PRIVACY POLICY


Last Updated: January 29, 2020

SoulMates Animal Care Referral Network Inc. (collectively “SoulMates” or “we” or “us” or “our”) has developed this Privacy Policy which details important information regarding the use and disclosure of information collected on our website (https://www.soulmatesanimalcare.com/) and our collection of information during our normal course of business and record-keeping, such as through your participation in our referral services.

SoulMates is a referral service provider (our “Services”) that seeks to match pet owners (“Clients”) with independent qualified service providers (“Service Providers”) to provide animal care services including dog walking, dog- and cat-visits, and house sitting on a one-time or recurring basis.  In conjunction with providing this Service, privacy is of great importance to us.  Therefore, we have established this Privacy Policy as a means to communicate our information gathering and dissemination practices.

It is important that you read this Privacy Policy, together with any other terms, contracts, and notices that we may provide you on specific occasions when we are collecting or processing information about you, so that you are aware of how and why we are using such information. 

By using this website and/or providing information to us during our normal course of business with you, such as through your use of our Services either as a Client or Service Provider, you signify your assent to this Privacy Policy.  We may modify this Privacy Policy from time to time in our sole discretion and will post any such changes on our website. If you are from outside the United States, please note any information you provide may be transferred to, stored, and processed within the United States.

INFORMATION WE COLLECT

We may ask for and collect the following information about you when you use our Services either as a Client or a Service Provider. This information is necessary for the adequate performance of the contract between you and us, for us to be able to provide and improve the functionalities of our Services, and to allow us to comply with our legal obligations. Without it, we may not be able to provide you with any or all of our Services.

  • Account Information. When you sign up for an account with us, we require certain information such as your first name, last name, email address, home address, phone number and information on your pet.

  • Client Information. If you are a Client, you may provide us with certain information such as contact information for yourself and other animal guardians, your home address, credit card/debit card or other billing information, a key or lock code to your premises, information about your animals (including breed, vaccinations, age, weight, medical or other conditions, past aggressive behavior), and access to your premises while you are absent.  This information, except for credit card/debit card and billing information, may be passed to Service Providers for fulfillment of their contracts and services with you.  However, we require Service Providers to contractually agree to limit use of your information only to that necessary to provide their services, and further, that they must protect and guard your information and premises with the same degree of protection and care they afford their own sensitive data.

  • Service Provider Information. If you are a Service Provider, you may provide us certain information, such as contact information, employee background check information and clearances, insurance information and billing address.  Your business name, primary contact name, and telephone number will be provided to Clients if you agree to provide services to such Clients.  In addition, while at a Clients’ premise, Clients may utilize video or audio cameras, monitoring or recording devices in or around their premises, including “Ring” and similar doorbells and security cameras, which may record Service Provider’s voice and/or image subject to certain contractual limitations.

  • Payment Information. When you use our Services, we require certain financial information (like your bank account or credit card information) in order to process payments and comply with applicable law.

  • Identity Verification and Other Information. If you are a Service Provider, we may require identity verification information (such as images of your government issued ID, passport, national ID card, or driving license) or other authentication information, your date of birth, your address, email address, phone number and other information in order to verify your identity, preform background checks, and provide payments to you, and to comply with applicable law.

  • Other Information. You may otherwise choose to provide us information when you fill in a form, update or add information to your account, respond to surveys or feedback requests, post to community forums, participate in promotions, communicate with our customer care team, share your experience with us, or use other features. Doing so is completely voluntary on your part, and you have the choice about whether and what information to disclose in doing so.

  • Other Sources. To the extent permitted by applicable law, we may receive additional information about you, such as demographic data or information to help detect fraud and safety issues, from third party service providers and/or partners, and combine it with information we have about you. For example, we may receive background check results (with your consent where required) or fraud warnings from service providers like identity verification services for our fraud prevention and risk assessment efforts.

  • Our Website. We do not collect personal information from you when you visit our website.  However, if you choose to contact us via email through our website, we may retain your email and email address along with any other associated information.  Doing so is completely voluntary on your part, and you have the choice about whether and what information to disclose via your email.

 HOW WE USE AND SHARE YOUR INFORMATION

Use of Information by Us. 

We do not sell or disclose your data or information or use it for purposes other than to provide referral, billing, and dispute resolution services or to collect a debt from you.

However, we may use such information: (1) to process transactions and/or conduct business with you; (2); to provide, improve, and develop our Services (3) to contact you (4) for internal business purposes and record keeping; (5) as required by law, and/or (6) as otherwise set forth in this Privacy Policy. 

For example, and without limitation, we may use your personal information to:

  • enable you to access and use our Services,

  • enable you to communicate with other Clients and/or Service Providers, as the case may be,

  • operate, protect, improve, and optimize our Services,

  • provide customer service to you,

  • enable payment and payment processing,

  • for internal record keeping,

  • send you service or support messages, updates, security alerts, and account notifications,

  • detect and prevent fraud, spam, abuse, security incidents, and other harmful activity,

  • conduct security investigations and risk assessments,

  • verify or authenticate information or identifications provided by you,

  • conduct checks against databases and other information sources, including background or police checks, to the extent permitted by applicable laws and with your consent where required,

  • comply with our legal obligations, and

  • resolve any disputes and enforce our agreements and contracts.

We process and use this information for these purposes given our legitimate interest in operating and providing our Services, for performance of our contract(s) with you, and/or to comply with applicable laws.

In addition, as part of our legitimate interest in operating our Services, providing our Services to you, and in performance of our Contract(s) with you, a Service Provider’s business name, primary contact name, and telephone number will be provided to Clients if Service Provider agrees to provide services to such Clients.  And, Client information, except for credit card/debit card and billing information, may be passed to Service Providers for fulfillment of their contracts and services with the Client.

Third Party Providers.

We may use a variety of third-party providers to help us provide our Services to you. For example, third party providers may help us: (i) verify your identity or authenticate your identification documents, (ii) check information against public databases, (iii) conduct background or police checks, fraud prevention, and risk assessment, (iv) provide customer service, advertising, or payments services, or (v) resolve any disputes and enforce our agreements and contracts. These providers have limited access to your personal information to perform these tasks on our behalf, and are contractually bound to protect the personal information and only use the personal information in accordance with our instructions.

Legal Matters; Safety. 

We may, without your consent, access and disclose your information, any communications sent or received by you, and any other information that we may have about you as may be permitted or required by law or to prevent or investigate suspected fraud, or activity that appears to us to be illegal or may expose us to legal liability. Additionally, we may disclose your information and/or communications in situations that we believe to be: (i) emergencies involving potential threats to the physical safety of any person, property, or pet if we believe that your information in any way relates to that threat; or (ii) your conduct that we believe is inappropriate and inconsistent with generally accepted norms of behavior. 

ACCESS TO YOUR INFORMATION

If for any reason you are concerned that any information you provided to us is not correct and you wish to change it, you have the ability to review and update or correct your personal information. If you would like to do so, please contact us as set forth below. Specify the nature of your request and the information that is subject to your request.

We reserve the right not to allow access to your information or to limit your rights (e.g. if such disclosure is prohibited by law or if the rights of another individual might be violated). Please also note that despite any request for an update or change to personal information, we may need to retain certain information for recordkeeping purposes and there may also be residual information that will remain within our databases and other records, which will not be removed or changed. 

COOKIES AND OTHER TRACKING TECHNOLOGIES

We do not track cookies or use other tracking technologies on our website.  In addition, you can also control the use of cookies at the individual browser level as most browsers and mobile devices allow you to change your settings to notify you when you receive cookies or other tracking technologies are being used, and to choose whether or not to accept or allow it.  Most browsers allow you to disable or delete existing cookies or to automatically reject future cookies.

IMPORTANT DISCLOSURES, PRACTICES AND CONTACT INFORMATION

How long is your personal information retained by us.  Unless we explain otherwise to you, we’ll hold information based on the following criteria: for as long as we have legitimate business needs, such as managing our contracts and relationship with you and managing our operations and Services; for as long as someone could bring a claim against us related to the information; and/or retention periods in line with legal and regulatory requirements or guidance.

Links to other Site and Communities.  To the extent hyperlinks and/or social media links may be utilized to access external or third party sites and communities, you should be aware that these external or third party site and social media communities are not controlled by us and, therefore, are not subject to this Privacy Policy. We recommend that you check the privacy policies of each such site and social media community to determine how your personal information will be utilized by their proprietors. 

Security.  We are committed to ensuring that your information is secure. In order to prevent unauthorized access or disclosure, we have put in place reasonable physical, electronic and managerial procedures to safeguard and secure the information we collect.  However, please be aware, no data transmission over the Internet, wireless transmission or electronic storage of information can be guaranteed to be 100% secure, and we cannot completely ensure the security of any information you transmit to us.  We will make all commercially reasonable efforts to protect your information from disclosure and utilize secure servers for transmission of credit card data; provided, however, that no business can guarantee against skimming, hacking, or other wrongful third party conduct.  We will promptly notify you in the event of a security breach in compliance with data privacy laws.

Children's Privacy.  We do not knowingly collect or maintain personal information from persons under 13 years of age.  If you are under 13 years of age, then please do not use or access the website and our Services at any time or in any manner unless you parent or guardian has given written consent. If we learn that information of persons under 13 years of age has been collected without verified parental consent, then we will take the appropriate steps to delete this information.

Your California Privacy Rights.  The California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”) provides specific protections and rules with respect to California’s own definition of “Personal Information,” which includes information that identifies, relates to, describes, is reasonably capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, with a particular individual or household. Upon a verifiable consumer request, a consumer can request that a business that collects consumers’ personal information give the consumer access, in a portable and (if technically feasible) readily usable form, to the specific pieces and categories of personal information that the business has collected about the consumer, the categories of sources for that information, the business or commercial purposes for collecting the information, and the categories of third parties with which the information was shared. California residents also have the right to submit a request for deletion of information under certain circumstances.

We do not sell or disclose your data or information or use it for purposes other than to provide referral, billing, and dispute resolution services or to collect a debt from you.  However, if you want to review, verify or correct your personal information, please contact us as discussed below. But, please note, there are instances where applicable law or regulatory requirements do not allow us to provide all of the information that we hold about you and/or such information may have already been destroyed, erased or made anonymous in accordance with our record retention obligations and business practices.  We will not discriminate against you, charge you different prices, or provide different quality of services because of your exercise of a right under the CCPA.

Contacting Us.  If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, or have inquiries about your personal data, please contact us at:  info@soulmatesanimalcare.com, call us at 415-457-3443, or write us at 336 Bon Air Center #523, Greenbrae, California 94904.