Since then, businesses throughout the country, and from all industry sectors, have been working to ensure they are ready for GDPR by that date.

Here at CDS, in addition to preparing for our own GDPR compliance, we have been working with our customers to determine, develop and implement CODAS changes which will assist them in complying with the legislation. CDS began its CODAS GDPR programme in Spring 2017:

• First, we invited CODAS customers to join our GDPR working party

• GDPR workshops were hosted at our offices in Manchester over the summer to discuss and agree appropriate software changes

• Developed changes were then presented to customers in further workshop and training sessions over the autumn

• Changes were trialled on pilot sites in December and January with customer experience being fed back into the CDS development team

In the second phase of our CODAS GDPR programme, new versions of the software with embedded GDPR changes have now been rolled out to most customers, and a programme of updates and accompanying training is in progress; all CODAS customers will be updated before the GDPR deadline.

Some examples of CODAS facilities added in the light of GDPR are listed below:

• The ability to record marketing preferences for all contacts

• The ability to create supporting scripts for CODAS users who generate new accounts or new orders

• User profile definitions have been enhanced to protect the security of personal data

• Customer anonymisation functionality has been enhanced

• Visibility has been added for distributors’ customers, via CODAS–Online, of the marketing preferences the distributor holds for them

As the GDPR deadline date approaches, we are holding further workshops and training sessions to build customers’ familiarity with the new software. As an added bonus these sessions provide opportunity for CODAS users to talk to one another about GDPR compliance generally and share thoughts on how the new features can be used to support their broader strategies.

CDS has hosted a number of group sessions in Manchester over the course of 2017, with GDPR representing just one of many topics covered; feedback from customers has been very positive and we are really looking forward to hosting more throughout 2018.