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Terms & Conditions

BEN WILSON AAA  refers to Ben Wilson ACCA FCA
VLE refers to the Ben Wilson Study Site, a cloud based Moodle site hosted on secure servers in the EU
TUTOR refers to Ben Wilson and any affiliated tutor involved in the delivery of your course. Such tutors are named in the ‘Meet the Team’ section of the benwilsonaaa.com website

 

This page contains:

The BEN WILSON AAA  terms and Conditions

Appendix 1: The BEN WILSON AAA Data Protection Policy

Appendix 2: The BEN WILSON AAA Complaints Policy
Appendix 3: GDPR Policy

 

Terms & Conditions

 

  1. By ordering one, or more than one, BEN WILSON AAA online Course or Product you have agreed to be bound by these Terms and Conditions, by any additional or  supplementary terms and conditions noted in the t&cs tab of the course description of the Course of Product you bought, and by the Appendices to these Terms and Conditions.

 

  1. Terms & Conditions

2.1 These terms and conditions are applicable to any product, service, course or equivalent purchased through, or acquired by enrolling through, the benwilsonaaa.com, a domain owned and operated by Ben Wilson (henceforth ‘BEN WILSON AAA’) whose registered office is The Barn House, High Street, Bramham, UK, LS23 6QQ

2.2. You may order a Course from your BEN WILSON AAA via the benwilsonaaa.com website. Your order is accepted by BEN WILSON AAA once cleared funds have been received.

2.3. Access to your Course is through the VLE

2.4 Unless explicitly stated otherwise in the Course description, access to your Course shall be given from the date of your Course enrolment and shall end on the date of the exam sitting specified when you booked. For instance, if you book for March 202X, then access to your learning materials will end on your course subject’s March 202X ACCA exam date. See also the deferral and transfer section below.

2.5 BEN WILSON AAA is contractually obliged to deliver courses under these terms and conditions. BEN WILSON AAA cannot amend these terms and conditions or agree anything that conflicts with these terms, but they can provide more information as to how they will exercise their discretion and / or add additional terms through course descriptions given on the BEN WILSON AAA website, or through direct communication with you. If there is a conflict between these terms and any additional terms then these terms shall prevail.

  1. Personal service for the exam your course is designed to prepare you for

3.1. Your Course is personal to you and once you have accessed your Course you may not transfer your rights to access your Course or provide access to your Course, in whole or in part, to any other person. Video content is designed only to be viewed online and should not be recorded for viewing offline. BEN WILSON AAA will retain a record of the IP addresses you use to access all materials held on the VLE, and reserves the right to suspend or cancel your enrolment should BEN WILSON AAA believe you are abusing this clause or if you hide or otherwise disguise your IP address. In such circumstances no refund of any fee will be given.

3.2 BEN WILSON AAA does not take any responsibility for visa applications. BEN WILSON AAA courses are fully online and therefore are available in all countries that allow you to access the BEN WILSON AAA websites and videos.

3.3 To be eligible to buy and remain on a course you must be enrolled on, or be eligible and intend to enrol on, the professional exam and exam diet which your chosen course is designed to prepare you for. BEN WILSON AAA has the right to request evidence that this is the case. If you are not enrolled, or eligible and intending to be enrol, on the professional exam which your chosen course is designed to prepare you for (e.g. if you have recently passed the exam, or you have indicated you do not intend to sit your exam), then you may be excluded from your course. In this case no refund will be due to you.

  1. Enrolment, re-enrolment, cancellation, refunds and Pass Assurances

4.1 BEN WILSON AAA reserves the right to cancel your enrolment on your course at any time at their discretion. Reasons for cancellation may include but are not limited to your inability to access your learning resources for technical or other reasons, your impact on the learning environment of other learners, the inappropriate use of learning materials, the inability of BEN WILSON AAA to deliver your Course, or that BEN WILSON AAA judges the course to be unsuitable for your needs. In such cases you will be given either a full refund, or, if you have made use of BEN WILSON AAA’s learning resources already, a reasonable proportionate refund based on your period of enrolment on your course and/or your use of / downloading of resources on that course.

4.2 You will be enrolled on the VLE within two working days of funds clearing to BEN WILSON AAA via a payment gateway such as Stripe (often you will be enrolled immediately), or within five working days of BEN WILSON AAA receiving your payment if you pay by bank transfer. You will be enrolled on the course as described on this website, and as noted on your enrolment receipt.

4.3 If you have not downloaded a product or accessed your purchased course on the VLE using your registered name and password then you may cancel your purchase within 14 days of your order and receive a full refund by emailing info@benwilsonaaa.com

4.3a If you have purchased and downloaded a downloadable product you are not able to cancel your purchase and no refund will be given.

4.3b If you purchased your course within 14 days AND have accessed your course (or courses) on the VLE (as recorded in the VLE logs) then 50% of the full undiscounted value of any course (or courses) you have accessed will be deducted from your payment and the balance refunded. This is because views of (usually extensive) video content visible on the course front page are not logged. Platinum Package course values will be assumed to divide in the proportion 3:3:1 between tuition, revision and mock, and the value of Revision Plus and Core courses shall be assumed to divide in the proportion 3:2 between revision and mock.

4.4 Cancellation: Where you cancel more than 14 days after purchase no refund will be made.

4.5 If you enrol on an ACCA course you will be asked to supply your ACCA registered name, ACCA number and date of birth (your data). Your data is required by the ACCA to enable us to enrol you on the BEN WILSON AAA instance of the ACCA CBE practice platform, and also to allow the ACCA to monitor our pass rates, and thereby ensure continued ACCA ALP accreditation.

4.6 Our inability to enrol you on the ACCA Practice Platform because either you have not provided us with your data or if your data does not reconcile with that held by the ACCA, shall not entitle you to a refund of your course fee or to the alternative delivery of any product which requires the use of the ACCA Practice Platform.

4.7 We require your permission to share your data with the ACCA as part of their Approved Learning Provider Results Service. If BEN WILSON AAA is unable to register you on the ACCA Approved Learning Provider Results Service by the standard ACCA enrolment date for the exam you are taking due to you withholding your permission or providing inaccurate or incomplete personal data then you will not be entitled to claim under any Pass Assurance, Pass Guarantee or Free Re-enrolment scheme.

4.8 Where you make a payment on account or pay by instalments you should ensure you note as part of your payment the name of the course and the exam date on your payment. In the absence of such detail you will be enrolled on the next available exam date course for a course of the value covered by your payment, and in such cases you will be bound by these terms and any additional terms of the course on which you are enrolled.

4.9 A Pass Assurance, Pass Guarantee, a Free Re-enrolment offer (henceforth Pass Assurance) or other sales incentive, where offered, will always include conditions that will be set out in the course description and which must be met before the Pass Assurance offer can be exercised. These conditions will include a minimum score in your final mock and real exams, and may also include minimum course participation requirements. You should ensure you read such Pass Assurance offer conditions before purchasing your course.

4.10 Nothing in any Pass Assurance offer, or any other offer or sales incentives shall be taken to be an offer to support you indefinitely until you pass your exam, or a guarantee that you will pass your exam, or indicate any special relationship with any examiner.

 

  1. Course amendment / Course fee amendment / Use of discount coupon codes / Payment by instalment

5.1. BEN WILSON AAA reserves the right to withdraw a Course or Courses at any time, or to amend the fee for any Course, or to change the content of your course, or to change the dates and/or times of any webinar delivered under your Course, or to remove you from their course. If you have already enrolled on a Course which is cancelled, or on a course where changes are significantly detrimental to you, then you will be offered the choice between receiving a pro-rata refund or enrolment on an alternative Course if one is available. This clause does not apply to deliberate changes in the price of a Course.

5.2. Where a Course is withdrawn BEN WILSON AAA shall endeavour to give you reasonable notice of this.

5.3. BEN WILSON AAA or your Tutor may offer you a discount coupon code to enable you to receive a discount. A public discount coupon code is one which has been published or advertised to the public by BEN WILSON AAA. A private discount coupon code is a discount coupon code which is not a public discount coupon code. You should only use a private discount coupon code after being authorised to do so to purchase a particular product by BEN WILSON AAA. If you use a private discount coupon code without suitable authority then BEN WILSON AAA shall be entitled to remove you from the relevant course and retain all or a portion of your payment.

5.4. Where a student pays for a course by buying the first instalment then any failure to pay any subsequent instalment by the due date shall result in their permanent exclusion from their course or courses. In such cases no refund of earlier instalment payments shall be due. The due date of subsequent instalments shall be specified either within the course description or by email/WhatsApp.

  1. Student commitment and behaviour

6.1. Your commitment to and diligent pursuit of your studies is the key to your success. We monitor your use of our materials, and many Courses also include tests, assignments and/or homework. BEN WILSON AAA reserves the right to suspend your individual access to a Course in the event that you do not complete such tests, assignments and/or homework adequately without good reason and/or do not respond to reasonable requests for explanations and/or do not participate adequately in a Course on which you are enrolled. In such cases you may be recommended to defer OR permanently excluded from your course OR transferred to another course at the discretion of BEN WILSON AAA, and following any such action by BEN WILSON AAA you shall not be eligible for any refund.

6.2. If your Course includes Tutor support then this will be provided, at BEN WILSON AAA option, via Whatsapp or email, study site forum, Zoom, Webinar or a mutually agreed communication mechanism and:

  1. a) support will only be given to assist you in understanding the learning materials provided by the course on which you are enrolled.
  2. b) BEN WILSON AAA shall respond to your request for support within a reasonable period (usually 24 hours). BEN WILSON AAA may advise you of holiday periods when their responses may be delayed.
  3. c) in exceptional circumstances BEN WILSON AAA may limit the amount of support you receive where you make excessive demands. What constitutes excessive demands is at the discretion of BEN WILSON AAA, but shall be reasonable. If BEN WILSON AAA notifies you of such a limit then you may apply to withdraw from your Course, and in this case you will be refunded a proportion of your Course fee based on the days from purchase to withdrawal from your course compared to the days from purchase to your exam date.
  4. d) tutor support via some channels (e.g. WhatsApp) may require your contact details to be visible to others in that support group. By enrolling on your course and revealing your contact details to BEN WILSON AAA then you accept your contact details may become visible to others in one or more support groups associated with your course. If you do not wish to join a specific support group then you should make this clear to your Tutor at the time you purchase your course.
  5. e) tutor support will be relevant to the course it is designed to support. For instance, tutor support for a revision course will not include support relevant to a tuition course, and vice versa.
  6. f) any and all communications and behaviour shall be professional and mutually respectful. You must not share the intellectual property of others on any support group.  Any unprofessional or disrespectful communication or behaviour may result in you being suspended or excluded from your Course.
  7. g) support groups will close on or before the date of the exam your Course is designed to support. If your support group is to close more than 24 hours before your exam then this will be stated in your Course description.
  8. Deferral / Adequate Progress in Tuition / Transfer

7.1 Your initial decision to take an exam should involve a serious commitment that you intend and have the time and resources to study for and sit your exam.

7.2. BEN WILSON AAA may recommend you defer your exam sit based on a lack of participation, but the decision to do so, or not to do so, rests solely with you. If you choose to defer your exam sit you should notify BEN WILSON AAA as soon as possible.

7.3 If you defer your exam sitting, BEN WILSON AAA may, at their sole discretion, offer you the option to enrol on a later Course (a Course Deferral) either for free or at a reduced fee. If you choose to take your exam following a decision to defer then your tutor may, at their option, cancel your Course Deferral.

7.4 Deferral after the ACCA standard enrolment date for your exam will not be possible without evidenced extenuating circumstances.

7.5 Where you are paying for your course by instalments then any Course Deferral you must continue to pay all instalment(s) by the previously agreed due date(s) to maintain your Course Deferral enrolment. If you are unable to make any previously agreed instalment payment(s) by the agreed due date(s) then you should speak to BEN WILSON AAA before the due date. If you do not pay an instalment by the due date BEN WILSON AAA may, at their discretion, terminate your enrolment and no refund will be due in such cases.

7.6 Unless BEN WILSON AAA informs you otherwise in writing, where you re-enrol on a later Course at no cost to you (e.g. under a deferral or transfer) then that re-enrolment shall not include any Pass Assurance or Free Re-enrolment element otherwise applicable to the course on which you are re-enrolled.

  1. Webinars / webinar recordings

8.1 Where a webinar is scheduled, but no student has logged on to the webinar within 15 minutes of the commencement of that webinar, the tutor may cancel that webinar.

  1. Fees / Value Added Tax (VAT)

9.1. Fees for Courses and Resources are quoted in pounds sterling exclusive of VAT (if applicable) and any import duties, taxes and customs clearances which may be payable either by you or by BEN WILSON AAA. BEN WILSON AAA is not currently VAT registered in the UK.

9.2. All our Courses/Resources include a personal service element by BEN WILSON AAA, and are therefore not classed as electronic services for VAT purposes by the EU/UK. As such they are treated as delivered at the location of BEN WILSON AAA under UK/EU law.

9.3. If you are a registered business outside the UK then you may not be due to pay VAT.  Please discuss your situation with BEN WILSON AAA in such cases.

  1. Connection to BEN WILSON AAA services

10.1. You may incur charges to your internet service provider while you are accessing or using your Course. Charges may also be payable to third parties for use of the software necessary to access your Course, for instance Microsoft Word, Excel or Powerpoint. You are responsible for paying these charges. In some jurisdictions, access to video material held on sites that host your course material may be restricted (BEN WILSON AAA uses Vimeo for video hosting), and you should check before ordering that this will not prevent you using such services.

10.2. It is your responsibility to check that the computer and internet service you plan to use to access your Course is compatible with the minimum specification requirement that relates to your Course. A reliable bandwidth of at least 1Mbps download/upload speed is recommended. For HD webinars 2-3 Mbps is recommended. For older Treasury courses only, HD videos may sometimes play back through Javascript popups – so you must have Java installed and popups enabled to be able to view them. The BEN WILSON AAA area of the ACCA CBE practice platform requires a PC or laptop (so cannot be accessed using a tablet or phone), the use of a clean, up to date version of Chrome, and is likely to be unobtainable from behind a corporate firewall.

10.3. You acknowledge and accept that BEN WILSON AAA cannot be held responsible for any technical problems you encounter following the purchase of your Course that are outside the control of BEN WILSON AAA.

10.4. If you experience a problem with your course, or poor performance from our study site, then you should report this to info@benwilsonaaa.com under the Complaints Procedures in Appendix 2 of this document. BEN WILSON AAA shall endeavour to respond within 24 hours (and usually much sooner), and to correct any such fault or poor performance within a reasonable time.

10.5. BEN WILSON AAA is not obliged to offer you any technical support in relation to your use of your Course, but BEN WILSON AAA may elect to offer technical support and the extent of any such technical support is entirely at the discretion of BEN WILSON AAA. BEN WILSON AAA cannot be held responsible for the any consequence from following, or not following, such support or advice.

10.6. You accept and acknowledge that periods of downtime may be required in respect of the information technology infrastructure connected to BEN WILSON AAA websites and that technical support may not be available during such periods of downtime. Further you accept that you will not have a claim for breach of contract or otherwise in respect of any such period of unavailability.

10.7. BEN WILSON AAA will use reasonable endeavours to make your Course available but cannot guarantee uninterrupted, timely or error-free availability or that defects will be corrected. BEN WILSON AAA reserves the right to suspend access to BEN WILSON AAA websites for the purpose of scheduled or emergency maintenance, repairs or upgrades to improve the performance or functionality of the Website.

10.8. You also accept and acknowledge that BEN WILSON AAA shall not be held responsible for you being unable to your access your Course or any service associated with your Course whether temporarily or permanently as a result of any of the following:

  1. a) the operation of the internet and the World Wide Web, including but not limited to viruses;
  2. b) any firewall restrictions that have been placed on your network or the computer you are using to access your Course;
  3. c) failures of telecommunications links and equipment;
  4. d) issues caused by any update, lack of update or extension to your browser; or
  5. e) any issue connected with the BEN WILSON AAA area of the ACCA CBE practice platform (which is under the control of the ACCA / TestReach, not BEN WILSON AAA). Please note that the CBE Practice Platform requires a PC or laptop to access (phone/tablet access is not possible) and will only operate through the Chrome browser.
  6. Suitability of study materials / Tutor contact / Availability of published materials

11.1. BEN WILSON AAA expects you to take reasonable care to verify that your Course will meet your needs. BEN WILSON AAA does not make any commitment to you that you will obtain any particular result from your use of your Course. BEN WILSON AAA does not make any representation, guarantee or commitment to you that your Course will be error free. BEN WILSON AAA does not make any commitment that your Course will be compatible with or operate with your software or hardware.

11.2 There is no guarantee of a minimum amount of contact time with your Tutor.

  1. Liability under this contract

12.1. All representations, warranties and/or terms and/or commitments not expressly set out in these Terms (whether implied by law, conduct, and statute or otherwise) are hereby excluded to the maximum extent permissible by law.

12.2. The exclusions and limitations of liability contained in these Terms do not apply to a party’s liability: (i) for fraud or wilful default; (ii) for death or personal injury caused by its negligence; or (iii) where such limitation or exclusion cannot lawfully be excluded.

12.3. Except as set out in these Terms, BEN WILSON AAA shall not be responsible for losses that result from its failure to comply with these Terms including, but not limited to, losses that fall into the following categories:

  1.    a) indirect or consequential losses
  2.    b) loss of income or revenue
  3.    c) loss of business
  4.    d) loss of anticipated savings
  5.    e) loss or corruption of data.

12.4. BEN WILSON AAA cannot be held responsible to you for any data that you lose as a result of accessing your Course. It is your responsibility to ensure that you regularly save and back up all data which you hold on the computer from which you are accessing your Course.

12.5. Save as otherwise set out in this section “Limitation of liability”, BEN WILSON AAA’s maximum aggregate liability to you for any claims that you may have for direct loss in contract, tort or otherwise arising out of or in connection with these Terms, your use of your Course and any technical support shall be limited to the amount of the Fee which has been paid, or is payable, by you or on your behalf for your Course.

12.6. BEN WILSON AAA will not be held responsible for any delay or failure to comply with its obligations under these conditions if the delay or failure arises from any cause which is beyond its reasonable control. This condition does not affect your statutory rights.

12.7. Your Course is for educational purposes only. BEN WILSON AAA will not accept any responsibility to any party for the use of your Course for any purpose other than for educational purposes, including but not limited to the giving of advice by you to any third party.

  1. Intellectual property

13.1. At all times, your Tutor, BEN WILSON AAA and/or their licensors, remain the owner of the intellectual property in your Course. No part of your Course may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of BEN WILSON AAA.

13.2. In consideration of receipt by BEN WILSON AAA of the Fee, BEN WILSON AAA grants to you a non-exclusive, non-transferable licence to use your Course strictly for your own educational purposes only. The licence granted is to access your Course from two devices only. BEN WILSON AAA has access to the IP address of those devices that access the VLE, and reserves the right to cancel your access without the return of any fee, should you access your Course via our VLE from more than two devices.

13.3. Save as expressly set out in these Terms, you may not modify, copy, reproduce, re-publish, sub-licence, sell, upload, broadcast, post, transmit, make available, disseminate or distribute in any way any of your Course. You may not modify, adapt, merge, translate, disassemble, decompile, recompile or reverse engineer any software forming part of your Course or create derivative works based on the whole of or any part of your Course or incorporate any part of your Course into any software program. Use of your Course not expressly permitted in these Terms is strictly prohibited and will constitute an infringement of BEN WILSON AAA’s copyright or intellectual property rights.

  1. Data protection

14.1. BEN WILSON AAA is registered with the UK Data Commissioners Office under registration reference CSN9676531. BEN WILSON AAA will process the personal information it receives from you or otherwise holds about you in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulations. You consent to the use by your Tutor and BEN WILSON AAA of such information in accordance with those regulations until and unless you have withdrawn your consent. BEN WILSON AAA and / or your Tutor will use your data to supply the services you have bought. BEN WILSON AAA or your Tutor may use your data for direct marketing (unless you request otherwise). BEN WILSON AAA will not share your data with third parties unless this is necessary for the delivery of your Course to you or other students, or is a statutory requirement. You have the right to receive details of the personal information held by BEN WILSON AAA by contacting Ben@benwilsonaaa.com. The Appendix labelled ‘Data Protection Policy’ appended to and forming part of these Terms and Conditions outlines the nature of the personal data BEN WILSON AAA holds and how this is used and protected.

14.2. If you do not wish to receive marketing correspondence from BEN WILSON AAA or any affiliated organisations, a written request or email should be sent to BEN WILSON AAA at info@benwilsonaaa.com.

14.3 BEN WILSON AAA may with your specific permission use your personal data (name, email, date of birth and ACCA number) to register you on the ACCA CBE practice platform, which involves sharing that data (which is already held by the ACCA) with the ACCA. BEN WILSON AAA may with your specific permission share your personal data as part of the ACCA Results Service. Such data and permissions can be managed and deleted by you on your VLE.

 

 

 

 

  1. Overdue amounts

15.1. Your Tutor reserves the right to charge late payment interest on any overdue amounts, at a rate of 10% a year above the base lending rate of Barclays Bank plc from time to time. The interest shall accrue on a daily basis from the due date until the date of actual payment of the overdue amount, whether before or after judgment. You must pay us interest together with the overdue amount.

15.2. BEN WILSON AAA reserves the right to recover any reasonable debt collection costs in connection with these Terms.

  1. Other terms and conditions

16.1. BEN WILSON AAA may update or amend these Terms from time to time to comply with law or to meet its changing business requirements without notice to you. Any updates or amendments will be available through this website.

16.3 The t&cs tab and these Terms constitute the entire agreement and understanding between the parties and supersedes and replaces any other terms and conditions previously published by BEN WILSON AAA and any other understanding, undertaking, representation, warranty, arrangement or statement of any nature whatsoever made by BEN WILSON AAA to you, whether oral, written or otherwise, relating to the subject matter of these Terms.

16.4. You may not assign or sub-contract any of your rights or obligations under these Terms to any third party unless we agree in writing. BEN WILSON AAA may assign, transfer or sub-contract any of their rights or obligations under these Terms to any third party at their discretion.

16.5. No relaxation or delay by BEN WILSON AAA in exercising any right or remedy under these Terms shall operate as waiver of that right or remedy or shall affect its ability to subsequently exercise that right or remedy. Any waiver must be agreed by BEN WILSON AAA in writing.

16.6. If any of these Terms are found to be illegal, invalid or unenforceable by any court of competent jurisdiction, the rest of these Terms shall remain in full force and effect.

16.7. Any notices required to be served on you by BEN WILSON AAA under these Terms will be deemed properly served if emailed to the email address notified by you. Any notices required to be served on BEN WILSON AAA by you will be deemed properly served if sent to the address set out at the start of this agreement.

16.8. A notice delivered personally is deemed to be given on the day on which it was left at the specified address. A notice sent by post is deemed to be given on the day it was posted as evidenced by the sender. A notice sent by fax or email is deemed to be given on the day it was sent.

16.9. The agreement between you and BEN WILSON AAA will be concluded in English only.

16.10. The agreement between you and BEN WILSON AAA which is compromised in these Terms is not intended to be for the benefit of any other party, and shall not be exercised by any other person under the Contract (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999 or otherwise.

16.11. These Terms and any other matters arising out of or in relation to these Terms are governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of England and Wales. You agree to submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the English courts to settle any disputes which may arise out of or in connection with these Terms.

 

 

Appendix 1: Data Protection Policy

For the purposes of this policy, BEN WILSON AAA means Ben Wilson ACCA FCA

 

  1. BEN WILSON AAA Study sites / ACCA CBE practice platform / ACCA Exam Results service

1.1. To gain access to any BEN WILSON AAA Study site you must give us data on your first name, last name and email address. Our study sites use Moodle Cloud open source software, to store this information. Moodle logs your IP address for security and support purposes.

1.2. All Moodle sites require a small amount of information to be stored and maintained for user access. User data will be stored securely within this Moodle site and backed up nightly. Backups are kept for 30 days. You may amend or correct this data yourself through your Moodle user account, which you have access to during and after your enrolment.

1.3. BEN WILSON AAA has been allocated an exclusive area of ACCA’s Practice Platform by ACCA for the sole use of BEN WILSON AAA students. To register you on this area BEN WILSON AAA must provide the ACCA with your name, email address, date of birth and ACCA number, which the ACCA cross checks against their records before allowing BEN WILSON AAA to register you as a student on the BEN WILSON AAA exclusive area.  Providing us with this data is taken to also give us permission to use this data for this purpose.

1.4. Where you give us explicit permission to do so, we will also use your data to register you as our student with ACCA.  This allows ACCA to assess our collective pass rates, and for ACCA to provide us with your exam result. You may withdraw your permission at any time by amending your Study Site user information.

  1. Accounting Data

2.1. BEN WILSON AAA is required to keep data on clients, tutors and suppliers for accounting purposes.  We use the Xero accounting package to do this.

2.2. All clients and suppliers (students, tutors and others) who interact with BEN WILSON AAA consent to consent to BEN WILSON AAA storing and processing their contact details and transaction data.

2.3. BEN WILSON AAA accounting system includes both cloud based and desktop based systems. The accounting system allows us to maintain records of the services you have purchased from or supplied to us. We must maintain this data for HMRC and statutory compliance purposes.

2.4. We keep some or all of the following information for accounting purposes:

  1.    a) Customer / supplier name, address, phone, email and other contact details.
  2.    b) Transaction data such as PayPal / Stripe reference, amount, date, product purchased etc.
  3. Backups

3.1. Backups of the VLE are made daily and stored for 30 days using the Moodle Cloud software.

3.2. Backups hold a full copy of each site database: this includes all user information and their interactions with the site such as IP address, messaging, forums, assessments, days of login, activity tracking, etc.

3.3 Backups of the BEN WILSON AAA website are made on a daily basis and are kept by our website provider, EKM.com for 7 days before being overwritten.

  1. BEN WILSON AAA server information

4.1. BEN WILSON AAA uses cloud-based servers with third party providers based in the EU to host our websites.

4.2. All our servers are cloud based and managed / supported by EU based hosting companies and other EU and non-EU contractors. BEN WILSON AAA may have access to these servers from time to time, and the hosting providers or other contractors may require access for purposes of support. ALL clients (students, tutors and others) utilising our services are required to give their consent to our hosting your sites in this cloud.

  • All servers sit behind firewalls with only the required ports open to the outside world
  • User passwords must meet minimum password standards.
  • Administrative account passwords must meet strong password standards, and are usually also subject to two form factor authentication
  • Individual sites on our servers are under separate user accounts and are locked down so that one client cannot gain access to another client’s account
  • Our cloud hosting providers use intrusion detection software which monitors for unusual activity and flags on our monitoring systems should anything untoward occur
  • Our cloud service providers have software in place to prevent brute force attacks on passwords
  • Our cloud service providers’ agents use a secure password database with two form factor authentication to access account details for server and sites
  • All cloud service providers backup all sites nightly and these backups are kept for 30 days
  1. Email information

5.1. Email is managed and stored on Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive and EU hosting providers.

5.2. BEN WILSON AAA email is managed and stored on Microsoft OneDrive, Google and EU hosting providers.

  1. Electronic document storage

6.1. BEN WILSON AAA stores electronic documents and files on local PC’s, Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive. These files primarily contain information of a non-personal nature such as learning materials. However, accounting records and emails may include personal data, and learning videos may contain personal images.

  1. Visual images and recordings

7.1. BEN WILSON AAA may use Vimeo, Zoom and YouTube to store learning videos and recordings of webinars. Such material may be retained for an extended period as it may be incorporated into subsequent learning materials.

7.2. Personal data may include the image of tutors, students and occasionally the names and comments of webinar attendees.

  1. Student enrolments, progression and results

8.1. We use Zoho CRM, EKM.com, Google Sheets and Excel as longer term data repositories of your enrolment, progression and results.  We use this data to manage your personal enrolment, for management information purposes, and to meet our obligations to ACCA on enrolments.

 

 

 

Appendix 2: Complaints policy

Introduction

This document outlines the policy which applies to complaints by students concerning their treatment by BEN WILSON AAA.  These guidelines are designed to ensure complaints are investigated and resolved in a fair and timely manner, and that BEN WILSON AAA learns from such complaints and implements appropriate responses.

Policy

  1. Complaints should, where reasonably possible, be raised informally with your tutor.
  2. Formal complaints should be made as soon as reasonably possible after the informal complaints procedures explained here are exhausted, and within 60 calendar days of the occurrence of the event which is the subject of the complaint.
  3. If submitted more than 40 calendar days after the event which is the subject of the complaint then a formal complaint will only be considered where there are good reasons for the delay. An explanation for any such delay, together with authoritative evidence to support such lateness, should accompany any Formal Complaint.
  4. Formal complaints should be made by email to info@benwilsonaaa.com . Any communication received which states that it is a formal complaint will be treated as such. Any formal complaint received by email will be acknowledged as having been received within 24 hours. If no acknowledgement is received then it is likely your email has not been received, and you should contact us by WhatsApp on +447968702318.
  5. A formal complaint should:
  6.    a) state the nature of the complaint,
  7.    b) state whether your complaint concerns the actions or non-actions of a particular person,
  8.    c) provide evidence to support the complaint, and
  9.    d) detail the outcome and/or remedy being sought.

The formal complaint investigation can only investigate what is complained about on the basis of evidence available to BEN WILSON AAA. You should ensure all issues are addressed, and that you provide what evidence you can to support your complaint. This evidence should include a full WhatsApp Export (with media) of any WhatsApp chat.

  1. Where your complaint concerns the actions of a particular person then that person may, if appropriate, be informed of your complaint and allowed to present evidence to explain their actions, but will not otherwise be involved in the handling of your complaint. Your identity will only be revealed as part of this process where this is necessary for the person complained of to respond to the complaint.
  2. BEN WILSON AAA will investigate your complaint in a timely fashion, will keep you informed of the progress of your complaint, and will inform you of the outcome of your complaint within 14 days unless there is good reason for any investigation to take longer.
  3. BEN WILSON AAA is governed by professional ethical codes. This means BEN WILSON AAA may be obliged under those ethical codes to inform the ACCA or another professional body where evidence is found of a breach of those professional ethical codes by your tutor or yourself.

 

 

Appendix 3: GDPR policy

 

Who we are

BEN WILSON AAA is a “data controller”. This means that we are responsible for deciding how we hold and use personal information about you. Where we act as a data controller, we are required under data protection legislation to notify anyone who provides personal data to us, either directly or through a third party, of the information contained in this Privacy Notice.

Data complaints

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK supervisory authority for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk).

What is personal data?

Personal data is any information about an individual from which that individual can be identified. Your name, address, phone number and bank account number are examples of personal data. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data).

Data protection principles

We will comply with data protection law. This says that the personal information we hold about you must be:

Used lawfully, fairly and in a transparent way.

Collected only for valid purposes that we have clearly explained to you and not used in any way that is incompatible with those purposes.

Relevant to the purposes we have told you about and limited only to those purposes.

Accurate and kept up to date.

Kept only as long as necessary for the purposes we have told you about.

Kept securely.

How we use your personal data

We will only use your personal data when the law allows us to. Most commonly, we will use your personal data in the following circumstances:

Where you give us your consent to do so, for example where we ask for special category (sensitive) personal information for equal opportunity monitoring.

Where we need to perform a contract we have entered into with you.

Where we need to comply with a legal obligation.

Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests, or those of a third party and your interests and fundamental rights do not override those interests.

We may also use your personal data in the following situations, which are likely to be less common:

  • Where we need to protect your or someone else’s vital interests.
  • The personal data we collect about you
  • Enquiries

When you request information or make enquiries about any of our services or programmes, we may use the personal data you provide in order to fulfil your request or respond to your enquiry. It is in our legitimate interests to use your personal data in this way so that you receive the information you have requested.

Enrolments and orders

If you submit a booking request, enrol onto one of our Courses or purchase any of our other products or services, we may collect the following categories of personal data about you:

  • Personal contact details such as name, title, addresses, telephone numbers, and personal email addresses.
  • Date of birth.
  • Nationality and country of residence.
  • Education history.
  • Employment history.
  • Bank account details.
  • Billing address.
  • Credit card or other payment information in order to process your payments.

This information will be used by us to perform the contract we have entered into with you.

We may also ask you to disclose information regarding any criminal convictions you may have. We need to use this information in order to comply with our legal obligations.

During your programme we may collect information about your academic experience and progression. This is in order to fulfil our contract with you but it is also in our legitimate interests to use this personal data in order to monitor the provision of our service to you.

We may also collect personal data about your health in order to make appropriate arrangements and reasonable adjustments for you regarding your welfare or attendance. We use this information in order to perform our contract with you and in order to comply with our legal obligations.

Marketing

Where you have explicitly consented to do so, we may use your personal data to inform you of special offers and new or existing services that we believe may be of interest to you.

If you are opted into marketing, we may also upload an encrypted version of your email address to social media and advertising platforms to do the following if a match is found:

show you direct, relevant marketing messages

create audiences of people that are similar to you

ensure you do not see irrelevant marketing messages.

If you would prefer that we do not send such communications to you or share your email address in this way, please follow the opt-out links on any marketing message.

Internal business purposes

We also may use your personal data for our internal business purposes. This is in our legitimate interests in order to operate as a business and monitor and improve the services we provide. Where possible we will anonymise this information. Please contact us using the contact details in this Privacy Notice if you would like more information.

 

Automated technologies or interactions

As you interact with our website, we may automatically collect technical data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns. We collect this personal data by using cookies and other similar technologies.

Artificial Intelligence

To enhance our services and interaction with you, we may deploy different solutions which use AI – for example, to summarise questions we receive from you, to answer an FAQ, to capture information about you and your query, to provide instant feedback on simple quiz answers, etc.

These features will supplement the existing support we offer and will help us improve our student support services.

Where AI is utilised, we will ensure your privacy rights and the security of your data are robustly protected as follows:

  • In most cases the Al features deployed will not be trained with your data
  • In certain circumstances, the AI models will be trained on your data (for example to teach the model how to auto-triage different types of queries). However, in these cases, your personal data will only be used by us and will not be shared or used by the supplier of the AI tool.

In some cases, aggregated data may be used to train a supplier’s AI model. However, all personal data will be anonymised in advance, which means that it will no longer be possible for anyone to identify you.

If you fail to provide personal data

Where we need to collect personal data by law, or under the terms of a contract we have with you and you fail to provide that data when requested, we may not be able to perform the contract we have or are trying to enter into with you (for example, to provide you with goods or services). In this case, we may have to cancel a product or service you have with us but we will notify you if this is the case at the time.

Information shared with us from third parties

In some circumstances we may receive information about you from a third party, for example where a professional body shares your exam results with us, in order for us to support you as a learner and for us to monitor and improve the services we offer.

When and how we share your personal data with others

We may share your personal data with third parties where required by law, where it is necessary to perform a contract or where we have a legitimate interest in doing so. Such third parties may include the following:

  • Our service providers: We may share your personal data with other companies that perform certain services on our behalf. These services may include processing payments, providing customer service and marketing assistance, performing business and sales analysis and supporting our website and IT functionality. These service providers may be supplied with or have access to your personal data solely for the purpose of providing these services to us or on our behalf. BEN WILSON AAA is the data controller and will remain accountable for your personal data.
  • Your employer or sponsor: We may share your personal data with your employer or sponsor with whom we have a contract relating to your programme of study.
  • Parents and guardians: If you are under 18, we may share your personal data with your parents or guardians in order to perform our contract, comply with our legal obligations and if it is in your vital interests.
  • Professional bodies and regulators: We may need to share your personal data if required by a professional body or institute related to your programme or if required by a regulatory body or to otherwise comply with law.
  • Others: We may share your personal information with other third parties such as in the context of the possible sale of our business. We may also need to share your personal data in order to permit us to pursue available remedies or limit damages we may sustain.

The security of your personal data

We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal information to those employees, service providers, business partners, agents and other third parties who have a legitimate need to know. They will only process your personal information on our instructions or as otherwise agreed and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

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

Our storage and retention of your personal data

We will only retain your personal data for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting or reporting requirements. To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal requirements. Please contact us using the contact details in this Privacy Notice if you would like more information.

It is important that the personal information we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal information changes during your working relationship with us.

In some circumstances we may anonymise your personal data so that it can no longer be associated with you, in which case we may use such information without further notice to you.

Your rights as a data subject

Under certain circumstances, by law you have the right to:

  • Request access to your personal data (commonly known as a “data subject access request”). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.
  • Request correction of the personal that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate information we hold about you corrected.
  • Request erasure of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal data where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal data where you have exercised your right to object to processing (see below).
  • Object to processing of your personal data where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal information for direct marketing purposes.
  • Request the restriction of processing of your personal data. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal data about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.
  • Request the transfer of your personal data to another party.

If you want to review, verify, correct or request erasure of your personal data, object to the processing of your personal data, or request that we transfer a copy of your personal information to another party, please contact us at info@benwilsonaaa.com

No fee usually required

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request for access is clearly unfounded or excessive. Alternatively, we may refuse to comply with the request in such circumstances.

What we may need from you

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access the information (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is another appropriate security measure to ensure that personal information is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it.

Your right to withdraw consent

In circumstances where you may have provided your consent to the collection, processing and transfer of your personal data for a specific purpose, you have the right to withdraw your consent for that specific processing at any time. To withdraw your consent, please contact us using the contact details in this Privacy Notice. Once we have received notification that you have withdrawn your consent, we will no longer process your information for the purpose or purposes you originally agreed to, unless we have another legitimate basis for doing so in law.