Privacy Policy

The Foundation for International Education Limited

Company number 03508179 | Updated October 2026

About this notice

This notice explains how the Foundation for International Education Limited (FIE) collects and uses personal information when you:

• visit www.fie.org.uk or another FIE-operated webpage that links to this notice
• send FIE an enquiry or ask for information
• register your interest in a programme, event, conference, site visit or service
• subscribe to marketing communications
• deal with FIE as a university contact, internship or accommodation partner, supplier, contractor, facilities user or other professional contact
• interact with FIE through social media or another online channel

It covers FIE's general website and business-contact processing across its activities in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Spain and the United States. It does not replace the more detailed notices described below.

Who we are

The Foundation for International Education Limited is the data controller for the processing covered by this notice. This means that FIE decides why and how the relevant personal information is used.

Legal name: The Foundation for International Education Limited

Company number: 03508179

Registered office: 31 Heywood Road, Cinderford, England GL14 2QT

Principal and privacy correspondence address: Foundation House, 114 Cromwell Road, London SW7 4ES, United Kingdom

Privacy contact: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Other privacy notices

Students and applicants to FIE programmes should read FIE's Student Privacy Notice, which explains the more detailed processing associated with applications, admissions, academics, internships, accommodation, health and wellbeing, insurance, safeguarding and programme administration. It is available through the Student Policies and Guidance page.

Employees, faculty, contractors and job applicants receive a separate workforce and recruitment privacy notice. Where another FIE form or service provides a more specific notice, that notice should be read together with this one.

Personal information we collect

Depending on how you interact with FIE, we may collect:

Identity and contact information: such as your name, email address, telephone number, postal address and social-media username.

Professional information: such as your job title, employer or institution, professional interests and relationship with FIE.

Enquiry and correspondence information: including the content of enquiries, messages, feedback and other communications.

Event, visit and service information: such as locations and dates of interest, booking details, attendance, preferences and comments.

Marketing information: including subscription status, communication preferences, campaign engagement and records of consent or objection.

Transaction information: where relevant to a booking, payment, facilities hire or other service.

Accessibility or other sensitive information: where you choose to provide it so that FIE can support your participation in an event, visit or service.

Technical and usage information: including IP address, device and browser information, approximate location, referring page, pages viewed, time spent, links selected, online identifiers and cookie or pixel data.

Advertising information: including information about visits and actions sent through Meta Pixel so that FIE can measure campaigns and build or retarget advertising audiences.

Publicly available information: including professional profiles, institutional websites and public social-media activity.

Please do not include health, disability or other sensitive information in a general enquiry unless it is necessary for us to respond or provide the support you request.

How we obtain personal information

We obtain information:

• directly from you, including through forms, email, telephone, events, visits, surveys and social media
• automatically when you use the website, through server logs, cookies, Google Analytics, Meta Pixel and similar technologies
• from your university, employer, institution, colleague or another person who introduces or refers you to FIE
• from FIE's programme, internship, accommodation, technology and professional-service partners
• from conference and event organizers or providers, including attendee or participant lists made available to exhibitors, sponsors or partners
• from public sources, including institutional websites and professional directories

Why we use personal information

FIE must have a lawful basis whenever it processes personal information. The basis may differ according to the activity and the information involved as outlined below.

Responding to enquiries and requests

We use identity, contact and enquiry information to respond, supply requested information and take steps you ask us to take before entering into a contract. We rely on steps taken at your request before a contract and on FIE's legitimate interest in communicating with prospective students, partners and other contacts.

Providing events, visits, facilities and other services

We use contact, booking, professional and preference information to arrange and deliver the relevant activity or service. We rely on contract, steps requested before contract, and FIE's legitimate interests in administering its activities and relationships.

Managing university, partner and supplier relationships

We use professional contact information and correspondence to establish, manage and develop institutional and commercial relationships. We rely principally on FIE's legitimate interests in operating and improving its educational activities.

Marketing and communications

We use contact details, interests and communication history to send relevant news, programme information, event invitations and other marketing. Depending on the circumstances, we rely on consent or legitimate interests, subject to applicable electronic-marketing rules. You may opt out at any time.

Professional contacts and business marketing

We may obtain professional contact information from third parties, including conference organizers and event partners, as well as from publicly available professional sources such as university websites and staff directories, where such information is made available to us for legitimate business purposes. We may also use professional contact details to send information about our services, events and other relevant business communications, where permitted by applicable data protection and electronic marketing laws.

Where appropriate, we rely on our legitimate interests in developing institutional relationships and promoting our services. We comply with applicable electronic marketing requirements and provide recipients with a clear opportunity to opt out of marketing communications. We respect all unsubscribe and objection requests.

Operating and securing the website

We use technical information to deliver pages, diagnose faults, prevent misuse, maintain security and protect FIE's systems. We rely on legitimate interests and, where relevant, compliance with legal obligations.

Analytics and service improvement

We rely on FIE's legitimate interest in understanding and improving the website, subject to your cookie consent choices where analytics tools use cookies or similar technologies.

Audience building and targeted advertising

We may use advertising and audience-building technologies, such as Meta Pixel, to measure the effectiveness of our advertising, build audiences and deliver or retarget relevant advertising. These technologies may collect information about your device, online activity and interactions with our website.

We will only activate these technologies where you have provided the relevant consent through our cookie preferences tool, where consent is required by law.

Legal, regulatory and safeguarding purposes

We use information where necessary to comply with law, respond to lawful requests, establish or defend legal claims, prevent fraud, protect rights and safety, or respond to an emergency. We rely on legal obligation, legitimate interests, vital interests or another basis permitted by law.

Research and reporting

We may use aggregated or anonymized information for statistical analysis, planning and reporting. Information that has been effectively anonymized is no longer personal information. If personal information is used, FIE will identify an appropriate lawful basis and apply safeguards.

Sensitive personal information

Some information, including information about health, disability, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation or other protected characteristics, receives additional legal protection. General website and business forms should collect this information only when necessary. Where we process it, we will rely on an additional legal condition, such as explicit consent, protection of vital interests, employment or social-protection law, substantial public interest, or the establishment or defense of legal claims, depending on the circumstances. Student health, disability, identity, wellbeing and safeguarding information is addressed more fully in the Student Privacy Notice.

Who we share personal information with

Where necessary for the purposes described in this notice, FIE may share information with:

• FIE staff, faculty and contractors who need it for their work
• universities, academic providers and other programme partners
• internship, accommodation, event, travel, insurance and facilities providers
• website, hosting, cloud, CRM, application, email, payment, communications and IT-security providers
• Google in connection with Google Analytics
• Meta in connection with Meta Pixel, campaign measurement, audience building and retargeting
• Mailchimp (Intuit) in connection with email marketing
• professional advisers, auditors and insurers
• government departments, immigration authorities, regulators, courts, law-enforcement agencies and emergency services where required or permitted
• another organization where required as part of a lawful reorganization or transfer of activities, subject to appropriate protections

FIE does not sell personal information in exchange for money. However, the disclosure of online identifiers and website activity to Meta for audience building and retargeting may be treated as a 'sale', 'sharing' or targeted advertising under some US state privacy laws. Google and Meta may process information for their own purposes under their respective terms and privacy notices and may act as separate or joint controllers for some processing.

How long we retain information

FIE keeps information only for as long as it is reasonably needed for the purpose for which it was collected, to meet legal or contractual requirements, to protect individuals, or to establish, exercise or defend legal claims. Current indicative periods include:

• marketing information: for the duration of the subscription and, where needed for suppression, consent or recordkeeping purposes, for up to five years
• information connected with events, visits and related insurance or activities: ordinarily between one month and three years, depending on the activity and reason for retention
• financial and transaction records: between one and eight years, depending on the record and applicable legal requirements
• general correspondence and business-contact information: for the duration of the relevant relationship and thereafter only while reasonably needed for operational, legal or recordkeeping purposes

Website analytics and advertising identifiers are retained according to FIE's configuration and the settings applied by Google, Meta and other providers identified through the website's tag-management configuration. Current cookie durations are listed in the table in the Cookies, Google Analytics and Meta Pixel section below.

Student and workforce records are subject to the retention periods in the relevant privacy notices and FIE's internal retention schedule.

Marketing

You can stop receiving marketing emails at any time by selecting the unsubscribe link in the message or contacting This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Opting out of marketing does not require FIE to delete records that it needs for another lawful purpose, including programme administration, contracts, legal obligations or suppression of further marketing. Where FIE relies on consent, you may withdraw it at any time. Withdrawal does not affect processing that was lawful before withdrawal.

Text messages

No mobile information will be shared with third parties/affiliates for marketing/promotional purposes. Text messaging originator opt-in data and consent is not included in any third-party sharing arrangements and will not be shared with any third parties.

Automated decisions

FIE does not use the general website information covered by this notice to make decisions about individuals that are based solely on automated processing and produce legal or similarly significant effects.

Cookies, Google Analytics and Meta Pixel

Cookies fall into the following categories: strictly necessary cookies, which are required for the website to function and cannot be switched off; analytics and functional cookies, which help us understand how visitors use the website; and advertising and marketing cookies, which are used by us and third parties such as Meta to make advertising more relevant to you. When you first visit the website you will be asked to choose which categories to allow. You can review or change your choice at any time using the cookie icon at the bottom left of any page. A full list of the cookies we use, including their provider, purpose and duration, is available below:

Security

FIE uses organizational and technical measures intended to protect personal information against unauthorized access, alteration, disclosure, loss or destruction. Measures include access controls, authentication, encryption or pseudonymization where appropriate, system maintenance, staff training and incident-response procedures. No internet service can be guaranteed to be completely secure.

Your rights

Depending on the law and the circumstances, you may have the right to:

• be informed about how FIE uses your personal information
• request access to your personal information
• ask FIE to correct inaccurate or incomplete information
• ask FIE to delete information in certain circumstances
• ask FIE to restrict its use in certain circumstances
• receive certain information in a portable format
• object to processing based on legitimate interests
• object at any time to direct marketing
• withdraw consent where processing is based on consent
• complain to FIE or an appropriate supervisory authority

To exercise a right, contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. FIE may need enough information to verify your identity and understand the request. Rights are not absolute, and FIE will explain if an exemption or restriction applies.

Complaints

Please contact FIE first if you have a concern about how your information has been used. You may submit a data-protection complaint by emailing This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or writing to the privacy correspondence address above. FIE will acknowledge a complaint within 30 days, investigate it without undue delay, keep you appropriately informed and communicate the outcome. You may also complain to the United Kingdom Information Commissioner's Office (ICO).

External websites and services

FIE's website may link to or embed services operated by other organizations. Their privacy practices are governed by their own notices. FIE is not responsible for the content or privacy practices of external websites, although FIE remains responsible for its own decisions to embed or deploy third-party technologies on its pages.

Changes to this notice

FIE will review this notice when its services, technologies, data uses or legal obligations change. The published version should display its effective date. Material changes should be brought to the attention of affected people where appropriate.

Contact

Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Postal address: Foundation for International Education Limited, Foundation House, 114 Cromwell Road, London SW7 4ES, United Kingdom.