RDS HUB LTD (company number 16285288), trading as Rana Driving School and RDS dual-control car hire / test-day car service, is the data controller for the personal data described in this notice. Trading address: 6 Exeter Place, Walsall WS2 9UQ.
Data we collect, by service
Lesson enquiries and callbacks: name, phone number, area/postcode, lesson type, and instructor preference.
Registering as a pupil: name, email, phone, address (and addresses from the last six months), driving licence number, theory test number, test centres, any notes you add, a photo of your provisional licence, and your electronic signature.
Test-day car hire enquiries: your contact details, your DVSA test booking details, a screenshot of your DVSA booking confirmation, a photo of your provisional licence and, if you ask us to collect you, your pickup postcode.
Dual-control / vehicle hire: your driving licence and identity documents, insurance documents (where you supply your own cover), vehicle-check photos and videos at start and end of hire, your e-signature and its audit trail (the time, your IP address and device details when you sign), and payment references (we do not store full card numbers). If you allow it in your browser, the vehicle check can also record your location.
Instructor applications: name, email, phone, address, licence or ADI number, details of any driving school you are leaving and your written release, DBS certificate details (and a copy where you give one), and your signing record.
SMS / text messages: the content and delivery status of texts we send about your booking, lesson or hire, and any replies you send us.
Which advert brought you here: only if you accept advertising cookies (see Cookies and online advertising below).
Our texts are about your booking, lesson or hire. Reply STOP to any text to stop messages that are not needed to carry out your booking, or contact us at info@rds-hub-ltd.co.uk.
Why we use it, and our lawful basis
We use your data to arrange and deliver lessons, test-day hire and dual-control hire, to communicate with you about your booking, and to meet our legal and insurance obligations. Our lawful bases are:
Performance of a contract — arranging and running your lesson, test-day hire or vehicle hire.
Legitimate interests — following up enquiries, preventing fraud and damage disputes, and improving our service.
Legal obligation — DVLA/DVSA checks, insurance requirements, and passing on details relating to penalty charge notices (PCNs) where the law allows it.
Consent — only for advertising cookies (see below). You can say no, and you can change your mind at any time.
Who we share it with
These companies help us run the service and handle your data for us:
Google — Google Workspace (email), Google Sheets and Drive (our booking records and the documents you upload) and Google Apps Script (our booking system). Our pages also load fonts from Google Fonts, so Google receives your IP address when a page loads.
Google Gemini — an AI assistant our team uses to look up and answer questions about bookings. It receives the booking details our team asks about, for example a name, phone number, booking status and amounts. If we switch on our automated phone assistant, what callers say is also processed by Gemini.
Airwallex (UK) Limited — the bank account that receives payments made to RDS HUB LTD.
Starling Bank — we read our Starling payment feed to match incoming payments to bookings.
Our SMS gateway provider — to send and receive booking and hire text messages.
Postcode and map services (postcodes.io, OSRM and OpenStreetMap Nominatim) — a pickup postcode you type on our forms is sent to them to work out the distance.
ipify.org — used when you sign a vehicle check, to record the IP address you signed from.
WhatsApp (Meta) — if you message us on WhatsApp, the conversation goes through WhatsApp under its own privacy policy.
Google Ads — only if you accept advertising cookies (see below).
Insurers and relevant authorities (e.g. for PCNs or vehicle-related enquiries), where we're required or permitted to share details.
We do not sell your data. We do not share it outside these purposes without telling you.
How long we keep it
Personal data is kept while needed for the booking and our legal obligations, then deleted or anonymised. In practice:
Licence, identity and DBS documents: while needed for the booking or application, then deleted or anonymised.
Vehicle-check photos and videos, signed agreements: while the hire is running and while an insurance, damage or fine (PCN) claim could still arise, then deleted or anonymised.
Payment and accounting records: at least 6 years, because tax law requires it.
Enquiries that do not become a booking: only as long as we need to follow them up, then deleted or anonymised.
Cookies and online advertising
Our website works fully without advertising cookies. We only use them if you press Accept on the cookie banner.
What we use: Google Ads. If you accept, Google sets cookies on your device and receives information such as the pages you visit and the advert you clicked, so we can see which adverts bring in customers.
The advert you clicked: if you arrive from an advert and accept, we keep the click ID and campaign name from the web address for this browser session. If you then send an enquiry we may save them with it, so we know which advert it came from. If you decline, we do not store them.
Your phone number: if you accept and then send a test-day enquiry, your phone number is passed to Google in scrambled (hashed) form so it can match the enquiry to the advert. Google's own privacy policy applies to what it receives.
Your choice: we remember it on your own device (not on our server) for 12 months, then ask again. Declining makes no difference to the service. You can change it at any time with the button below, or the “Cookie choices” link at the bottom of every page.
Other storage: we do not use any other cookies for tracking. A few pages keep things on your own device so that they work: a draft of the registration form until you send it, and the sign-in for the instructor portal.
Your rights
Under UK GDPR you have the right to ask us for access to your data, to have inaccurate data corrected, to ask us to erase or restrict it, and to object to certain processing. Where we rely on your consent (advertising cookies) you can withdraw it at any time. To exercise any of these, contact us using the details below. If you're not satisfied with our response, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113.