CANDIDATE PRIVACY INFORMATION STATEMENT

First release: January 2022
Welcome to The Adecco Group, the world’s leading HR solutions partner. We provide more than 700,000 people with permanent and flexible employment every day. With more than 34,000 employees in 60 countries, we transform the world of work one job at a time.
This website is our global applicant tracking system (“Website”) which enables the Adecco Group’s recruitment process for internal positions worldwide, offering you the possibility to apply for any position in a given business unit, country and/or entity.
As a candidate you can search and apply for any job available in the organization or create your own profile and set your preferences for future positions that will fit your requirements.
The Website is operated by Adecco Group AG, a company registered under the laws of Switzerland with registered address at Bellerivestrasse 30, 8008 Zürich, Switzerland. It is operated as a global site for The Adecco Group and is accessible by all members of The Adecco Group worldwide.
The Adecco Group is committed to protecting and respecting your privacy. This Candidate Privacy Information Statement (“Statement”) describes your privacy rights in relation to the information about you that we process, as well as the steps we take to protect your privacy. We know it’s long, but please read this Statement carefully. There is an index below, so you can go straight to the relevant sections if you prefer.
Depending on the country and brand website through which you access the Website, the respective Adecco Group entity will be the data controller of your personal data. In some cases even more than one Adecco entity can become controller of your personal data of your personal data. In some cases even more than one Adecco entity can become controller of your personal data.

Some terms to be clear about

First, we need to be clear about how we use some words in this Statement.
It may seem obvious, but in this Statement, you will be referred to as the ‘Candidate’ or ‘You’.
When we talk about ‘us’, ‘we’ or the ‘Company’ we mean Adecco Group AG. We have our registered office at Bellerivestrasse 30, 8008 Zürich, Switzerland. The Company is part of the Adecco Group, the largest HR services provider in the world. Through its various companies and business lines the Adecco Group provides several HR (Human Resources) activities like staffing, secondment, payroll services, recruitment & selection, testing solutions, career transition, talent development, training & education, outplacement and international mobility.
Finally, this is a statement about information and people. It includes facts about you, but also opinions about you and that you hold (“I’m a football fan” for example). It’s not about information about the Company (although sometimes the two overlap). This type of information is sometimes called ‘Personal information’, ‘Personally Identifiable Information’ or ‘PII’. We use the term ‘Personal Information’ in this Statement.

What Personal Information do we collect and use?

Personal Information that the Company usually collects includes, but is not limited to:
  • a username and password (credentials) of your free choice (mandatory fields to take part to the selection process);
  • your name, date and place of birth, contact details and qualifications (education, training courses and internships), documents evidencing your identity and right to work and any other information you listed on your resume or CV;
  • if you log on to the Website using your LinkedIn or any other social media account: your profile data;
  • if you contact us, we will keep a record of that correspondence;
  • feedback about you from our staff and third parties; where you give feedback on others; in some cases, we will contact your former employer to check your professional experience (this will depend on the job position or certain specific requirements); any reference check will be in accordance with applicable legislation and limited to information which has a direct link to the open job position or the related skills to be assessed;
  • your feedback about us and our services through our satisfaction surveys;
  • we also collect personal information on your visits to the Website including (but not limited to) your IP address, browser, timestamp, location, country traffic data, location data, weblogs and other communication data and the resources that you access. This information will make your visit to the Website easier in the future. We will, for example, suggest jobs to you which are being handled by branches local to where you were when you contacted us;
  • photos and videos of your attendance at a video interview or training or similar sessions (you will be given a chance at the session to ask not to be videoed or photographed);
  • We would like also to inform you that Adecco will perform whatever assessments are necessary as part of the selection process, which may require the data submitted to be processed, and that it will include the results of the assessment in its recruitment database as part of the selection process.
  • You are also informed that, as part of the selection process, the hiring entity may consult details of your public profile on social media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.), and other public information and records, with the sole purpose of assessing and ascertaining your experience and professional skills, and to know whether your profile is consistent with the Adecco culture and values.
  • we will also store cookies as set out in more detail in our Cookie Policy

Sensitive personal information. When you visit or interact with the Site, you are not required to submit information that may be considered sensitive. In some cases, we will ask for certain sensitive personal information such as details of any disabilities and any accommodations we may need to make for you in the workplace or details related to your gender or race or ethnic origin but only when we are permitted to do so by law. If you decide to provide us with sensitive personal information, we will handle the information according to the practices identified in this Statement or in the application page of the Site.

Why do we use Personal Information about you?

We collect and process Personal Information:
  1. to provide you with the services you expect us to, like finding you suitable jobs/assignments to apply for, helping you with training, or facilitating the process of applying for jobs/assignments. This includes sending your CV to prospective employing entities of The Adecco Group for their consideration and keeping you informed of future work opportunities by email, telephone, mail and/or other communication methods;
  2. to further develop, test and improve our Website, or other existing or new systems/processes to better serve you; this takes place in the context of new IT systems and processes, so that information about you will be used in the testing of those new IT systems and processes where dummy data cannot fully replicate the operation of that new IT system;
  3. to perform studies and statistical and analytical research, for example to compare the effectiveness of our placement of candidates between different business sectors and geographies and seek to identify factors that can influence any differences we identify;
  4. to transfer data to third parties (see below);
  5. where necessary, to comply with any legal obligation; and
  6. we will also process your information to:
    1. promote the security and protection of people, premises, systems and assets;
    2. monitor compliance with internal policies and procedures;
    3. administer communications and other systems used by The Adecco Group (including internal contact databases);
    4. investigate or respond to incidents and complaints;
    5. promote internally that training sessions have taken place and utilise their content (in the case of photos or videos of training sessions), to market similar sessions internally and externally to third parties. In this case we will ask for your explicit consent; and
    6. participate in any potential or actual purchase or sale, or joint venture, of all or part of a business or company, that any member of The Adecco Group wishes to participate in.

On which basis do we use Personal Information about you?

We are required by law to have a ground set out in the law to process the information we hold about you.
The legal grounds can be:

  1. Performance of a contract or steps prior to entering a contract

    2. When you are already working with or about to engage through Adecco, our processing of Personal Information for all these purposes is based on processing grounds like the performance of a contract, or about to enter into a contract (purposes 1, 6 above). These services can be such as providing you with suitable jobs to apply for or helping and assisting you with training and the application process.

  2. Compliance with legal obligations

    3. Sometimes the processing is necessary to comply with legal or regulatory obligations (purpose 5 above). Public authorities, such as tax, finance or data protection authorities may request personal information from us, and provide us with a statutory reason to disclose information about you (e.g. the prevention or detection of a crime). In these circumstances, we are forced by law to provide the authorities with your Personal Information.

  3. Fulfilment of our legitimate interest

    4. The processing is necessary in the legitimate interests of The Adecco Group in exercising its and its staff’s fundamental rights to run a business in a way which does not unduly affect your interests or fundamental rights and freedoms (purposes 1,3-5,6 above). This means that when processing is necessary for the legitimate interests of The Adecco Group, we balance your interests or fundamental rights and freedoms against our legitimate interest in processing. This ensures that we are not processing data in a manner that your interest and fundamental rights override our interest in such processing.

  4. Consent

    5. We shall only process your Personal Information other than on the abovementioned grounds with your consent, e.g. subscribing to job alerts. You can withdraw your consent at any time by contacting us at globalprivacy@adeccogroup.com or filing a request in our web form here.

Do you have to give us the Personal Information we ask for?

You are not obliged to provide your Personal Information to us, but it would not be possible for us to work with you, or provide our services to you, if you do not provide us with a required minimum. It may also limit the services that you can receive from us if you, in some instances, choose to provide us with limited personal information.

Do we process information about you without any human intervention at all?

We do not make any automated decisions solely on automatic processing, including profiling, which produces legal effects concerning you or similarly significantly affects you.

How long do we keep your Personal Information for?

The Company will usually keep your Personal Information for up to 2 years, once you have registered with us, after the last update of your profile, but this depends on your location; please refer to the applicable data retention period here.
If you are successful in finding work with us, we will need to keep your Personal Information for a longer period in order to comply with our ongoing legal and contractual obligations. Generally, we retain your Personal Information concerning taxes, contracts of employment and any financial information (including payroll data and data relating to pay, etc.) for 7 years after your employment ends, and other Personal Information for 2 years.

Which terms apply if you sign in with LinkedIn?

We also offer you the opportunity to apply to a given position by using LinkedIn. When you do so, you will be redirected to LinkedIn site (“third party site”) which has its own terms about privacy, cookies and use of the platform (“terms”).
We suggest you check their terms for more information. We do not accept any responsibility for any third-party website linked to or from the Site. Following any link to any other off-site page or third-party site is at your own risk.

Do we transfer your Personal Information to third parties?

As mentioned above, we usually disclose your data to third parties. This is done to complete the purposes set out above. We do this in the following circumstances:
  • To our suppliers. We will, for example, engage a supplier to carry out administrative and operational work in support of our relationship with you. The supplier(s) will be subject to contractual and other legal obligations to preserve the confidentiality of your data and to respect your privacy, and will only have access to the data they need to perform their functions; the relevant suppliers are typically IT suppliers (who host or support our IT systems, including information about you), premises management companies (who look after physical security at our buildings, and therefore need to know about you to allow access to our buildings) and back office finance and accounting management providers (who need to handle details of candidates in order to process accounts payable and receivable). We also engage suppliers who provide IT technology services and solutions, which might include video interview and skills assessment tools.

    These suppliers include:
    • Pontoon Solutions Inc. a Delaware corporation with a principal place of business at 10151 Deerwood Park Blvd, Bldg 200, Ste 400, Jacksonville, FL 32256; this supplier is part of the Adecco group of companies. It provides us with outsourced recruitment process services. Its processing locations include Poland, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, United Kingdom, USA, India, China, Manila and Philippines.

    • Lumesse Ltd with registered office at Ground Floor, Mulberry House, 750 Parkland Square, Luton LU1 3LU; this supplier provides us with the applicant tracking system which supports the automation of our recruitment process; this supplier relies on hosting services which are provided by Amazon Web Services which hosting locations are Germany and England.

    • Associates in Advertising Ltd with registered office at 200 Aldersgate, London, EC1A 4HD; this supplier provides us with the platform which enables and hosts our career website in the United States.

    • SHL Group Ltd with registered office at The Pavilion, 1 Atwell Place, Thames Ditton, Surry, KT7 0NE, UK ; this supplier provides us candidate assessment services. Its hosting locations are Germany and Ireland.

  • To members of the Adecco group of companies in other countries. These are located in- or outside the European Union; different members of the group fulfil different functions and as result your information will be shared with them for different reasons:

    • information is shared with members of the Adecco group that provide IT functions for the Adecco companies world-wide; those IT functions are located among others in Czech Republic, France, Mexico and Malaysia.
    • information is also shared with Adecco affiliates worldwide where you have expressed an interest in opportunities in that market, or members of the Adecco Group identify that you may have particular skills required or helpful in that market. A list of the countries in which we operate is available in our global corporate website

  • We will share your data with government, police, regulators or law enforcement agencies if, at our sole discretion, we consider that we are legally obliged or authorised to do so or it would be prudent to do so; and

  • As part of due diligence relating to (or implementation of) a merger, acquisition or other business transaction, we may need to disclose your data to the prospective seller or buyer and their advisers.

Do we transfer your Personal Information outside the European Union?

Your Personal Information can be transferred and processed in one or more other countries, in- or outside the European Union. A list of the countries in which we operate is available in our global corporate website.
We shall only transfer your data outside the EU to countries which the European Commission believes offers an adequate level of protection to you (a list of those countries is available here). Or where the Adecco Group has put in place appropriate safeguards to seek to preserve the privacy of your information (for which we usually use one of the forms of data transfer contracts approved by the European Commission, copies of which are available here).
Personal information which we share with members of The Adecco Group worldwide is subject to intra-group data processing agreements which have an adequate standard of data protection as required by data privacy laws. Additional European standard contractual clauses are also an initial part of our intra-group data processing agreements in order to protect the processing of your personal information in a secured and compliant way.

What are your rights?

  • Right to access and obtain a copy of your Personal Information
    • You are entitled to request confirmation whether we process any of your Personal Information. Where this is the case, you have the right to access to some of your Personal Information (via the Website) and to certain information about how it is processed. In some cases, you can ask us to provide you with an electronic copy of your Personal Information. In some limited circumstances, you also have the right to request portability of your Personal Information, which means, we will provide them to a third party upon your request.

  • Right to correct your Personal Information
    • If you can demonstrate that Personal Information which we hold about you is not correct, you can request that this Information is updated or otherwise corrected. We would encourage you to access the self-service Website where possible and update your Personal Information directly.

  • Right to delete/right to be forgotten
    • In certain circumstances you have the right to request that your Personal Information is deleted. You can make such a request at any time and we will evaluate if your request should be granted, however this right is subject to any legal rights or obligations where we need to retain data. For situations where in accordance with the law, we determine that your request to have your Personal Information deleted must be granted, we will do so without undue delay. Please bear in mind, once your data is deleted – that we might not be of service to you anymore once this data about you has been deleted. If you want to re-register with the Company again, you will need to re-enter your data.

  • Right to restrict
    • In certain circumstances, you have the right to restrict the processing of your Personal Information. However, in some instances such restriction of processing may limit any application you made or any services you may have subscribed to (e.g. job alerts).

  • Right to object
    • As far as our processing of your Personal Information is based on our legitimate interest (and no other processing ground) or relates to direct marketing, you are entitled to object to our processing by reference to your particular situation.


If you want to exercise any of your rights, please complete our form here

If you want to contact our data protection officer, please email us at globalprivacy@adeccogroup.com. When you email us to exercise your rights, the Company will need you to identify yourself before actioning your request.
Finally, you have the right to lodge a complaint with the data protection authority in the place where you live or work, or in the place where you think an issue in relation to your data has arisen.
To the extent our processing of your personal information is based on your consent, you also have the right to withdraw your consent at any time. Withdrawal of your consent will not affect the lawfulness of any processing based on your consent before the receipt of such withdrawal.

Do we send you marketing communications?

The Website does not collect any personal information for this purpose.

What about data security when using Adecco Systems?

You are responsible for keeping your login details to the Website safe, in particular the password that we have given you or that you have chosen. These login credentials are for your own use. You are not permitted to share your credentials or other account details with any other person(s).

How can you contact us?

If you have any questions or concerns regarding our Statement, would like further information about how we protect your information (for example when we transfer it outside Europe) and/or when you want to contact our data protection officer, please email us at globalprivacy@adeccogroup.com. You can also reach out to us by sending your questions, comments or requests at Adecco Group AG, Talent Acquisition, Bellerivestrasse 30, 8008 Zürich, Switzerland.

How do we handle changes to this Statement?

The terms of this Statement may change from time to time. We shall publish any material changes to this Statement through appropriate notices either on this Website or contacting you using other communication channels. However, we advise you to regularly check this page to keep yourself informed of how we process your personal information.

The Adecco Group team
V1 January 2022