Privacy Notice

1. Privacy Notices: Introduction

Your privacy and Personal Information are important to us, and we are committed to keeping it protected. As the data controller, we are responsible for decisions about how your Personal Information will be processed and managed. We’ve tried to make this Privacy Notice as clear and transparent as possible, so you are confident about how we use your Personal Information. This Privacy Notice explains how we collect, store, and share Personal Information. You will also find details regarding your rights under data protection laws and how you can contact us.

If you'd like a printed copy of this Privacy Notice, please contact the Data Rights team (see Section 12). You can get this and other documents from us in braille, large print or audio format please visit our accessibility page here for more options.

 

2. Who we are and whose Personal Information we collect

When we refer to "we", "us" and "our" in this Privacy Notice it means Allianz Insurance plc, which is part of the Allianz Group, including includes insurance companies, insurance brokers and other companies owned by the Allianz Group. Please click here to see a detailed list of these companies. When we say “you”, “your” or “individuals” in this Privacy Notice, we mean any living person whose Personal Information we receive in connection with the services and products we provide including:

  • anyone seeking an insurance quote from us or whose details are provided during the quotation process;
  • policyholders and anyone named on or covered by the policy;
  • anyone who may benefit from or be directly involved in the policy or a claim, including claimants, witnesses or other individuals involved;
  • your participation in promotions and market research; 
  • your use of our apps and websites, as well as details from the devices you use to interact with our apps and websites;

 

3. The types of Personal Information we collect 

We only collect information that we need, and have strict controls to keep it safe. The information we collect will depend on our relationship with you. We collect the following types of Personal Information so we can complete the activities in Section 5, How we use Personal Information:

  • basic Personal Information, such as name, age, address and contact details; 
  • family, lifestyle and social circumstances information, such as marital status, dependents and employment type; 
  • information relating to children in some circumstances, for example, where a child is involved in a claim;
  • product information relating to the things you want to insure;
  • fraud and sanctions information, including identification checks and background insurance risk details including previous claims information;
  • credit assessment information from credit agencies such as credit ratings;
  • claims information, including information about the claim collected from you and third parties for example witnesses;
  • audio, photographs and/or video, including surveillance to help us manage policies and assess claims;
  • tracking and location information, if it is relevant to the insurance policy or claim;
  • accessibility details if we need to make reasonable adjustments to help;
  • marketing and communications preferences including information collected from your devices relating to your use of our websites, via the use of cookies (see Section 10, Marketing below).

In certain circumstances, we may request and/or receive special category or sensitive information about you. We would only collect this information if it is relevant to the insurance policy or claim or where it is necessary for a legal obligation:

  • health information, including details of your current or former physical or mental health;
  • criminal information, criminal proceedings, outcomes and sentences (previous criminal convictions, bankruptcies and other financial sanctions such as County Court Judgments).

 

4. Where we collect Personal Information 

We collect Personal Information direct from individuals, their representatives or from information they have made public, for example, on social media.

We also collect Personal Information from other persons or organisations, for example:

  • veterinary practices, animal charities and breeders;
  • insurance brokers, intermediaries, business partners, affinity associations, price comparison websites or other introductory services where you have purchased our product or service through one of these third parties;
  • other insurers or service providers who underwrite the insurance or provide the services for our products for example insurance investigators and claims service providers;
  • financial crime, fraud prevention or uninsured detection agencies, databases and sanctions lists for example, the Claims and Underwriting Exchange (CUE), and Insurance Fraud Bureau (IFB);
  • government agencies and regulatory bodies including, emergency services and the courts;
  • credit reference agencies and debt advisors;
  • third parties involved in your product or claim, for example, claimants, witnesses, or business partners;
  • other third party suppliers including actuaries, medical, legal practices and other professional service firms;
  • Industry Regulators for example the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS);
  • insurance industry bodies and databases including the Association of British Insurers (ABI);
  • third parties in connection with any acquisition of a business by us; 
  • other Allianz Group companies.
     

5. How we use Personal Information 

We collect and use Personal Information in accordance with applicable data protection laws. In order to use your Personal Information as described in this Privacy Notice, we must have a legal justification, known as a lawful basis which will be one of the following:

  • Contract - to arrange, underwrite and manage our products, services and deliverables including handling claims;
  • Legal obligations - to administer third party claims, deal with complaints, prevent financial crime and to meet our responsibilities to our regulators; 

We also use Personal Information for the legitimate needs of our business. This includes, but is not limited to:

  • managing our business and developing our commercial activities including improving, and personalising our products, service, risk selection and pricing;
  • providing you with information about your product or our services related to your product;
  • conducting market research and enhancing customer service;
  • helping to detect and prevent fraud and financial crime for example by carrying out fraud, sanctions and anti-money laundering checks. Where we suspect financial crime or fraud through information obtained as a result of our investigations, we may cancel any policies  you may have with us, retain any premiums paid, be unable to pay any claim or offer you the requested product or service;
  • monitor animal cruelty;
  • developing and improving our administration, training, security services and insurance applications;
  • providing a service that keeps our customers and suppliers safe by identifying vulnerability to better meet their needs; 
  • managing our relationships with business partners;
  • facilitating the purchase, sale, transfer or disposal of any part of our business;
  • sharing your Personal Information with other Allianz Group companies when you submit an insurance application and or claim for the purposes of fraud detection and prevention. 

Please refer to Section 6, to understand how we share your Personal Information in further detail.

There is no obligation to provide us with Personal Information, but we cannot provide our products and services without it.

 

6. Sharing your Personal Information 

We only share your Personal Information when necessary for the purposes stated in Section 5: How we use Personal Information. 

We may share Personal Information with:

  • veterinary practices, animal charities and breeders;
  • insurance brokers, intermediaries, business partners, affinity associations, price comparison websites or other introductory services who introduce or help us arrange, manage and underwrite our products and provide our services and deliverables;
  • other insurers, and reinsurers who provide services for our products;
  • companies who help us check your identity and evaluate your insurance risk;
  • financial crime, fraud prevention, sanctions checking and third parties who maintain fraud databases and lists;
  • government agencies and law enforcement;
  • credit reference agencies and debt advisors;
  • relevant third parties if they are making a claim against you;
  • our approved suppliers to help deal with claims or manage our benefit services, for example, legal advisors, insurance investigators and loss adjusters
  • other third party suppliers including actuaries, auditors, medical, legal practices and other professional service firms;
  • other partners, local authorities and councils, including the RSPCA, if we suspect or conclude, following investigation animal cruelty;
  • regulators who monitor and enforce compliance with regulation, and insurance industry bodies and databases;
  • providers of data services and data analysts who support us with developing our products and enhancing customer service and experience;
  • any organisation where you have agreed for them to receive that data as part of the terms and conditions of your membership or affiliation;
  • external agencies for market research purposes;
  • third parties in connection with the sale, transfer or disposal of our business;
  • other Allianz Group companies;
  • other companies within the global Allianz Group (visit here for more details).

Some of the organisations we share information with may be located outside of the UK. For further information, please see Section 7, International Data Transfers.
 

Giving someone permission to talk to us about your policy 

We can only talk about the policy to you or someone we’re satisfied that you have authorised to talk to us, on your behalf, after we’ve carried out data security checks.

 

How third parties use data

Credit Reference Agencies (CRA)

To process your application, renewal or claim, we supply Personal Information about you or anyone on the policy to Credit Reference Agencies (CRAs) and they will give us information, such as financial history. We do this to assess creditworthiness and affordability, check identity, make pricing and underwriting decisions, manage policies, trace and recover debts and prevent fraud and other financial crime. We’ll also continue to exchange information with CRAs on an ongoing basis, including settled accounts and any debts not fully repaid on time.  

CRAs will share Personal Information with other organisations. This will be linked to the Personal Information of any joint applicants or other financial associates. The identities of the CRAs and the ways in which they use and share Personal Information are explained in more detail at www.experian.co.uk/crain, www.transunion.co.uk/crain and www.equifax.co.uk/crain. 

7. International Data Transfers

In the event that we, or third parties acting on our behalf need to transfer, store, or process Personal Information outside of the UK, we will ensure that this process is carefully managed with appropriate safeguards in place to protect your privacy rights. This can include transfers to countries that the UK considers will provide adequate levels of data protection (such as countries in the European Economic Area) or by putting contractual obligations in place with the party we are sending information to. 

Transfers within the Allianz Group are covered by an intra-group agreement which contractually obliges each group company to ensure that your Personal Information receives an adequate and consistent level of protection wherever it is transferred within the Group (see Section 15, Binding Corporate Rules).

 

8. Automated Decision Making

We use automated processes to make decisions which can affect the products, services, deliverables or features we may offer you now or in the future, or the price we charge for them. These automated processes use Personal Information provided by you, other information about you provided by third parties, including public databases, and information about the risk of insuring you to inform our business decisions including, product design, customer journeys and marketing strategy.

When we provide you with a quote we’ll use an automated underwriting engine that takes into account the Personal Information you provide. We validate this Personal Information by carrying out checks to confirm your identity and enrich it with information provided by third parties.

We assess the information to help determine the likelihood of a claim being made, how much it might cost. This assessment is based on various factors including information about the area you live in such as the likelihood of crime and the cost of veterinary fees. Insurers use different weightings to price insurance and this rating is confidential to each insurer.

Once we have a view of your insurance risk we can decide whether or not to offer insurance and the price of the policy.

We also make automated decisions throughout the life of your policy, e.g. before offering you a renewal or when dealing with a claim.

To help us prevent and detect crime we evaluate and predict whether your conduct when accessing our products or services suggests a risk of fraud. Behaviour consistent with that of known money launderers, inconsistent submissions or deliberately hiding your true identity, may result in us refusing to offer you insurance, services and deliverables or accepting your claim.

If you’ve chosen to receive marketing information from us, profiling and automated decision making will be used to make our marketing more relevant, e.g. personalising the channels used to market to you, the marketing messages you receive and the offers you’re sent.

Where we make an automated decision that has a legal or substantially similar effect, you may request a team member to review that decision. We’ll consider your comments and assess whether the decision was made correctly.

 

9. Artificial Intelligence

We use Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) technologies help us make decisions, identify trends, and improve how we deliver our services. Personal Information is processed to perform profiling and data analysis to build, train and audit models and algorithms including those used in our Automated Decision Making.

AI refers to a system’s ability to carry out tasks usually associated with human intelligence, such as learning, problem-solving and decision-making. ML is a type of AI that enables systems to learn from data and make predictions or suggestions based on that learning. The use of these technologies is subject to regular audits and human oversight to ensure they operate fairly, transparency, and without bias. 

We use models, algorithms and analytical tools for purposes which could include:

  • improving our products and services - for example, by reviewing complaint patterns, understanding website performance or identifying where we can streamline our processes;
  • predicting future events - such as assessing insurance risk, the likelihood of a claim being made, or whether a claim could be fraudulent;
  • managing claims - such as assessing liability or processing claims;
  • maintaining data quality - by checking how our systems, tools and models are performing.

To support this work, we may combine your Personal Information with information about other customers or with information obtained from trusted third parties. We may also use Personal Information provided during a quote, even if you did not take out a policy with us. 

We only use Personal Information for these purposes where we’re satisfied it is fair, lawful and complies with data protection law, the Equality Act 2010 and FCA requirements. We also carry out checks to minimise the risk of unfair bias or discrimination and use statistical techniques to ensure the information we rely on is accurate and meaningful.  

Where practical, we pseudonymise Personal Information before it is used in analysis. This means removing details that directly identify you (such as your name) and replacing them with a unique code or reference. This helps us protect your privacy while still gaining insights from the data.

 

10. Marketing

Cookies 

To provide you with a personalised online experience we rely on third party advertising technology, for example, the deployment of cookies or small text files on our website or pixels within emails.  These collect information about your interactions with us and analysis of your customer behaviour, including your use of other websites. This technology is used to optimise what you may see on our websites and deliver content when you are browsing elsewhere. We do this to provide you with advertising that we believe may be relevant for you, as well as to improve our own products and services.

For further information about cookies and other technologies we use on our website and how to manage cookies, please see our Cookie Policy.

Prize Draws / Competitions

If you enter any of our competitions, prize draws and similar promotions we will process your personal details to administer your entry including, selecting winners, advising promotion outcomes and sending prizes to the nominated address. We may use third party fulfilment partners to assist us in administering promotions, including contacting you on our behalf.  Please refer to the specific terms and conditions of the competition, prize draw or promotion that you are entering for further details about how we use and share your Personal Information.

In accordance with the rules of the Advertising Standards Authority, we may publish or make publicly available information that indicates that a valid award has taken place. If we do this, only your surname, country and, if applicable, your winning entry, will be published. You have the right to object to this use of your Personal Information.

 

11. How long we keep Personal Information

We keep Personal Information for as long as is reasonably required for the purposes explained in this Privacy Notice.

We also keep records, which may include Personal Information to meet statutory and regulatory obligations. For example, we are required to retain an accurate record of your dealings with us, so we can respond to any complaints or challenges you or others might raise later.

To support us in managing how long we hold your data and our record management, we maintain a Data Retention Policy which includes clear guidelines on data retention and deletion.

 

12. Know your Data Rights

Under data protection law, you have legal rights in relation to your Personal Information that we need to make you aware of.

We may ask you for proof of identity when you make a request to exercise any of these rights. We do this to ensure we only disclose information to the right individual.

We aim to respond to all valid requests within one calendar month, however, we may extend this if we deem the request to be complex and will inform you.  We may also ask additional questions to help us with your request.

The rights available to you depend on our reason for processing your Personal Information and we may not always be able to do what you have asked, however, we will always explain this to you.  

You have the right to:  

  • The right of access – you can request a copy of the Personal Information we hold about you, subject to certain exemptions (a Subject Access Request);
  • The right of rectification – we do our best to ensure that your Personal Information is accurate and up to date, if you believe our information is inaccurate or incomplete you can request that we update or correct it;
  • The right to be forgotten – you can ask us to delete your Personal Information from our records, but this right only applies if it is no longer needed for the original purpose. This isn’t an absolute right and we have to balance your request against other factors such as legal or regulatory requirements;
  • The right of restriction – you can ask us to restrict the processing of your Personal Information. This isn’t an absolute right and we may not be able to comply with your request;
  • The right to data portability – in some cases, you can ask us to transfer Personal Information that you have provided to us, to another third party of your choice;
  • The right to object – you can object to us processing your Personal Information and we will either agree to stop processing or explain why we are unable to;
  • The right to withdraw consent – you can ask us, at any time, to stop processing your Personal Information for marketing purposes;
  • The right to make a complaint – if you have concerns about how we process your Personal Information or are not satisfied with our handling of a request you have made in relation to your data rights, you can make a complaint. 

You can also ask us to have a team member review an automated decision.

If you want to find out more or to exercise these rights, you can do so by writing to: Data Rights, Allianz, PO Box 5291, Worthing, BN11 9TD 

or by emailing datarights@allianz.co.uk

To submit an individual right request, please use the button below:

Exercise Your Rights, powered by OneTrust  Privacy Web Form 

 

13. Data Privacy Officer

If you have any questions about this Privacy Notice or how we use your Personal Information, please contact our Data Protection Officer:

address:  Allianz Insurance plc, PO Box 5291, Worthing, BN11 9TD

email: dataprotectionofficer@allianz.co.uk

phone: 0330 102 1837

If you have concerns about how we process your Personal Information or are not satisfied with our handling of a request you have made in relation to your data rights, you can make a complaint to the Information Commissioner’s Office on 0303 123 1113 or visit ico.org.uk/concerns.

We ask that you please attempt to resolve any issues with us first before contacting the ICO.

 

14. Privacy Notice updates

This Privacy Notice is updated to take into account any changes to our business activities or to comply with legal requirements. This Privacy Notice was last updated in June 2026.

 

15. Binding Corporate Rules

The Allianz Binding Corporate Rules (BCRs) provide you with information on the rules governing the international transfer of personal data between Allianz Group companies operating in the European Economic Area (EEA) and Allianz Group companies outside that area.

The Allianz BCRs also describes your rights in respect of such transfers, what to do if you want to exercise your rights or complain about such transfers, and how to contact us.

The latest Allianz BCR can be found here, and an up-to-date list of Allianz Group companies who have committed to comply with them can be found here.