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Ufford Park
December 20, 2018
Coes
January 28, 2019
Hughes is the UK’s fourth largest specialist electrical retailer and the second largest rental provider of home entertainment equipment and kitchen appliances. A complex multichannel B2C business, Hughes operates a network of physical stores, a strong online platform, a growing B2B distribution arm (Hughes Trade), and a dedicated Smart Home division.
With such a diverse operational structure, Hughes sought expert support from The DPO Centre to map its dataflows, review existing data protection policies and procedures, and conduct a comprehensive GDPR gap analysis across all business units.
Key Challenges
- Minimising customer data
- Ensuring data security
- Defining data retention periods
Solutions
The DPO Centre worked alongside Hughes’s in-house Data Protection Officer to provide tailored guidance and hands-on support. This included delivering staff training sessions, mapping data across the organisation, identifying high-risk data sets, and conducting impact assessments.
A suite of GDPR-compliant policies was drafted and implemented, and a prioritised action plan was developed to help Hughes address key compliance issues and improve data governance across all divisions.
As a result of this collaboration and the scale of its ongoing compliance needs, Hughes has since appointed a full-time in-house Data Protection Officer, who continues to benefit from The DPO Centre’s support as needed.
Outcome
Henrico Doward, Group Operations Director at Hughes, said:
‘We have had a positive working relationship with The DPO Centre, from our first meeting and the insightful workshop – from review to implementation – the process has been straightforward and hassle-free.
‘Guidance has been offered at every stage of the project, and we have felt supported in adopting the new GDPR processes. Importantly, the task has never seemed overwhelming with their help; we have some 41 retail stores as well as trade locations and warehouses, so it could have been a daunting project, however, the team at The DPO Centre never scare-mongered and simply worked diligently and systematically with us, giving us all complete confidence in their work.’
