Privacy policy for Customer Service

According to articles 13 and 14 of the Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (GDPR) and the Maltese Data Protection Act (Chapter 586 of the Laws of Malta), Lidl Malta Ltd, with registered office in Vassallo Business Park, Burmarrad Road, Naxxar NXR 6345, Malta, hereby informs you about the processing of your personal data in the context of the handling of your inquiries by Lidl’s customer service.

The Data Controller according to article 4, paragraph 1, number 7) of the GDPR is Lidl Malta Ltd. with registered office in Vassallo Business Park, Burmarrad Road, Naxxar NXR 6345, Malta. If necessary, you can contact Lidl Malta Ltd. by telephone at 800 62 777 or by e-mail at info@lidl.com.mt .

Personal information provided by you when filling out our contact form, by telephone or submitted by e-mail, letter, fax, through social media or messaging services is, of course, treated as confidential. We use your personal data solely for the purpose of processing your inquiry, resolving complaints and disputes as well as for complying with applicable legal obligations.

The processing of the aforementioned personal data is necessary as essential in order to provide the service requested by you when filling out our contact form, by telephone or submitted by e-mail, letter, fax, through social media or messaging services (article 6, paragraph 1, letter b) of the GDPR) and fulfil the obligation to comply with the applicable legislation (article 6, paragraph 1, letter c) of the GDPR).

Furthermore, to ensure high quality standards in the handling of your request during telephone conversations, your spoken communications with the operator are transcribed into text format in real-time, without the audio of the conversation being recorded. This temporary transcription is immediately analysed by an artificial intelligence system to automatically generate a summary of your request. The legal basis for generating this temporary transcription and the related summary is Lidl's legitimate interest in optimizing and improving the efficiency of the service provided to its customers (Article 6, paragraph 1, letter f) of the GDPR). Should you wish to object to this specific processing, we invite you to end the telephone conversation and reach out to our Customer Service using the alternative contact channels made available to you (e.g., online contact form, postal address, social media, messaging services and e-mail).

In the event of requests for assistance relating to non-food and/or textile products, regardless of whether you wish to make use of the legal warranty or are interested in purchasing spare parts, we inform you that your personal identification and contact data will be transmitted to the technical assistance center specifically appointed by Lidl which will contact you to handle your request for assistance in the best possible way. The said data transfer takes place for the sole purpose of handling your request for assistance for products purchased at Lidl (article 6, paragraph 1, letter b) of the GDPR).

In order to identify you as a customer or to process your request, we may use personal data from your customer accounts at Lidl. The legal basis for processing your data is article 6, paragraph 1, letter f) of the GDPR. The legitimate interest in the processing of your personal data by Lidl arises from our intention to answer your request and thus to maintain and promote customer satisfaction.

In order to allow the verification of the quality of the assistance services offered by Lidl and its business partners specifically appointed as Data Processors, some calls to Customer Service may be recorded. Any personal information you may provide during the telephone call and included in the recording will be processed by Lidl and its business partners exclusively for the purpose of verifying the quality of the assistance services offered, improving the quality of Customer Service processes, and more effectively guiding the training of the persons authorized to process the data who are entrusted with such services. To ensure your privacy, Lidl has introduced specific protection measures, such as, for example, the alteration of voices within the telephone conversation (so-called "morphing"). The legal basis for data processing in the event of recording Customer Service calls is provided by article 6, paragraph 1, letter f) of the GDPR, as it constitutes a legitimate interest of Lidl to promote the improvement of the service provided to customers. Should you wish to object to this specific processing, we invite you to end the telephone conversation and reach out to our Customer Service using the alternative contact channels made available to you (e.g., online contact form, postal address, social media, messaging services and e-mail).

For the aforementioned purposes of handling inquiries sent to our Customer Service, personal data will be processed by specifically appointed employees and / or by service providers carefully selected and contractually bound to process personal data on our behalf as data processors pursuant to article 28 of the GDPR or transmitted to subjects and authorities whose right of access to personal data is expressly recognized by law, regulations or provisions issued by the competent authorities.

In the event of requests for assistance relating to non-food and/or textile products, your personal data may be transmitted to technical assistance centers specifically appointed by Lidl to handle your request for assistance (legal warranty or purchase of spare parts).

In general, your personal data will not be disclosed to recipients located in a third country, outside the European Union (EU) or the European Economic Area (EEA). Any transfer of personal data to a third country will take place, in any case, in compliance with the appropriate and appropriate guarantees for the purposes of the transfer itself, such as the use of standard contractual clauses, pursuant to the applicable legislation and, in particular, to articles 45 and 46 of the GDPR.

All personal information that you send to us in case of inquiries (suggestion, praise or criticism), when filling out contact forms, by telephone or submitted by e-mail, letter, fax, through social media or messaging services will be deleted by us no later than 90 days after the given final response to you, or securely anonymized. The retention of 90 days is explained by the fact that you, as a customer, may occasionally need to contact us regarding the same issue again and we have to be able to refer to the previous correspondence. Experience has shown that usually after 90 days, questions about our answers no longer occur. Occasionally it may happen that for legal reasons (e.g. in insurance cases) we need to store your personal details for longer period. In these cases, we do not save your information longer than the statutory retention requirements allow.

Regarding calls to Customer Service, the real-time text transcription is stored solely for the duration of the operator's intervention, in order to allow the proper handling of your request. The automatic summary of your request, however, will be deleted or anonymized based on the retention periods described above.

According to the GDPR, you as the data subject also have the following general rights:

• According to article 15, paragraph 1 of the GDPR, you have the right, upon request, to obtain information free of charge about the personal data stored by Lidl concerning your person.
• In addition, if the legal prerequisites exist, you are entitled to obtain rectification (article 16 of the GDPR), cancellation (article 17 of the GDPR) and restriction of the processing (article 18 of the GDPR) of your personal data.
• If the data processing is based on article 6, paragraph 1, letter e) or f) of the GDPR, you are entitled to exercise the right to object pursuant to article 21 of the GDPR. When an objection is entered, the processing of data ceases, unless Lidl can prove compelling and legitimate reasons requiring the continuation of the further data processing, which outweigh the interest of the person concerned in the objection.
• If you have provided the processed data yourself, you are entitled to data portability according to article 20 of the GDPR.

Insofar as the data processing is based on consent pursuant to article 6, paragraph 1, letter a) or article 9, paragraph 2, letter a) of the GDPR, you can revoke the consent at any time with future effect, without affecting the lawfulness of the previous processing of data.

You also have the right to lodge a complaint with the appropriate Data Protection Supervisory Authority. The competent authority is either defined by your country or the country where the Data Controller has its Headquarters registered.

However, should you have any inquiries concerning the exercise of your rights with regard to the processing of your data (data protection rights), please contact our Customer Service:

If you have any further questions concerning the processing of your data, you can contact our Data Protection Officer at the following email address privacymt@lidl.com.mt. Please do not use this e-mail address for issues that do not present privacy-relevant profiles (e.g. applications and customer service contact requests).