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Privacy Statement
EST PRIVACY POLICY effective APRIL 17, 2005
This
privacy policy applies to
http://www.ESTAssociates.com and all
websites and URL's controlled or operated by EST, Inc., which
link to this policy, unless otherwise specified.
This is a new privacy policy effective as of the date set forth
above. Even if you read and approved a prior policy, you need to
review this new version as it has been updated and revised.
Titles and headings are provided for general reference and ease
of use only, as information may be covered in more than one
heading or under other headings.
If users have questions or concerns regarding this statement,
they should first contact EST's privacy department at
privacy@ESTAssociates.com.
Information Collection
Registration and Service Professional Enrollment
In
order to complete a service request or to enroll as a
prospective service professional, a user must first complete a
registration form. During registration a user is required to
give contact information (such as name and email address). We
use this information to contact the user about services on our
site for which they have expressed interest, to inform service
professionals of leads, and/or inform customers about service
professionals they matched to. By providing this information to
us, or by submitting a service request, you expressly consent to
being contacted by us and by our service professionals and
providers via phone, fax, email, mail or other reasonable means,
at any of your contact numbers or addresses, in order that we
may provide the services set forth on our Web site, service your
account, reasonably address matters pertaining to your account
or for other reasonable purposes related to our business. Unique
identifiers (such as username and password) are required.
Registration
We
request information from the consumer in our registration
process. A user must provide detailed information
about the service requested. No financial information (such as
credit card number, expiration date) is collected from the
consumer. This information is used to match consumers with
appropriate service professionals. The information may also be
used to contact the consumer to verify or clarify their service
request or to customize the consumer's Web site experience or
future EST communication.
Feedback, Ratings and Reviews and Testimonials
Additionally, we collect feedback from users (called ratings and
reviews) about the performance of Service Professional's who
work for them. We also collect general feedback and testimonials
from users of our service and system. By providing such feedback
to us, you consent to our use, publication and/or distribution
of such feedback at no compensation to you, and if you are a
Service Professional in our system, you consent to the
publication of ratings and reviews about you and your business.
Information Use
Profile
We
store information that we collect through the Web site
experience and activities, cookies, log files, clear gifs,
and/or third parties to create a profile of our users. A profile
is stored information that we keep on individual users that
detail their viewing preferences, activities and interactions
with EST. Consequently, collected information is tied to the
user's personally identifiable information to provide offers and
improve the content of the site for the user. This profile is
used to tailor a user's visit to our Web site and to direct
pertinent marketing promotions and communications to them.
Cookies
A
cookie is a piece of data tied to information about the user and
stored on the user's computer. We use both session cookies,
which terminate when a user closes his browser, and persistent
cookies, which remain on the user's computer until manually
deleted.
Log
Files
Like
most standard Web site servers we use log files. This includes
internet protocol (IP) addresses, browser type, internet service
provider (ISP), referring/exit pages, platform type, date/time
stamp, and number of clicks to analyze trends, administer the
Web site, track user's movement in the aggregate, and gather
broad demographic information for aggregate use. IP addresses,
etc. are not linked to personally identifiable information.
Service Announcements
On
rare occasions it is necessary to send out a strictly service
related announcement. For instance, if our service is
temporarily suspended for maintenance we might send users an
email. Generally, users may not opt-out of these communications,
though they can deactivate their account. However, these
communications are not promotional in nature.
Customer Service
We
communicate with users on a regular basis to provide requested
services and in regards to issues relating to their account via
email, fax, phone or mail, and we reply to user inquiries via
email or phone, or other reasonable means, in accordance with
the user's wishes where applicable.
Sharing Information to Provide Services and
to Conduct Our Business
Though we strive to preserve user privacy, due to the existing
regulatory environment, we cannot ensure that all of your
private communications and other personal information will
always remain confidential. By way of example, we may disclose
personal information when required by law wherein we have a
belief that such action is necessary or advisable to comply with
a judicial proceeding, court order, legal proceeding, process or
investigation served on our business or Web site(s), or when we
believe parties are misusing or attempting to misuse our Web
sites or services, including but not limited to violating the
law, committing fraud, deception, theft, attempting to harm or
divert our business, engaging in threatening or inappropriate
behavior or threatening to place, or placing themselves or
others in danger. You should also be aware that courts of
equity, such as U.S. Bankruptcy Courts, may have the authority
under certain circumstances to require us to share or transfer
your information to third parties. Finally, although we strive
to protect your privacy, third parties beyond our control may
unlawfully intercept or access transmissions or private
communications. Therefore, we do not promise, and you should not
expect, that your personal information or private communications
will always remain private.
Aggregate Information (non-personally identifiable)
EST
may share aggregated activity or statistical information with
partners, advertisers or others, but that information that does
not contain personally identifiable information.
Business Transitions
In the
event EST goes through a business transition such as a merger,
being acquired by another company, or selling a portion of its
assets, users' personal information will, in most instances, be
part of the assets transferred. See also, section entitled
"Changes and updates to this policy…" set forth below.
Choice/Opt-out
Users who no longer wish to receive our newsletter and
promotional communications may opt-out of receiving these
communications by replying to unsubscribe in the email or email
us at
info@ESTAssociates.com.
Users of our Web site are always notified when their information
is being collected by any outside parties (excluding our
affiliates, service providers, or agents) for marketing
purposes. We do this so our users can make an informed choice as
to whether or not they should proceed with services that require
an outside party.
Links and Integrated Partnerships
This
Web site contains links from and to other Web sites. Please be
aware that EST is not responsible for the privacy practices of
such other Web sites. We encourage our users to be aware of this
when they leave our Web site and to read the privacy statements
of each and every Web site that collects personally identifiable
information. This privacy statement applies solely to
information collected by EST’s Web site.
With some partners, EST receives information concerning the
service requested by a consumer including personal or contact
information that is inputted on a partner Web site. This
information is sent from the partner to us either in a batched
format, or via Internet technology such as XML, FTP or HTTP
Post. This information may or may not be encrypted by the
partner. With other partners, EST may provide information
concerning a consumer's service request, including contact
information to other partners to provide services.
Surveys
From
time-to-time, EST may request information from users via surveys.
Participation in these surveys is
completely voluntary and the user therefore has a choice whether
or not to disclose this information. The requested information
typically includes contact information (such as name and mailing
address), and demographic information (such as zip code).
Contact information will be shared with the survey
sponsors (if EST elects to utilize an outside
survey company). Survey
information will be used for purposes of monitoring or improving
the use and satisfaction of our services and this Web site.
Security
While
we employ several different security techniques, "perfect
security" does not exist on the Internet and we do not guarantee
security of information or that unauthorized access will not
occur.
Servers that store personally identifiable information are
located in a supervised and/or locked facility.
Users' personal information off line is restricted by our
internal security procedures, and authorized access to such
information is only provided to our employees and contractors
who reasonably need the information for their areas of
responsibility (for example, a billing clerk, a sales rep, a
customer service representative, a software engineer or management).
If users have any questions about the security at our Web site,
users can send an email to
privacy@ESTassociates.com.
Verification and Supplementation of Information
In
order for us to better conduct our business it is sometimes
advisable or necessary for us to verify and/or supplement the
information we receive from service providers and users of our
Web site with information from 3rd party sources.
Enhancement of Marketing Profile
Occasionally, we purchase third party marketing data and add it
to our existing user database to better target our advertising
and provide pertinent offers we think our users would be
interested in. We use this information to enhance or overlay the
'profile' of individual users. This aggregate marketing data is
therefore tied to the users' personally identifiable
information. See also the "Profile."
Correcting/Updating/Deleting/Deactivating Personal Information
If a
user's personally identifiable information changes (such as zip
code, phone, email or postal address), or if a user no longer
desires our service, we provide a means to correct, update or
delete/deactivate users' personally identifiable information.
This can be done by emailing our Customer Support at
info@ESTAssociates.com. Or, contact us
by telephone or postal mail at the contact information listed
below.
Changes and Updates to This Policy and to EST Services, Products
and Functionality of Web Site(s)
We
reserve the right to change our information, features, services,
products, policies, promotions, disclosures and disclaimers at
any time. Changes to this Policy will be in writing and be
posted on our Web site as applicable. Please check these terms
periodically for changes. At the top of the policy we indicate
the date of an update. The continued use of any EST services or
of the applicable EST affiliated web sites following the posting
of changes to these terms will mean you accept those changes.
Contact Information
If
users have any questions or suggestions regarding our privacy
policy, please contact us at:
EST
51 Fremont Street,
Needham, MA 02494
(781) 455-0003
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