The Data Professionals respects your privacy. This policy explains how we collect, use and protect personal information when you visit this website, use the maturity assessment or contact us, in line with the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA).
1. Who we are
This website is operated by The Data Professionals (Pty) Ltd, a private company registered in South Africa. For the purposes of POPIA, The Data Professionals (Pty) Ltd is the responsible party for personal information collected through this website.
Our Information Officer is Siyabonga Mabuza, Director. You can contact the Information Officer at info@thedataprofessionals.com.
2. What we collect
- Information you give us: your name, organisation, email address and message when you email us, including when you send us an application for a membership or a service, or send us your assessment result.
- Technical information: when you visit the site, our hosting provider automatically records limited technical data, such as your IP address, browser type and the pages requested, to deliver and secure the website.
- Your country, for prices: our hosting provider works out which country your connection comes from, so we can show prices in South African rand to visitors in South Africa and in US dollars to everyone else. We use only the country, we do not store it, and it is kept in your browser only until you close the tab.
- Anonymous visit statistics: we use Vercel Web Analytics to count visits, the pages viewed, the referring website, and the broad country and device type. It uses no cookies and does not identify individual visitors.
The purchase selector does not collect your personal or payment details. When an offer is available, you enter your billing and payment details in Odoo. The contact form prepares an email that reaches us only when you send it. References from earlier applications may remain in your browser until you clear its stored data.
The separate service quotation form at /enquiries, when enabled, sends the contact details and message you enter to our Odoo customer system after you give consent. We use them to respond and prepare a quotation. Assessment answers are not attached to service quotation requests or purchases.
We do not use cookies, advertising or tracking on this website, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children.
3. The maturity assessment
Your answers and your result stay in your own browser. They are not sent to us or to anyone else, and we cannot see them.
- Your browser keeps your answers on your device so that you can stop and return. When you choose to see your free result, the answers are removed from your browser and only the date and time you viewed it are kept. Choosing “Clear all answers”, or clearing your browser data, removes everything.
- When you use the assessment, your browser asks the World Bank's public data service for the latest governance figures. As with any website request, this shows the World Bank your IP address. It does not include your answers or the countries you selected.
- If you choose to email your result to us, we receive what you send and treat it as an enquiry.
4. Why we use it
- To respond to your enquiry and to continue a conversation you have started with us.
- To discuss services, training or membership where you have asked us to.
- To operate, maintain and secure the website, and to understand in aggregate how it is used.
- To meet our legal and regulatory obligations.
We process your information with your consent, to take steps you have requested, where it is necessary for our legitimate interests in responding to enquiries and running our business, or where the law requires it. We will not use your details for direct marketing unless you have agreed to receive it, and you may withdraw that agreement at any time.
5. Who we share it with
We do not sell or rent personal information. We share it only with service providers who help us run the website and our communications, such as our website host and our email provider. They may process information only on our instructions and must keep it secure and confidential. We may also disclose information where the law requires us to.
6. Transfers outside South Africa
Some of our service providers store or process information on servers outside South Africa. Where this happens, we take reasonable steps to ensure the recipient is subject to law, binding rules or an agreement that provides an adequate level of protection, as section 72 of POPIA requires.
7. How long we keep it
We keep enquiry information only for as long as we need it for the purpose for which it was collected, or as the law requires. Enquiries that do not lead to an ongoing relationship are deleted within 24 months.
8. How we protect it
We use reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect personal information against loss, misuse and unauthorised access, including encrypted connections to this website and restricted access to our records. If we believe a security compromise has affected your information, we will notify you and the Information Regulator as POPIA requires.
9. Your rights
Under POPIA you may ask us:
- whether we hold personal information about you, and for a copy of it;
- to correct or update information that is inaccurate or incomplete;
- to delete information we are no longer entitled to keep;
- to stop processing your information, or object to it, on reasonable grounds.
To make a request, email info@thedataprofessionals.com. We may need to confirm your identity before we act on it.
10. Complaints
If you are unhappy with how we have handled your personal information, please contact our Information Officer first so that we can try to resolve it. You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator (South Africa) at inforegulator.org.za.
11. Third-party services and links
The World Bank request is described in section 3. When the service quotation form is enabled, Cloudflare Turnstile verifies submissions to reduce spam; see Cloudflare's privacy policy. Odoo stores service enquiries, and Odoo and its configured payment provider handle checkout if you choose an approved online offer. The typefaces are served from this website. Links to other websites are provided for convenience; we are not responsible for their privacy practices.
12. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time. The date at the top of this page shows when it was last changed.