Data analysis, wealth screening and targeting communications

The Bristol Royal Infirmary, the first hospital in Bristol, was founded in 1735 with the help of philanthropic donations. Philanthropy continues to have a significant impact on patient care and remains crucial to providing a better patient experience than the NHS can provide alone.

To help continue the tradition of philanthropic support of the hospitals, we may gather publicly available personal information about our supporters who we think can give us a major donation as they have been referred to us by existing major donors, key charity or hospital staff or have already given a £500/annum or more.  We do this to understand our supporters so we can focus our conversations with you about fundraising in the most effective way. 

We may gather information from publicly available sources, for example, Companies House and the Electoral Register.  We sometimes use the internet to find out about your interests and causes you support, membership of clubs and associations, average house value in your area, typical earnings in a given sector in order to better understand your interests and preferences so we can contact you with the most relevant communications.  We may carry out wealth screening, a process which uses trusted third-party partners to automate some of this work.  They may also use major industry directories, newspapers and journals.

This process helps us to make appropriate requests to those who may be able and willing to give more than they already do.  Importantly, it enables us to raise more funds, sooner, and more cost-effectively, than we otherwise would. We therefore believe that using your personal information in this way is necessary for our legitimate interest of efficiently raising income to support the hospitals.  Although there will be some impact on your rights, freedoms and expectations we do not consider it will cause undue harm because we have informed you of what we would do, and why.  Targeting our resources effectively and efficiently is an issue donors consistently tell us is a key priority for them.

We’d really like to know more about you and may send you a questionnaire or ask to come and meet you.

Due Diligence

We also use publicly available sources to carry out due diligence on donors in line with the charity’s Gift Acceptance and Anti-Money Laundering to meet money laundering regulations.