Privacy Notice for Network Rail’s Contact Centre

We take your right to privacy seriously and want you to feel comfortable when contacting our national helpline or using one of the other ways to contact us.

If we ask you to provide certain information by which you can be identified, you can be assured that it will only be used in accordance with this privacy notice and only for the reasons you are aware of. 

About this Privacy Notice 

This privacy notice provides information about how personal data is used with regards to query resolution and other occasions where you may contact our Contact Centre and other enquiry services. 

This privacy notice sits beneath our top-level privacy notice and provides information about how personal data is used with regards to query or complaint resolution and other occasions where you may contact our Contact Centre via telephone (03457 11 41 41), in writing (General Offices, Waterloo Station, Station Approach, London, SE1 8SW), or use our live chat or online webform.

What personal information we collect and why we collect it 

The data we collect is solely for the purpose of resolving the query, request or complaint that you have contacted us regarding. This will only include the information you provided to us when you made contact such as: 

  • Your name and the email address/telephone number you give – this is so we can get back in touch with you in relation to your enquiry/complaint, ask you for more information or to provide a response 
  • Your address and/or postcode – if the issue you raise relates to your property or the railway next to it, we will ask for that information so that our staff will know where to visit 
  • Personal information about you – whilst we do not actively ask for or collect this information, you may choose to share details about yourself such as ‘I am a disabled person’ or ‘I am elderly’ to provide some extra context for us.   

If you contact us through our live chat service or by using our web form, certain information is collected such as your IP address, operating system type (Windows or Mac) and version, internet browser type and version, electronic device manufacturer and model, language, time of the visit and pages visited. Please visit our cookie policy page to find out more about the cookies we use, what they’re used for and when they expire.

What legally allows us to collect and handle information about you 

Your data will be processed under Article 6 (1) (e) of the UK General Data Protection Regulation as Network Rail’s Public Task responsibilities for the management of the rail network.

Who we may we disclose your personal information to 

Your details and the details of the query/complaint you have made will be shared with the team(s) responsible for resolving it and providing a response. If your query is the responsibility of another company within the railway industry (e.g. a train operating company) we may pass your details onto them on your behalf so they can start investigating straight away. We will let you know if that is the case and provide their contact details for you to follow up with them directly. 

For complaints made about services in one of our 20 managed stations, we may provide your contact details to our regulator (the Office of Rail and Road) and their partner organisations to enable them to carry out surveys with customers across the rail industry. 

How do we store and protect your information 

We use our contact centre to gather the information on our behalf on a system called Oracle Service Cloud. The data collected is stored securely on Oracle’s UK servers.  

We have strong security measures in place to prevent your personal information make sure that your data is not lost, accidentally destroyed, misused, or disclosed. In addition to this, we limit access to your personal information to only those employees who have a business need to access it. 

Your personal information is not processed outside the UK. 

We have procedures in place to deal with any suspected personal data breach and will notify you (and any applicable regulator) of a breach where we are legally required to do so. 

How long we will keep your personal information for 

We will retain your information for the duration required to resolve your query plus six years from the date of resolution (with a further two years in a restricted, archived state.)

If you contact us for another reason later within that time frame, then your data will be kept for six years from the resolution of your latest enquiry.

We keep copies of call recordings to our contact centre for a period of six months.

Your rights and choices in relation to your personal information 

Please see our main privacy notice for more details on your rights.

Who is responsible for the personal information that we collect about you? 

Network Rail is the Data Controller for the purpose of data protection law, in respect of your personal information collected or obtained as outlined with this Privacy Notice. This is because we dictate the purpose for which your personal information is used and how we use your personal information.  

Our contact centre staff are the Data Processors. The current providers of this service are Journeycall Ltd, 3 James Chalmers Road, Arbroath Enterprise Park, Arbroath, Angus, DD11 3RQ. Their privacy policy can be accessed here.

Contacting Us 

We have a number of ways for you to get in touch with us. For the full range of options please visit the Contact Us page on our website.

What do to if you have any questions about your information 

If you have concerns about how we use your information, you can contact the data protection officer on data.protection@networkrail.co.uk  or see Network Rail’s Data Protection Privacy Notice. Or you can contact the Information Commissioner’s Office: 

  • By post: Information Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF