Privacy Policy

This document explains the principles and our commitments for the protection of your personal data and aims to inform you about :

• The personal data that La Méridionale collects and the reasons for this collection,
• How your personal data will be used,
• Your rights as a data subject.

Version of the Policy: May 2025

Who are we?

The data controller is La Méridionale represented by Maria Harti in her capacity as Managing Director. The contact details are as follows:

• Postal address: Immeuble Le Mirabeau, 4 Quai d'Arenc, Boulevard Jacques Saadé - CS 62345, 13213 Marseille CEDEX 02
• E-mail address: dpo@lameridionale.fr

The terms ‘La Méridionale’, ‘we’ or ‘us’ used herein refer to the company La Méridionale.

In accordance with the regulations in force, La Méridionale has a data protection department, which you can contact if you have any questions about your rights or the management of your personal data.

What personal data is used by La Méridionale?

As part of our relationship, you are likely to communicate your personal data to us by various means: via our website and our mobile site, our social networks, our call centres or when browsing, purchasing or booking. You also communicate your data to us by completing the collection forms when you subscribe to the monthly newsletter, when you create an account, when you submit an application, or more generally when you establish contact with La Méridionale.

La Méridionale undertakes only to collect data that is strictly necessary for the provision of the services offered. The categories of data collected may include :

• Identification data: surname, first name, contact details (postal address, telephone number, email), identity document, video surveillance image;
• Browsing data: IP address, cookies, connection data;
• Payment data: bank details (via secure service providers);
• Preferences: centres of interest linked to the services used.

When we collect data, we mark mandatory fields with an asterisk. Some of the data we request is essential for the following reasons:

• The performance of the contract we have entered into with you (e.g. to manage your shipping contract);
• To provide the service you have requested (e.g. to send you a newsletter);
• To comply with legal obligations (e.g. to combat fraud and ensure the safety and security of sailings);
• To improve your customer experience and our service offers (e.g. satisfaction surveys);
• To optimise the processing of requests and/or complaints.

Failure to complete the fields marked with an asterisk may affect our ability to offer you the services.

What is the legal basis for using your personal data?

Depending on the purpose for which the data is used, the legal basis for processing your data may be:

• Your consent ;
• Our legitimate interests, which may include
  o Improving our services, and more specifically our commercial interests in order to help us better understand your needs and expectations and thus improve our services, websites and applications in the interests of our customers.
  o Securing our tools, in order to ensure the protection and security of the tools you use (our websites and applications) and to ensure that they function correctly and are constantly improved.
• The performance of a contract, and more specifically the provision of the services you request from us.
• Legal obligations where applicable legislation requires data to be processed.

Minors' personal data

La Méridionale does not collect or process personal data relating to children under the age of 16 without the prior consent of the parents or holders of parental responsibility for the child.
If personal data concerning children is collected, the parents or holders of parental authority have the possibility of objecting by contacting us at the address indicated above.

To whom may your personal data be communicated?

The data collected on the La Méridionale website, its mobile site and/or its mobile applications, may be communicated to the company's authorised personnel, its partners or its service providers (reservation system), as part of the fulfilment of all or part of the services referred to above.

In accordance with the RGPD, La Méridionale asks its sub-contracted service providers to implement strict confidentiality and data protection measures.

Furthermore, in accordance with the laws and regulations applicable in France and internationally, La Méridionale may be required to provide personal information to the authorised French or foreign public authorities (customs, gendarmerie, police, etc.).

Links to third party sites

Our websites and applications may occasionally contain links to websites belonging to our partner networks, advertisers and affiliates. If you follow a link to any of these websites, please note that these websites have their own personal data protection policies and that we are not responsible for these policies. We invite you to read the terms of these policies before sending any personal data to these websites.

Can your personal data be transferred outside the European Union?

The data we collect from you may be transferred to, accessed from and stored in a country outside the EEA (European Economic Area). It may also be processed by staff operating outside the EEA who work for us or for one of our service providers, notably in Morocco.  

La Méridionale only transfers personal data outside the EEA in a secure manner and in compliance with the legislation in force. As some countries may not have laws governing the use and transfer of personal data, we undertake to take all necessary measures to ensure that the third parties concerned comply with the conditions set out in this Policy. These measures may include monitoring the personal data protection and security standards applied by these third parties and/or signing appropriate contracts (based on the model adopted by the Commission of the European Union).

For further information, please contact us in accordance with the instructions in the ‘Contact’ section below.

How long does La Méridionale keep your personal data?

La Méridionale retains your personal data only for as long as is necessary to fulfil the purpose for which we hold the data, to meet your needs or to comply with our legal obligations.

To establish how long we keep your data, we apply the following criteria: 

• If you create an account, we keep your personal data until you ask us to delete it or after a period of inactivity (no active interaction with La Méridionale) of three years;
• If you take part in a competition, we keep your personal data for 3 months from the end of the competition concerned;
• If you have consented to receive commercial prospecting messages and to benefit from advertising tailored to your interests when browsing third party sites, we retain your personal data until you unsubscribe and/or withdraw your consent or until you ask us to delete it or at the end of a period of inactivity (no active interaction) of three years;
• If you contact us to make a request, we will keep your personal data for as long as is necessary to process your request;
• If cookies are placed on your computer, we retain your data only for as long as is necessary to fulfil their purpose in accordance with current regulations.

We may retain certain personal data in order to fulfil our legal or regulatory obligations, to enable us to exercise our rights (e.g. to bring an action before any court) or for statistical or historical purposes.

When we no longer need to use your personal data, we will delete it from our systems and files or anonymise it so that it can no longer be used to identify you.

How does La Méridionale implement the protection of personal data?

La Méridionale undertakes to take into account the protection of your personal data and your private life from the design of the services offered to you. To ensure security and guarantee the respect and proper exercise of your rights, technical and organisational measures are implemented in order to prevent any unauthorised access, in particular by encrypting sensitive data, restricted access and a strict password management policy. We contractually require trusted third parties who manage your personal data on our behalf to comply with the same requirements.

What are your rights?

At any time, you have the right to exercise with La Méridionale the rights provided for by the regulations applicable to personal data, subject to meeting the conditions:

• Right to be informed: communication of clear, transparent, comprehensible and easily accessible information on how La Méridionale uses your personal data and your rights.
• Right of access: access to the personal data that La Méridionale holds about you. La Méridionale may require payment of a reasonable fee taking into account the administrative costs incurred in providing the information. Requests that are manifestly unfounded, excessive or repeated may not be answered.
• Right to withdraw consent: withdrawal of consent to the processing of your personal data at any time if such processing is based on consent.
• Right of rectification: update or correction of your personal data if it is inaccurate, out of date and/or incomplete.
• Right to object: unsubscribe or object to receiving our commercial communications at any time or to any processing of your data where the processing is based on legitimate interest. You can also click on the unsubscribe link in any email or communication we send you;
• Right to erasure/right to be forgotten: erasure or deletion of your personal data. This is not an absolute right, as we may be obliged to retain your personal data for legal or legitimate reasons.
• Right to restriction of processing: temporary suspension of the use and processing of your personal data in the cases provided for by the regulations.
• Right to portability: movement, copying or transmission of personal data to another data controller. This only applies to data that you have provided, where the processing is based on your consent or on a contract and is carried out using automated processes.
• Right to define post-mortem directives: formulation of general directives (with a trusted digital third party certified by the CNIL) or specific directives (with the data controller) relating to the conservation, deletion and communication of your personal data after your death (specific provisions for France), in accordance with the provisions of article 85 of law 78-17 of 6 January 1978.
• The right not to be the subject of a decision based on automated processing (profiling).
• Right to lodge a complaint with the supervisory authority: lodging a complaint with the personal data protection authority, the CNIL (Commission Nationale de l'Informatique et des Libertés). We invite you to contact us using the details below before submitting any complaint to the CNIL.

In order to respond to your request, we may require proof of identity.

To exercise these rights, you can contact La Méridionale by email at dpo@lameridionale.fr or by post at the address given above.

Modification of the present policy
Updates to this Privacy Policy will be posted on the La Méridionale website. We will also post a notice on www.laméridionale.com with the updated Privacy Policy.

Last updated: May 2025