Privacy Policy

Wholesale Direct Privacy Policy

Effective Date: 11th August 2026
Last Updated: 11th August 2026

1. About this Privacy Policy

Wholesale Direct is a trading website operated by Gem Imports Limited ("we", "our", "us").

We respect your privacy and are committed to protecting the personal information we collect and use when you visit the Wholesale Direct website (www.wholesaledirect.co.uk), create an account, place an order, contact us or otherwise interact with us.

This Privacy Policy explains what personal information we collect, why we collect it, how we use it, who we may share it with and the rights you have in relation to your personal information.

Wholesale Direct is designed primarily for businesses, organisations and other customers purchasing goods for the purposes of their trade, business, craft or profession. However, this Privacy Policy applies to personal information we process regardless of whether you are purchasing on behalf of a business or as an individual.

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. The latest version will always be published on this page.

2. Who is responsible for your personal information?

The data controller responsible for your personal information is:

Gem Imports Limited
2 Athena Way
Hoyland
Barnsley
S74 0FQ
United Kingdom

Wholesale Direct is a trading name/website operated by Gem Imports Limited.

If you have any questions about how we use your personal information, you can contact us using the contact details provided on the Wholesale Direct website or by writing to us at the address above.

3. What personal information do we collect?

The information we collect depends on how you interact with Wholesale Direct.

When you create an account

If you create a Wholesale Direct account, we may collect:

• Your name
• Company name, where applicable
• Billing address
• Delivery address
• Telephone or mobile number
• Email address
• VAT number, where applicable
• Account login details
• Information about your business, where provided
• Your account preferences
• Information relating to your orders and previous purchases

When you place an order

Whether you have an account or use our guest checkout, we may collect:

• Your name
• Company name, where provided
• Billing and delivery addresses
• Email address
• Telephone number
• Products ordered
• Quantities ordered
• Order value
• Delivery information
• Payment method
• Order and transaction details
• Information needed to process and fulfil your order
• Your IP address and certain technical information relating to your device and browser

Guest checkout allows you to place an order without creating a Wholesale Direct account. We still need to collect and retain the information necessary to process, fulfil, deliver and administer your order.

When you contact us

If you contact us by email, telephone, through the website or by another method, we may collect the information you provide, including your name, contact details and the contents of your enquiry.

Information collected automatically

When you visit our website, certain technical information may be collected automatically. Depending on your cookie and privacy settings, this may include:

• IP address
• Browser and device information
• Operating system
• Pages visited
• Products viewed
• Referring website or source
• Date and time of visits
• Website interactions
• Information about how you use the website

Some of this information is collected using cookies and similar technologies. More information is provided in our Cookie Policy.

4. How do we use your information?

We may use your personal information for the following purposes:

Processing and fulfilling orders

We use your information to:

• Process and confirm your orders
• Take and administer payments
• Arrange delivery
• Provide order and delivery updates
• Deal with queries relating to your order
• Process returns, refunds and other order-related matters
• Maintain appropriate records of transactions

Managing customer accounts

Where you create an account, we use your information to:

• Create and manage your account
• Provide access to account features
• Maintain your order history
• Allow you to update your details
• Provide account-related communications

Customer service

We may use your information to respond to enquiries, provide support and deal with complaints or other issues relating to our products and services.

Website operation and improvement

We use information about how our website is used to help us operate, maintain, secure and improve Wholesale Direct.

Where analytics or other non-essential tracking technologies are used, these will be subject to our Cookie Policy and applicable consent requirements.

Marketing

Where permitted by law and, where required, where you have provided consent, we may use your contact information to send you information about products, offers, promotions and services that may be relevant to you.

Our marketing communications may be delivered using our email marketing platform, Klaviyo.

You can unsubscribe from marketing emails at any time by using the unsubscribe link included in the communication or by contacting us.

Unsubscribing from marketing communications will not prevent us from sending important service communications relating to your orders, account or other transactions.

Fraud prevention and security

We may use information to detect, investigate, and prevent fraud, misuse, security incidents, and other unlawful activity, and to protect our website, customers, business, and systems.

Legal and regulatory requirements

We may use and retain personal information where necessary to comply with legal, regulatory, accounting or reporting obligations, or to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.

5. Our lawful bases for using your information

Data protection law requires us to have a lawful basis for processing personal information.

Depending on the circumstances, we may rely on the following lawful bases:

Contract

We may process information where it is necessary to enter into or perform a contract with you, including processing and fulfilling an order, administering an account and providing customer support.

Legal obligation

We may process information where necessary to comply with legal or regulatory obligations, such as accounting, tax, fraud prevention, or record-keeping requirements.

Legitimate interests

We may process information where necessary for our legitimate interests, or those of a third party, provided that those interests are not overridden by your rights and interests.

This may include operating and improving our business and website, maintaining website and system security, preventing fraud, administering customer relationships and dealing with enquiries.

Where we rely on legitimate interests, we consider the potential impact on individuals and ensure that our use of information is proportionate.

Consent

Where required by law, we will ask for your consent before processing your information for a particular purpose.

This includes certain marketing activities and the use of non-essential cookies and similar technologies.

Where processing is based on consent, you can withdraw your consent at any time. Withdrawal does not affect the lawfulness of processing carried out before consent was withdrawn.

6. Marketing communications

We may send marketing communications by email where we are legally permitted to do so.

Where consent is required, we will obtain it before sending marketing communications.

You can change your marketing preferences or unsubscribe from marketing communications at any time.

Every marketing email will include an unsubscribe facility.

We may use information about your previous purchases, account information or interactions with our website to make marketing communications more relevant where permitted by law.

7. Who do we share your information with?

We may share personal information with trusted service providers where this is necessary to operate Wholesale Direct, provide our services or fulfil our legal obligations.

These may include:

Service provider	Purpose
Etail Systems	Ecommerce platform, website operation, account and order management
Opayo (Sage Pay)	Payment processing
DPD	Delivery and fulfilment
Klaviyo	Email communications and marketing
Google	Website analytics, advertising and related services, subject to applicable consent requirements
Meta	Advertising and measurement services, subject to applicable consent requirements
Doofinder	Website search functionality and related services
CookieYes	Cookie consent and preference management

We may also disclose information where necessary to professional advisers, insurers, law enforcement agencies, regulators, courts or other authorities where we are legally required or permitted to do so.

We require appropriate third parties processing personal information on our behalf to protect that information and only use it for authorised purposes.

8. Payment information

Payments made through Wholesale Direct are processed using our payment service provider, Opayo or PayPal.

Payment information is handled through the payment processing service. We do not use your full payment card details for purposes unrelated to processing your transaction.

We do not intend to store full payment card details on our own systems.

You should refer to the relevant payment provider's own privacy information for further details about how it processes payment information.

9. Delivery information

When you place an order, we may provide DPD or another appropriate delivery service with the information required to deliver your order.

This may include your name, delivery address, telephone number, email address, order information and delivery instructions.

10. Website analytics, advertising and tracking

Wholesale Direct uses various technologies and services to understand how the website is used, improve the website and measure the effectiveness of advertising.

These may include:

• Google Analytics 4
• Google Tag Manager
• Google Ads
• Meta Pixel
• Doofinder

The use of non-essential cookies and similar technologies is managed through our CookieYes consent system.

Further information about these technologies and how you can manage your preferences is provided in our Cookie Policy.

11. How we protect your information

We take appropriate technical and organisational measures designed to protect personal information against unauthorised access, accidental loss, destruction, alteration or disclosure.

Access to personal information is restricted to authorised personnel and service providers who need the information for legitimate business purposes.

Where appropriate, information is protected using security measures such as access controls, encryption and secure transmission technologies.

However, no method of transmitting or storing information online can be guaranteed to be completely secure.

12. How long do we keep your information?

We retain personal information only for as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes for which it was collected, including where necessary to:

• Provide our products and services
• Maintain customer and transaction records
• Meet legal, accounting and tax requirements
• Resolve disputes
• Prevent fraud
• Establish, exercise or defend legal claims
• Maintain appropriate business records

Different types of information may therefore be retained for different periods.

Where you have an account, we may retain relevant account information while your account remains active and for an appropriate period afterwards.

Where you place an order using guest checkout, we will retain the information associated with that transaction for as long as necessary for the purposes described above.

Marketing information will be retained in accordance with our marketing practices and your preferences.

13. International transfers

Some of our service providers may process personal information outside the United Kingdom.

Where personal information is transferred outside the UK, we will take appropriate steps to ensure that the transfer is carried out in accordance with applicable data protection law and that appropriate safeguards are in place where required.

14. Your rights

Depending on the circumstances and applicable legal requirements, you may have rights in relation to your personal information, including:

• The right to be informed about how your information is used
• The right to access personal information we hold about you
• The right to request correction of inaccurate or incomplete information
• The right to request deletion of your information in certain circumstances
• The right to request restriction of processing in certain circumstances
• The right to object to certain processing, including processing based on legitimate interests
• The right to data portability in certain circumstances
• The right to withdraw consent where we rely on consent as our lawful basis

You also have an absolute right to object to direct marketing.

Some rights are subject to specific conditions and exemptions under data protection law. This means that we may not always be able to comply with every request.

15. How to exercise your rights

If you wish to exercise any of your data protection rights, please contact us using the contact details provided on the Wholesale Direct website or write to:

Gem Imports Limited
2 Athena Way
Hoyland
Barnsley
S74 0FQ
United Kingdom

We may need to request additional information to verify your identity before dealing with certain requests.

We will normally respond to a valid request within the time period required by applicable data protection law.

16. Complaints

If you have concerns about how we have used your personal information, we encourage you to contact us first so that we can try to resolve the issue.

You also have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), which is the UK's supervisory authority for data protection.

Information about making a complaint is available from the ICO website.

17. Changes to this Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes to our business, website, technology, service providers or legal requirements.

The latest version will be published on this page together with the date it was last updated.

18. Contact us

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or how we use your personal information, please contact us using the contact details provided on the Wholesale Direct website.

Gem Imports Limited
2 Athena Way
Hoyland
Barnsley
S74 0FQ
United Kingdom