American Express Online Recruitment Privacy Statement - United Kingdom
Effective Date: 30 September 2024
At American Express, we are committed to protecting your privacy. The data controller of your Personal Data will be the entity that processes your Personal Data in the context of recruitment (namely, American Express Services Europe Limited or American Express Payment Services Limited, as applicable) (“American Express”).
In this Online Recruitment Privacy Statement (“Privacy Statement”), we describe how American Express, in its capacity as a controller, collects, uses, shares and keeps Personal Data about you during the selection and recruitment process in accordance with Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 (the UK General Data Protection Regulation) and the Data Protection Act 2018, as amended, on data processing, files and freedoms.
It is important that you read this Privacy Statement to understand how your Personal Data is processed throughout the recruitment process at American Express. It is also important that you read any other privacy notice or statement that applies depending on the specific processing activity. For example, if you are an American Express cardmember or browsing our website, either our Online Online Privacy Statement or Cardmember Privacy Statement will apply.
Our Online Recruitment Privacy Statement is available for you to access via the American Express Careers website. From time to time, we may change this Privacy Statement. We recommend that you regularly consult the version available here for changes or updates. If there is a material change to the Privacy Statement (for example, if the change impacts you personally, such as if we change the way you can exercise your rights relating to your Personal Data, and/or if the change will have a material effect on how we use your Personal Data), we will tell you about it. We’ll do that by informing you that there is an updated version – for example, by email or with a pop-up window when visiting our Careers website.
This version was last updated on the date set out above.
This Privacy Statement is provided in a layered format so, if you’re accessing the notice online, you can click through to the specific areas set out below.
> Scope of this Privacy Statement
> Personal Data we collect
> How we use your Personal Data
> Sensitive Personal Data
> Personal Data we share
> International Transfers
> Security and retention
> Your rights
> Questions or Complaints
1. Scope of this Privacy Statement
This Privacy Statement applies to all persons visiting our careers website, creating a profile, signing up for job alerts, applying for jobs, internships or other opportunities at American Express directly or indirectly, through external recruiters or social media platforms that link to American Express careers websites.
The Privacy Statement explains how we collect, use, share and store Personal Data that we obtain online in the context of recruitment for the purpose of managing the application and selection process.
2. Personal Data we collect
Personal Data is any information relating to you as an identified or identifiable natural person. Personal Data excludes anonymous or de-identified data that is not associated with a particular individual.
Personal Data we collect may include:
Personal details such as name, address, contact details (email address, phone numbers), date and place of birth, gender, nationality, and any other identification (for example, ID card, driver’s license where needed), profile picture; and
Education and work history, including resume, qualifications, education, skills, training, references, professional memberships, and proof of work eligibility.
We collect various categories of Personal Data directly from you (i.e., when you provide us with Personal Data or when we collect it ourselves).
You provide us directly with your Personal Data when, for instance, you:
Visit, use or apply on our recruitment websites (i.e. Career Center);
Sign up for job alerts;
Create a profile and provide your Curriculum Vitae (CV) or send us a CV;
Receive or respond to electronic communications we send.
We may also collect Personal Data indirectly from third parties such as recruitment agencies, interviewing companies, job boards, existing employees who refer you for roles, third-party sanction screening providers to meet the processing purposes described in "How we use your Personal Data; section below. Some of the Personal Data we collect is more sensitive in nature (also known as special categories of Personal Data). We will always collect this data in accordance with applicable laws.
We sometimes process Personal Data so that it no longer identifies any individual person. Once processed in this manner, it will no longer constitute Personal Data and will be referred to as aggregated and anonymized information. Aggregated and anonymized information helps us analyze patterns in groups of individuals and create business insights and reports to help us manage and improve our business.
3. How we use your Personal Data
We will use your Personal Data for a range of purposes, including for the purpose of managing the recruitment process (application and selection), your job alerts or as required by law. We describe these purposes in further detail below.
We need a “lawful reason” under data protection laws to process your Personal Data, which are as follows:
- where it is necessary for the performance of our contract with you or to take steps at your request prior to entering into a contract with you;
- where necessary for our legitimate interests, such as to manage and run our business;
- for compliance with our legal obligations, including under employment or tax laws, or health and safety laws; or
- in some limited cases, we may obtain your consent to process your Personal Data.
The table below sets out what we use your Personal Data for and our legal basis for doing so. Please note that we consider and balance any potential impact on you and your rights before processing your Personal Data for our legitimate interests. The legitimate interest relied upon is also set out in the table below.
Please note that we may process your Personal Data for more than one legal basis depending on the specific purpose for which we are using your Personal Data. Please contact us if you need details about the specific legal basis we are relying upon to process your Personal Data where more than one basis has been set out in the table below.
What we use your information for |
The legal basis for using your Personal Data |
|---|---|
| Research and identify relevant profiles for open positions including: creation of a candidate database, by matching CVs you have uploaded in your profile or you sent to us in our database with available jobs, creation and management of a platform allowing candidates to apply to open roles on Amex’s Careers website, making contact at a job fair. | • It is in our legitimate interests to look for candidates and select candidates among the CVs/applications |
| Preselection/selection of candidates who applied for a position, including sorting, and filing of CVs and cover letters, creation, and management of your candidate profile, review your profile, organise the recruitment (including job interviews) and select the most qualified candidate for the position. | • Where necessary to take steps to enter into the employment contract with you • It is in our legitimate interests to look for relevant profiles |
| Assessment of candidates’ suitability for a job and measurement of their professional aptitudes including processing of information gathered during telephone, face to face and/or video interviews. | • Where necessary to take steps to enter into the employment contract with you |
| Communicating with you regarding your application (e.g., if you choose to provide us with your e-mail address or mobile number, to send you e-mails and/or SMS alerts regarding your application and ask for additional details on your CV). | • Where necessary to take steps to enter into the employment contract with you |
| Validate your professional experience and education credentials if you are applying for a job and are subsequently offered a position. | • Where necessary to take steps to enter into the employment contract with you |
| Organize the onboarding process once you have been selected for the position including contacting you to organize the terms of your integration and drafting your employment contract. | • Where necessary to take steps to enter into the employment contract with you |
| Send you specific newsletters adapted to your professional interests and new relevant job alerts according to your selected preferences. | • Where we have your consent when you have registered to receive emails and notifications |
| Conduct internal research and analysis about our recruitment process. | • It is in our legitimate interests to improve the recruitment process and better understand our applicants |
| To ensure equal opportunities and treatment in accordance with equal opportunities policy and legislation and in support of global diversity, equality and inclusion initiatives. | • It is in our legitimate interests to combat inequalities |
| Where required or authorised by law, for example to ensure that you are not subject to international sanctions. | • To comply with our legal obligations to screen against UK or applicable to the UK sanction lists • It is in our legitimate interest to screen against other sanction lists affecting other part of the group |
| Where required to defend our rights, for example in the context of a litigation | • It is in our legitimate to defend our-selves in justice when required |
4. Sensitive Personal Data
What we use your information for |
The legal basis for using your information and relevant condition allowing such processing |
|---|---|
| We may process Personal Data relating to your health or circumstances (for example, information regarding any disabilities you may have) to provide you with necessary accommodations in our offices or to ensure we comply with equal opportunities legislation. | • Based on your explicit consent |
5. Personal Data we share
We do not share your Personal Data with anyone except as described below. We will only share your Personal Data with others where it is lawful for us to do so, and for a specific purpose (as detailed below or in the above table) with:
regulatory authorities, courts, law enforcement authorities and government agencies in order to comply with legal orders, legal or regulatory requirements and government requests and/or in connection with actual or suspected fraud or criminal activities, or investigation of the same;
with our service providers (including their subcontractors) that help us to manage our recruitment process and to operate our business;
the American Express group (meaning any affiliate, subsidiary, joint venture, and any company owned or controlled by our parent company), including for the purpose of providing services to us.
6. International Transfers
We transfer your Personal Data in other counties and (where permitted by applicable law) to regulatory authorities in other countries. Some of these jurisdictions may not provide the same level of protection for Personal Data as provided in the UK. Some countries will have different data protection laws. This includes transfers to countries outside of the European Economic Area (EEA), including to Canada, India, Malaysia, Mexico, Philippines, and the United States (where some of our operational data centres are located). We undertake these transfers to operate our business and to manage and administer our relationship with you.
Keep in mind, no matter where we process your Personal Data, we will always protect it in the manner described in this Privacy Statement and in accordance with applicable laws. When we transfer your Personal Data to certain countries outside of the EEA:
If that country has received an adequacy decision from the UK Government (please see the list of countries here), we will rely on that decision to undertake our transfer; or
In the case of transfers of Personal Data to a third party in the United States, we may rely on that third party’s certification to the UK extension to the EU-US Data Privacy Framework to transfer your Personal Data.
In other cases, we are required to put in place an “appropriate safeguard”. In particular:
When we share Personal Data with other companies within the American Express group that are outside the EEA, we ensure an adequate level of protection through our Binding Corporate Rules, available here. Our Binding Corporate Rules ensure your Personal Data is protected by requiring all our group companies to follow the same rules when processing your Personal Data.
When we share your Personal Data with third parties outside the EEA to countries which have not received an adequacy decision from the European Commission, we include appropriate contractual protections (including the European Commission standard contractual clauses together with the UK's International Data Transfer Addendum) in those agreements. In addition, we assess whether other technical and organizational measures are required for those transfers. If we are dealing with public authorities or regulators, we won’t need to have contractual protections in place but that doesn’t mean your data is not protected by appropriate security measures when it’s transferred.
You can receive a copy of such contractual protections by contacting us. Please see the “Query or Complaint” section below.
7. Security and retention
We apply organizational, administrative, technical, and physical security measures to protect your Personal Data. These measures include computer safeguards, secure files, and facilities. We only give access to your Personal Data to authorized personnel when access to such information is necessary to perform their role.
We will retain your Personal Data for defined retention periods. These retention periods will vary, depending on the reason for why we hold your Personal Data, and considering the nature and the sensitivity of the data. The data retention period will be determined by the following criteria:
If you apply for a job with us, we will retain your Personal Data for the duration of the period during which we process your job application and if you are successful with your application, we will retain your Personal Data for the duration of your employment.
If you are unsuccessful with your application, we will retain your Personal Data for a strict and determined period after the position has been filled.
If you subscribe to specific newsletters, we will retain your Personal Data until you unsubscribe or for three years after our last contact.
Please note that we may have to retain your Personal Data for longer periods if we have to withhold destruction because of a legal obligation to retain your Personal Data, ongoing litigation, a court order or an investigation by law enforcement agencies or our regulators.
When your Personal Data is no longer necessary for the above purposes, we will securely destroy such information or permanently de-identify it. For more information about our data retention practices, you can contact us – Please see the “Query or Complaint” section.
8. Your rights
You have certain rights in relation to the processing of your Personal Data. More specifically, you have the right to:
Access the Personal Data we process about you (often referred to as a “data subject access request” or a “DSAR”).
This enables you to receive a copy of the Personal Data we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.
In certain cases, request the 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 successfully exercised your right to object to processing (see below), where we may have processed your information unlawfully or where we are required to erase your Personal Data to comply with applicable law. However, please note that we may not always be able to comply with your request for specific legal reasons which will be notified to you, if applicable, at the time of your request.
Correct inaccurate Personal Data we hold about you.
This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate data we hold about you corrected, although we may need to verify the accuracy of the new data you provide to us. It is your responsibility to ensure that the information we hold about you is accurate and up to date – please see further information on how to do this below.
Request restriction to the use of your Personal Data in certain cases.
You can ask us to restrict the processing of your Personal Data in the following scenarios:
if you want us to establish the accuracy of the Personal Data;
where our use of the Personal Data is unlawful, but you do not want us to erase it;
where you need us to hold the Personal Data even if we no longer require it as you need it to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or
you have objected to our use of your Personal Data, but we need to verify whether we have overriding legitimate grounds to use it.
Request the transfer of your Personal Data to yourself or a third party.
We will provide to you, or (where technically feasible) a third party you have chosen, your Personal Data (which you have provided to us) in a structured, commonly used, and machine-readable format. Note that this right only applies to automated information for which you initially provided consent for us to use or where we used the information to perform a contract with you.
Withdraw your consent for our use of your Personal Data at any time, where our processing is based on your consent.
This will not affect the lawfulness of any processing carried out before you withdraw your consent. If you withdraw your consent, we may not be able to provide and/or perform the associated activity. We will advise you if this is the case at the time you withdraw your consent.
Object to our processing of your Personal Data.
This enables you to stop or prevent us from processing your Personal Data. You can make an objection in relation to all the Personal Data we hold about you or only to certain information. It may also only relate to a particular purpose we are processing the data for.
Note that you can only do so on grounds relating to your particular situation, when the applicable legal basis is legitimate interest. In some cases, we may demonstrate that we have compelling legitimate grounds to process your Personal Data, which override your rights and freedoms. If this is the case, we will inform you.
You can also object when your Personal Data is processed for direct marketing purposes.
Please note that if you decide to restrict or object to the processing of your Personal Data for recruitment purposes or withdraw your application, we will not be able to process your application or consider you for future employment opportunities at American Express.
If we receive a request from you, we will respond as soon as possible but no later than one calendar month except as follows. If, due to the nature or circumstances of your request, we can’t meet that deadline, we may extend it by up to a further two months (complex requests). In this case, we will send you an email or letter explaining the cause of the delay. Please note that your request will be free of charge, except in certain circumstances where we consider the request is unfounded or excessive and when the law allows us to charge a fee (we’ll explain this at the time before processing the request if this is the case).
If you wish to exercise any of your rights, click here. If you have any questions about how we process your Personal Data, you can contact us - please see the "Questions or Complaints" section below.
9. Questions or Complaints
If you have any questions about this Privacy Statement or how your Personal Data is processed, or if you wish to make a claim or exercise your rights, please contact our Data Protection Officer at amexukdpo@aexp.com . You can also write to American Express Services Europe Limited or American Express Payments Limited, Belgrave House, 76 Buckingham Palace Road, London, SW1W 9AX.
You also have the right to file a complaint directly with the Information Commissioner's Office directly at https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/ . If your request is not resolved to your satisfaction, you may also seek a judicial remedy.