lawyer’s activity is subject to professional secrecy according to Swiss law. The basis is the client-attorney relationship.

If an attorney-client relationship exists, this Privacy Policy applies to clients, among other things.

“Non-attorney or non-professional specific activity”, also “economic or business activity” includes the exercise of board of directors mandates, consulting assignments without attorney or legal content, activity as a real estate agent, as a lecturer, as an author, sale of e-books, sale of courses, seminars, trainings, etc. These non-professional activities are not protected by the attorney/professional privilege. Thus, only the privacy policy for the website and online store applies.

2. Definitions or Terms

The following terms have the following meanings in this client privacy policy:

“Personal Data” is any information relating to an identified or identifiable individual who can be directly or indirectly identifiable from such data. This definition includes the definitions of the Swiss Data Protection Act (“DPA”) as amended from time to time and/or the EU General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”).

“we/us/our/company” refers to Frehner Law Office, Im Zentrum 9, 8604 Volketswil, Switzerland, which operates the Website and the Online Shop.

3. Collecting Data

Personal data from the client is collected by Frehner Law Firm. This personal data is processed by Frehner Law Firm as the controller in accordance with the current provisions of the Swiss Data Protection Act (DPA) and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) (collectively “Regulation”). This Privacy Policy indicates how personal data collected from the client will be processed.

4. Processing your Data

We process personal data that we receive from you directly or involved third parties in the context of the client relationship or that we collect ourselves. Responsible for the processing of personal data described in this privacy policy is Ms. Tamara Frehner, Frehner Law Firm, Im Zentrum 9, 8604 Volketswil.

You or the person concerned provide us with some of the personal data yourself, e.g. when contacting us by telephone or e-mail. We also process personal data that we receive in our correspondence with third parties (namely clients, counterparties, authorities and courts and their employees or other contact persons) in the context of the mandate relationship.

We collect some personal data ourselves, e.g. from public registers or websites, as far as this is permitted and necessary.

The processing of the aforementioned personal data takes place primarily in order to provide, document and invoice our legal services.

The following personal data is processed by Frehner Law Firm in connection with its counseling services, although the examples of personal data listed in each category are not exhaustive:

• Contact details: First and last name, address, telephone number, fax number if applicable, e-mail address, position or office, associated company;
• Counseling data: Contents of inquiries, advisory communications, documents, memos; and
• engagement data: Consulting documentation, performance records, invoices.

5. Use of your Data or Purposes of Data Processing

Personal data of the client will be processed by Frehner Law Office for the purpose of establishing and executing a contract, in particular an attorney-client relationship, for initiating or concluding a contract with you for a service, as well as for the fulfillment of legal requirements.

Furthermore, personal data will be processed for marketing purposes in order to make the client or their employees or other contacts aware of current legal developments, news, services, products, publications or events and activities of Frehner Law Office (using any means of communication such as email, social media, mail or telephone).

To achieve the purposes described in this Privacy Policy, it may be necessary to disclose Personal Data to the following categories of recipients: external service providers, clients, counterparties and their legal representatives, business partners with whom the provision of legal services may need to be coordinated, and public authorities and courts.

We may also transfer the Personal Data to recipients (namely clients, correspondent attorneys, counterparties, or public authorities) who in turn process the Personal Data in other countries, including those that do not ensure a level of data protection comparable to Swiss law. This is done based on consent or standard contractual clauses or when necessary for the performance of a contract or the enforcement of legal claims.

We generally store personal data for as long as is necessary to process the client relationship, for as long as there is a legal obligation to retain and document the data, or for as long as we have an overriding private or public interest in doing so. To protect personal data from loss, unauthorized modification, or unauthorized access by third parties, we take reasonable and appropriate precautions. If you provide us with personal data via a third party (e.g., via your employees or other contact persons), it is up to you to inform them in a general manner about the processing by legal service providers (such as us) or other external service providers (e.g. in a privacy policy for employees).

We use external IT service providers as part of our mandate management. We use certain IT services as well as means of communication which may be associated with data security risks (e.g., e-mail, video conferencing). It is up to you to inform us of your desire for special security measures.

We have a legitimate interest in processing personal data for the above purposes. Some processing is also necessary to fulfill our contractual obligations to you or our legal obligations (e.g., storage obligations).

The legal basis for the processing is Art. 6 para. 1 lit. b, c and f GDPR and the corresponding provisions of the Swiss Data Protection Act (DPA).

6. The Rights of a Client

The legal professional secrecy (so-called attorney-client privilege) may limit the rights indicated below. If there is no conflict with the attorney-client privilege, the client has the following rights:

• to request at any time information about any personal data that we process from the client and the purpose of the date processing;
• to request a rectification and completion of inaccurate personal data, insofar as they are inaccurate or incomplete;
• to request a deletion of his or her personal data, unless Frehner Law Office or its owner is legally obligated or entitled to continue processing the personal data;
• Request a restriction of the processing of personal data, provided that legal requirements are met;
• to object to the processing of your data by us, insofar as the data processing is carried out for profiling purposes. If the processing is carried out on the basis of a balancing of interests, the client may object to the processing. He must state the reasons arising from the particular situation;
• to data portability of the data provided by the client, provided that you have consented to the data processing or have concluded a contract with us and this does not interfere with the rights and freedoms of other persons;
• to revoke consent at any time with effect for the future if you have given us consent to process your data. The processing conducted prior to a revocation remains intact from the revocation;
• to lodge a complaint with a data protection supervisory authority at any time if the client has the view that any processing of data violates the applicable law.

Please note that conditions and exceptions apply to these rights. We may refuse requests to exercise these rights to the extent permitted or required by law.  Despite requests to delete personal data or restrict processing, we may or must retain or otherwise process personal data for legal reasons.

7. Contacting or Asking the Data Controller

If you have any questions about privacy or would like to exercise your data subject rights, please email us at info@frehnerlaw.ch with Privacy in the subject line or write to Tamara Frehner, Frehner Law Firm, Im Zentrum 9, CH-8604 Volketswil.

8. Changes to our Policy

We may change or update this Policy from time to time without prior notice. All changes will be immediately posted on the Website. The new Client Privacy Policy will then apply to your next visit. By using the website for the first time, you will be deemed to have accepted the terms of the Policy on your first use of the Website following the alterations. We advise you to visit this page each time to be informed.