Last updated: 16 February 2023
1. This policy explains how and why we use your personal information
Please read this policy – along with any other notice we might provide when we’re collecting or processing personal information about you – to make sure you understand how and why we’re using it. It applies to any information you give us when you visit our website, use our services or contact us in any other way.
Whenever we say ‘you’ and ‘your’, we mean whoever’s using our service.
Whenever we say ‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’ or ‘Bequest’, we mean FF Bequest Ltd (trading as Bequest, a company registered in England & Wales with company registration number 12367897). Our registered address is Bequest, Runway East, 20 St. Thomas Street, London, SE1 9RS. We’re authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and our firm reference number (FRN) is 923791.
Under the Data Protection Act 2018 and the UK General Data Protection Regulation (UK GDPR), we’re the data controller which means that we decide how and why we use your personal information within our business.
If you have any questions or want to exercise your legal rights (as explained in Section 16), please get in touch by:
● Email alexa@bequest.com
● Post Bequest, Runway East, 20 St. Thomas Street, London, SE1 9RS
● Phone +44 020 3916 5433
2. You can complain to the supervisory authority
You have the right to complain at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). However, we’d really appreciate it if you could contact us first and give us the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach them.
3. We may amend this policy from time to time
If and when we update our policy, we’ll publish the changes on our website. And, where appropriate, let you know. The date at the top of this page tells you when we last changed it, and if you want to see older versions, please just get in touch.
4. This table shows the different types of personal information we collect
We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal information about you if you ask about or buy the products and services we offer, and if you subscribe to our newsletter and/or emails. For example:
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Identity data |
Your first name, last name, maiden name, marital status, date of birth, gender, account username and account password. |
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Contact data |
Your current address, previous address, email address and phone number. |
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Transaction data |
Information about payments you make through our website (securely collected and processed by our bank or payment provider), and details of products and services you’ve engaged us for. |
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Technical data |
Your IP address, browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating systems and platforms and other technology on devices you use to access our website. |
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Profile data |
Your product and service choices, interests, preferences, feedback and responses, all of which we may analyse to help us improve our services, marketing, customer relationships and experiences. |
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Usage data |
Information about how you use our website, products and services. |
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Marketing and communications data |
How you prefer to receive marketing from us and any third parties, and your communication preferences. |
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Special category data |
Health. For more on this, see below. |
5. We sometimes collect health information
We may collect and store information about your health to make sure we can provide a quote for life insurance, as well as being able to tailor and adjust our services to your needs and circumstances. We’ll only use it to deliver our services as part of our contract.
We don’t collect any other special categories of personal information about you. Nor do we collect any information about criminal convictions and offences.
6. We use aggregated information in different ways
We collect, use and share aggregated information such as statistics or demographics in different ways. This isn’t considered personal information in law as it doesn’t identify you in any way. So, for example, we may put your usage data together with other people’s to calculate the percentage of visitors using a specific website feature.
If we ever combine or connect aggregated information with your personal information in a way that means you could be identified, we’ll treat it as personal information and use it in line with this policy.
7. We can’t help you if you don’t give us the information we need
We can only provide our life insurance and will products through our website. and we only need it when a product or service you’ve asked for depends on it.
If you don’t give us the information we need, we may have to cancel the product or service and the contract you’ve entered into with us. But we’ll let you know if we need to change or cancel anything.
8. We collect your personal information in different ways
Here are some of the ways we collect information from and about you:
Direct interactions
You may give us personal information over the phone or by completing online forms when, for example, you engage our services, give us feedback or ask us to send you marketing.
Automated technology
When you use our website, we may automatically collect technical data about your equipment, browsing patterns and actions. This will be collated after you accept our cookies – please see our cookie policy for more about that.
Third parties or publicly available sources
We may get personal information about you from other sources, including:
9. We use your personal information to fulfil our contract with you
When you create an account and order any products or services from us, there’s a contract between us (please see our terms of use) and we need to use your personal information to perform our side of that contract. So, we use your information so that we can:
Otherwise, we’ll only use your information where we have a legitimate interest to do so.
Normally, we don’t rely on consent as a legal basis for processing information other than when it comes to sending marketing communications. You have the right to withdraw consent for that at any time by contacting us at alexa@bequest.com.
10. This table explains all the ways we use your personal information
The table below describes all the ways we plan to use your personal information, and which of the legal bases we rely on to do that. We may process it on more than one lawful ground depending on why we’re using it. Please get in touch if you’d like more details.
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Purpose/activity |
Type of data |
Lawful basis for processing, including legitimate interest |
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To register you as a new customer |
(a) Identity (b) Contact |
Contract |
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To process and deliver our services to you, including: (a) Making a representation to an insurer (b) Collecting information for your Will (d) Binding your policy |
(a) Identity (b) Contact (c) Marketing and communications (d) Special category |
Contract Consent |
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(e) Providing administration support throughout the lifetime of your policy (f) Reporting to the insurer a first notification of loss as advised by you |
||
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(a) To let you know about changes to our terms or privacy policy (b) To ask you to leave a review or take a customer satisfaction survey |
(a) Identity (b) Contact (c) Profile (d) Marketing and communications |
Necessary to comply with a legal obligation Necessary for our legitimate interests (to keep our records updated and to study how customers use our products/services) |
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To administer and protect our business and website (including troubleshooting, data analysis, testing, system maintenance, support, reporting and hosting of data) |
(a) Identity (b) Contact (c) Technical |
Necessary for our legitimate interests (for running our business, providing administration and IT services, network security, to prevent fraud and in the context of a business reorganisation or group restructuring exercise) Necessary to comply with a legal obligation |
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To deliver relevant website content and ads to you and measure or understand the effectiveness of the advertising |
(a) Identity (b) Contact (c) Profile (d) Usage (e) Marketing and communications (f) Technical |
Necessary for our legitimate interests (to study how customers use our products/services, to develop them, to grow our business and to inform our marketing strategy) |
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To perform user research on our product, website and customer journey flow. |
(a) Identity (b) Contact (c) Profile (d) Marketing and communications |
Consent |
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To use data analytics to improve our website, products/services, marketing, customer relationships and experiences |
(a) Technical (b) Usage |
Necessary for our legitimate interests (to define types of customers for our products and services, to keep our website updated and relevant, to develop our business and to inform our marketing strategy) |
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To make suggestions and recommendations to you about goods or services that may interest you |
(a) Identity (b) Contact (c) Technical (d) Usage (e) Profile |
Consent Necessary for our legitimate interests (to develop our products/services and grow our business) |
We’ll only use your personal information as shown in the table, unless we believe we need to use it for another reason which is still compatible with the original one. If we need to use it for an unrelated purpose, we’ll let you know and explain the legal basis which allows us to do that.
Where we have to by law, we may process your personal information without your knowledge or consent, but it will still be in line with these rules.
11. You can change your marketing choices any time
You’ll receive marketing communications from us if you’ve asked us for information or bought something from us and haven’t opted out.
We decide which products, services and offers might interest you by using your identity, contact, technical, usage and profile data to form a view of what you might want or need. You can ask us to stop sending you marketing messages at any time by getting in touch with us at alexa@bequest.com. You can also choose to opt-out through the ‘unsubscribe’ button at the bottom of any emails.
We’ll get your express opt-in consent before we share your personal information with any third party for marketing purposes. And you can opt-out of third-party marketing at any point by contacting us at alexa@bequest.com.
12. You can control cookies in your browser settings
A cookie is a small file of letters and numbers that’s downloaded onto your device when you visit a website. Cookies can do a number of things such as remembering your preferences, recording what you’ve put in your shopping basket, and counting how many people access the website.
Cookies help us to provide a better website and service. When you come to our website, we’ll ask you to either accept or reject them.
You can create custom alerts when websites use or store cookies on your browser. If you want to refuse them altogether, you can do this in your browser settings. For more about this, please see our cookie policy.
13. We need to disclose your personal information in some circumstances
We share the information you give us with our staff so that we can provide our services to you.
We may also share your personal information as set out below for the purposes shown in the table in Section 10. These companies won’t use your information to contact you. And they’ll follow the same safeguards we use.
We may need to disclose your information to any one of the following:
The data we collect from you may be transferred to and stored somewhere outside the European Economic Area (“EEA”). It may be processed by staff outside the EEA who work for us or one of our suppliers.
Where the data is sent outside the EU/EEA, the protection may be based on standard clauses verified by the European Commission and other data security safeguards, or there might be an adequacy decision in place guaranteeing an equivalent degree of data protection.
The parties we send your information to are obliged to comply with data protection laws, regulations and standards. Each of them signs a contract with us, giving assurances over the security and correct treatment of your information.
If you want a full list of where your data is sent, please get in touch with us at alexa@bequest.com.
14. We keep your information secure but you send it at your own risk
To keep the information we collect online safe and secure, we’ve put in place strong processes and procedures whichwe review them regularly.
We try to make sure all the information you give us is transferred securely through our website (always check for the padlock symbol and “https” in the URL bar). Unfortunately, transmitting information over the internet isn’t completely secure which means we can’t give any guarantees – any transmission is at your own risk. But once we’ve received your information, we’ll use strict procedures and security features to try to prevent unauthorised access.
All the information you give us is stored on secure servers with Google Cloud Platform in the UK.
15. We only hold your personal information for as long as we need to
We only keep your personal information for as long as we need it – which will depend on the reason we collected it – and to satisfy any legal, accounting or reporting requirements.
If you’ve bought life insurance from us, we’ll keep this information for up to 7 years from the expiry date of the policy or from the settlement/closure of the claim, whichever is the latter.
If you’ve bought any other family protection service, such as a Will, we’ll keep it for 7 years after it has been claimed.
If you have an account on our website but don’t buy any products or services, we’ll keep it at least for as long as you keep your account on our website, and afterwards for 6 years from the date you last logged in.
Where you contact us but don’t have an account on our website (and we don’t have an ongoing relationship with you), we’ll keep it for 12 months so that we can recognise you if you contact us again in the near future.
If you’d like us to delete your personal information sooner, please let us know. We will do our best to adhere to your request however we do have regulatory and legal obligations in some cases to keep data.
16. This table shows your legal rights under UK GDPR
You have a range of rights that you can exercise under particular conditions, with a few exceptions.
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Your right to ACCESS |
You have the right to ask us to confirm whether or not we hold any of your personal information. If we do, you have the right to have a copy of it and to be told:
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Your right to RECTIFICATION |
You have the right to have inaccurate personal information corrected. You may also be able to have incomplete personal information completed – although this will depend on what we’re processing it for and it may involve providing a supplementary statement. |
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Your right to ERASURE |
Under certain circumstances, you have the right to have personal information deleted (also known as ‘the right to be forgotten’):
If you believe that one of these situations applies to you, please contact us. |
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Your right to RESTRICT PROCESSING |
Under certain circumstances, you have the right to ask us to restrict or suppress your personal information. Restricting processing means we can store your personal information but can’t use it. You have this right where:
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Your right to DATA PORTABILITY |
You have the right to get a copy of your personal information for your own purposes. This allows you to move, copy or transfer it more easily from one IT environment to another, safely and securely, without affecting the usability of the data. |
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Your right to OBJECT |
Sometimes, we use your personal information to achieve goals that will help us, you, or the other organisations we work with. This includes:
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Your right to be INFORMED |
You have the right to be informed about the collection and use of your personal information. Your right to be informed forms part of this policy, which explains why we process your information, how long we keep it and who we share it with. |
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Your rights when it comes to AUTOMATED DECISION-MAKING AND PROFILING |
Any automated decision-making or profiling we do is solely for the purpose of tailoring the information we give you. We won’t use automated decision-making or profiling to make decisions that will have a legal effect on you or otherwise significantly affect you, and you have the right not to be subject to such decisions. If you have any concerns or questions about this right, please contact us. |
Now. Death is unpredictable. You could die today or tomorrow. Having life insurance in place means your family are financially protected if the unexpected happens.
But that’s not the only reason. Life insurance gets more expensive the older you are. So, to get the best price, buy it now.
For example, £200,000 of cover until age 65 costs around £15 a month if you’re a 30-year-old non-smoker. It can be almost 3 times that amount when you’re 50.
We can’t tell you exactly how much you need – we’re all different. But you should consider choosing enough cover for ongoing living expenses, such as any outstanding mortgage, or a good few years in rent, and the monthly bills. Plus, any debts or loans you have, and don’t forget funeral costs.
You choose how long you want your policy to remain in place, anything from 5-40 years.
Most people choose to be covered until age 65, as that’s when they expect to retire. However, you can choose any age up to age 90, as long as you start the policy before your 65th birthday.
Level term is the most popular option. The amount of cover never changes. So, if you choose £200,000 of life insurance and you die in 10 years, we pay your family £200,000.
Decreasing term is designed to cover a mortgage. The payout amount decreases each month in line with your mortgage. The amount the cover goes down is equivalent to an annual interest rate of 8%. So, although the monthly cost you pay stays the same, decreasing cover is cheaper than level cover.
There are 2 options. You can either choose a joint life policy or 2 single life policies.
Although joint life policies tend to be a bit cheaper, they only pay out once. So, if one of you claims, the other is left with no life insurance in place.
The other option is for both partners to take out separate life insurance policies. That way if one of you dies your partner’s cover remains in place. Or if the relationship breaks down, you can both walk away with your policies intact. Separating a joint life policy isn’t always that easy.
We may be a new name in life insurance but we’re backed by some of the biggest names in the industry, so you can have complete trust in Bequest and our policies.
GenRe is one of the world’s leading reinsurers. They reinsure your policy so you can be confident we are always able to pay a claim.
Covéa is our underwriter. They have around 650,000 life and protection policies under administration in the UK.
Just call us on 020 3916 5433 and we’ll take it from there.
Check out our claims page for what to expect.
Life insurance is quite simple. If you die, or are diagnosed with a terminal illness, we pay out.
For a terminal illness claim, you’ll need a diagnosis from an attending consultant with the opinion that the illness is expected to lead to death within 12 months.
So, as long as you answered all the questions on your application honestly, you can sit back and relax safe in the knowledge you’re fully protected.
We know you were thinking it.
If Bequest were to close our doors, your policy is completely safe. Covéa, our partner, looks after the running of your policy today. So, they’d continue to do that if we were no longer around.
But we’re going nowhere.
We offer 3 Will options: Starter, Grow and Inherit.
Check out our Wills page for all the details.
Absolutely.
All our Wills are written and checked by JP Estate Planning, an award-winning, UK-based, professional Will writer and estate planner.
So, what are you waiting for? Write your Will now.
There are lots of reasons why writing a Will is so important – such as naming your children’s guardians, protecting stepchildren, protecting the family home and making sure your inheritance is spent wisely.
Read our 6 reasons why a Will is well worth writing.
If you’d like us to check your signature and upload a copy to the National Will Register, you’ll need to print it, and post it to: JP Estate Planning Ltd, PO Box 6438, Milton Keynes, MK10 1LY.
We highly recommend sending this to us by recorded delivery with Royal Mail, so it’s safe and secure. You’ll need to pay for postage with the Starter package, but we cover it in Grow and Inherit packages.