We at RetiredRoommates.com ("we" or "RetiredRoommates.com")
have created this privacy policy to demonstrate our firm commitment to protecting
your personal information and informing you about how we handle it. This
privacy policy only applies to transactions and activities in which you
engage, and data gathered, on the RetiredRoommates.com Website, RetiredRoommates.com
Messenger and double blind email communications between RetiredRoommates.com
members (collectively, the "Site") but does not apply to any other
Website or offline point of contact between RetiredRoommates.com, or any
other company, and consumers. Please review this privacy policy periodically
as we may modify it from time to time. This privacy policy was last revised
on March 01, 2004. Each time you visit the Site or provide us with information,
by doing so you are accepting the practices described in this privacy policy
at that time.
Your IP Address
Like most e-commerce Websites, each time you visit the Site,
we automatically collect your IP address and the web page from which you
came. In order to administer and optimize the Site for you and to diagnose
problems with our Site, we use your IP address to help identify you and
to gather broad demographic information about you.
Cookies
Like most Websites, the Site uses cookies to keep track
of your purchases and other activity on the Site and enhance your experience
on the Site. We also use cookies to deliver content specific to your interests,
to save your password, and if you choose, to save other personal and financial
information so you do not have to reenter it each time you visit the Site.
Third party advertisers on the Site may also place or read cookies on your
browser. If you wish to disable these cookies, the "help" portion
of the toolbar on most browsers will tell you how. However, if you set your
browser to disable cookies, you may not be able to access certain areas
on the Site.
Information We Collect From You
In order to operate the Site and to provide you with information
about products or services that may be of interest to you, we may collect
"personal information" (i.e. information that could be used to
contact you directly (without using the Site) such as full name, postal
address, phone number or email address), "financial information"
(i.e. credit card numbers or passwords) or "demographic information"
(i.e. information that you submit, or that we collect, that is neither personal
information nor financial information; this may include, but is not limited
to, zip code, postal code, hometown, gender, username, age/birth date, purchase
history information, browsing history information, searching history information,
registration history information, and the content of communications between
you and other members over the Site), subject to the rest of this paragraph.
Demographic information is divided into two categories: 1) "non-public
information", which consists of purchase history information and one-on-one
communications between you and other users of the Site; and 2) "public
information", which consists of all other demographic information.
We ask that you do not enter personal information or financial information
into your “Profile” (for example, don’t use your address
or passcode as your username, or include your name or address in your written
responses), because if you do then it may be posted publicly on the Site,
and the information will then be treated as "demographic information"
that is "public information." Please note that nowhere on the
Site do we knowingly collect personal information from children under the
age of 18, as we require that all users represent to us that they are at
least 18 years old.
Information Other Websites Collect From You
On the Site, we may place links to other Websites operated
by other parties. When you click on these links and visit these other Websites,
regardless of whether or not they contain our brand names, trademarks and
other intellectual property, you need to be aware that we do not control
these other Websites or these other Websites’ business practices,
and that this privacy policy does not apply to these other Websites. Consequently,
the operators of these other Websites may collect different kinds of information
about you, and may use and disclose that information in different ways than
we would if it were collected on the Site. We encourage you to review their
privacy policies and remind you that we will not be responsible for their
actions.
How We Use Personal Information
We use your email address and your other personal information
to help us efficiently operate the Site, to contact you in connection with
your transactions and other activities on the Site (including, but not limited
to, confirmation emails or important news that could affect your relationship
with RetiredRoommates.com), and to forward messages to you from other RetiredRoommates.com
users. These types of communications, are known as "Operational Communications."
In some cases, Operational Communications may also contain commercial messages,
such as banner ads and special offers.
We may, in the future, use personal information to send
you newsletters, information, offers and other promotional materials for
RetiredRoommates.com’s or third parties’ goods or services.
We will attempt to send you offers that are of value to you, such as discounts,
exclusive offers or special event information. If we choose to do so, we
will provide you with options to decline to receive communications from
RetiredRoommates.com (other than those contained in Operational Communications).
To operate the Site, including processing your transactions
and supporting your activities on the Site, we may share your personal information
with our agents, representatives, contractors and service providers so they
can provide us with support services such as authorization of credit card
transactions, email origination, receipt or support services, customer relationship
management services, order fulfillment and sweepstakes and promotional fulfillment.
We require these entities not to use your information for any other purpose.
By purchasing, or registering or making reservations for,
products or services offered or sponsored by third parties on the Site,
or electing to receive communications (such as emails or magazine subscriptions)
or electing to participate in contests, sweepstakes or other programs (such
as discount or rewards programs), offered or sponsored by third parties
on the Site, you consent to our providing your personal information to those
third parties. Those third parties may use your personal information in
accordance with their own privacy policies. You will need to contact those
third parties to instruct them directly regarding your preferences for the
use of your personal information by them. Additionally, you agree that we
may use and disclose all such information so submitted to such third parties
in the same manner in which we are entitled to use and disclose any other
information you submit to us.
Any third party with whom we are allowed to share your personal
information is authorized to use your personal information in accordance
with our contractual arrangements with such third parties and in accordance
with their own privacy policies, over which we have no control, and you
agree that we are not responsible or liable for any of their actions or
omissions. Those who contact you will need to be instructed directly by
you regarding your preferences for the use of your personal information
by them.
Please read the information below under the heading "Special
Cases in which we Share Personal and Financial Information" to learn
more ways in which we may share your personal information.
How We Use Financial Information
We use your financial information to check your qualifications,
to bill you for products and services and to enable you to participate in
discount, rebate and similar programs in which you may elect to participate.
By making a purchase, or engaging in any other kind of activity or transaction
that uses financial information, on the Site, you consent to our providing
your financial information to our service providers and to such third parties
as we determine are necessary to support and process your activities and
transactions, as well as to your credit card issuer for their purposes.
These third parties may include the credit card companies and banking institutions
used to process and support the transaction or activity. By purchasing,
or registering or making reservations for, products or services of third
parties offered on the Site, or by participating in programs offered on
the Site that are administered by third parties and that require you to
submit financial information in order to use them, you also consent to our
providing your financial information to those third parties. Any of these
various third parties may be authorized to use your financial information
in accordance with our contractual arrangements with such third parties
and in accordance with their own privacy policies, over which we have no
control, and you agree that we are not responsible or liable for any of
their actions or omissions. Additionally, you agree that we may use and
disclose all such information so submitted to such third parties in the
same manner in which we are entitled to use and disclose any other information
that you submit to us. Please read the information below under the heading
"Special Cases in which we Share Personal and Financial Information"
to learn more ways in which we may share your financial information.
Special Cases in which we Share Personal and Financial
Information
Your personal information or financial information may be
passed on to a third party in the event of a transfer of ownership or assets,
or a bankruptcy. We may also disclose personal information or financial
information when we determine that such disclosure is necessary to comply
with applicable law, to cooperate with law enforcement or to protect the
interests or safety of RetiredRoommates.com or other visitors to the Site.
We also may disclose your personal information or financial information
to our subsidiary and parent companies and businesses, and other affiliated
legal entities and businesses with whom we are under common corporate control.
Whenever personal information or financial information is disclosed under
this paragraph, we may also disclose your demographic information along
with it, on a non-anonymous basis. All of our parent, subsidiary and affiliated
legal entities and businesses that receive your personal information, financial
information, or non-anonymous demographic information from us will comply
with the terms of this privacy policy with respect to their use and disclosure
of such information.
How We Use Public Information and Other Demographic Information
We may review all demographic information. We may use public
information to enable other users to find your profile, to determine whether
they are a match for you and to communicate with you. We may use demographic
information to tailor the Site and communications to your interests. We
may also share demographic information with advertisers on an anonymous
and aggregated basis (i.e., without telling the advertisers your identity).
One of the reasons we may do this is to increase the likelihood that our
advertisers’ goods and services will appeal to RetiredRoommates.com’s
users, so that we may target specific ads at specific demographic groups.
Our sharing of demographic information with advertisers is anonymous (i.e.,
we do not tell advertisers which particular RetiredRoommates.com users are
members of which demographic groups), subject to the rest of this privacy
policy. When you respond to an advertisement, however, we ask you to remember
that if that ad that is targeted to a demographic group and you decide to
give the advertiser your personal information, then the advertiser may be
able to identify you as being a member of that demographic group. Please
also be aware that we may disclose your demographic information on a non-anonymous
basis as described above in the paragraph titled "Special Cases in
which we Share Personal and Financial Information."
Our Security Precautions
The Site has security measures in place to protect against
the loss, misuse and alteration of the information under our control. Our
secure server software (SSL) is the industry standard and among the best
software available today for secure commerce transactions. We encrypt all
of your personal and financial information as it travels over the Internet
and we store your financial information on our servers in encrypted form.
Your information may be transferred to and maintained on computer networks
which may be located outside of the state, province, country or other governmental
jurisdiction in which you reside, and the country or jurisdiction in which
these computer networks are located may not have privacy laws as protective
as the laws in your country or jurisdiction.
Changing our Privacy Policy for Previously Gathered Information
If at any point we decide to use particular personally identifiable
information in a manner different from that stated at the time it was collected,
we will notify users by way of an email or by providing 30 days notice on
the Site. Please note that we will continue to have the right to change
our privacy policy and practices, and how we use your personally identifiable
information, without notice, as described in the first paragraph of this
Privacy Policy, provided that such changes shall only apply to information
gathered on or after the date of the change.
How You Can Access and Update Your Email Preferences,
Personal Information and Public Information
If in the future we choose to send you newsletters, information,
offers and other promotional materials for RetiredRoommates.com’s
or third parties’ goods or services, we will give you the opportunity
to opt-out of certain communications and modify personal information or
demographic information you have provided to us, and to hide demographic
information from, or make demographic information visible to, the public
users of the Site, at anytime.
If you have any questions or concerns about this privacy
policy, the practices of the Site, or your dealings with the Site, you can
contact us at support@retiredroommates.com.