There’s the old roadside warning: “Tiredness can kill. Take a break.” Our version would read: “GDPR fatigue means fines. Don’t take a break.”
Fines issued by the ICO are now a lot tougher – and it’s just the beginning. With updated EU-wide legislation, there are two tiers of administrative fines that can be levied as penalties for GDPR non-compliance:
- Up to €10 million, or 2% annual global turnover – whichever is greater; or
- Up to €20 million, or 4% annual global turnover – whichever is greater.
Ouch!
In July 2019, British Airways was issued with a fine of £183 million. In the same month, Marriott hotels received a fine of £99 million for failing to protect the data of some 339 million guest records.
If you use clipboards, paper & pen to capture sensitive personal data like names, addresses, emails and telephone numbers on paper, you are at risk of not being GDPR compliant.
Imagine loose pieces of paper on pedestals, clipboards left in plain sight, remote staff accidentally leaving their paper diaries on a train.
The opportunity for human error is huge and the financial and reputational risk to businesses could be devastating.
And the number of reported breaches is rising fast. The Guardian newspaper reports that data protection complaints have almost doubled year-on-year from 21,019 to 41,661.
Being GDPR safe with paper records is not easy
To avoid a potentially business-crippling fine, businesses need to:
- create GDPR compliance procedures for each scenario
- assign GDPR compliance officers for each store location
- provide initial and on-going staff training
- carry out regular spot checks
- ensure secure storage methods for offline data and secure disposal procedures (like shredding or incineration) and more.
Go digital, for GDPR confidence
Digital tools like Qudini’s put GDPR processes in place automatically. So you can be sure that stored data is:
- collected with consent
- encrypted
- only accessible to branch staff
- set to delete automatically at the appropriate time
- ISO27001 compliant
- protected against vulnerabilities.
Ensure greater GDPR compliance, growing your business in the process…
Service providers who have swapped from a clipboard to Qudini have experienced exceptional results, including:
- Improved sales and loyalty through a better, more informed and engaging customer experience
- Improved productivity and resource allocation through tools that reduce workplace stress and help your staff to better manage their sales floor activities
- Capture unique insights on your brick-and-mortar operations.
Impressive results that our clients have seen:
Implementing a digital system for in-store customer management has positive business benefits beyond GDPR compliance. Qudini customers have seen tremendous results, including:
- 62% walkout reduction for O2 UK
- 33% average spend increase for a UK eyewear retailer
- 10% conversion increase for a global travel brand retailer
- 13% improved productivity for the one of the UK’s largest grocery retailers.
“Undoubtedly it has reduced our walk-out rate.” – Matthew Butler, Branch Manager, NatWest.
“I know exactly what is going on in my store, and it helps me lead my team a lot better.” –Shane Popat, Store Leader, O2.
