This policy
Seahold Plaintiff Financing (“we”, “us”, “our”) is a Canadian incorporated company. We provide settlement financing to plaintiffs awaiting resolution of their claims, as well as assessment financing to law firms with respect to their use of assessment experts. We are committed to protecting the privacy of the personal information of our clients. The purpose of this privacy policy, which is binding and forms an integral part of our Terms of Use, is to set out the principles governing our collection, use and disclosure of the personal information we may obtain about you during your visit to our website or otherwise.
Our employees have been trained on and understand the importance of our privacy policy and procedures and follow them carefully.
Personal information defined
In this policy, “personal information” means information about an identifiable individual. This includes but is not limited to your name, address, telephone number, e-mail address, age or date of birth, employment history, and banking, credit and financial information.
Information we collect from you
We collect your personal information primarily from you. We may also collect it from other sources including agents and contractors or other third parties who represent that they have the right to disclose the information.
When you make an inquiry on our website or complete an application for a loan or apply for assessment financing, we may collect from you certain information, including but not limited to the following: a username, password, your first and last name and email address, mailing address, phone number and information regarding the requested financing for which you are visiting our website.
Your consent
We may collect, use or disclose your personal information only with your duly obtained consent or as permitted or required by law. By providing personal information to us and / or using this website, you are consenting to its collection, use and disclosure as set forth herein.
We may also obtain your specific consent in an application for a loan or other document, or by facsimile, electronic mail or telephone conversations with our employees or agents.
We also obtain consent from your legal guardian, estate, trustee or person having power of attorney for you in situations where we become aware that you (i) have died (ii) are a minor (iii) have become seriously ill or (iv) are mentally incapacitated.
The form of consent may vary depending upon the circumstances and the type of information, including the sensitivity of the information and your reasonable expectations.
You may opt in to or out of receiving marketing or promotional communications for products and services from us at the time of completing a financing application or subsequently by contacting us by any means we use to contact you. You may withdraw your consent for any other identified purposes at any time by contacting us, subject to legal and/or contractual restrictions and reasonable notice. We may not be able to provide you with a particular product or service if you withdraw your consent to certain uses of personal information.
What we do with your personal information
Personal information provided by you in connection with your business relationship with us, may be used by, collected by and/or disclosed by us (including our agents and contractors, potential affiliates, lenders and investors) for the following purposes:
- to evaluate your financing application and your eligibility for a loan or assessment financing;
- to enable us to enter into contractual relationships with you;
- for contract management and administration, such as credit, billing, collection, service, lawsuit tracking and verification;
- to provide information and services that you request, and to respond to your comments and inquiries;
- for marketing and promotion of products, goods and services to you;
- to meet legal and regulatory requirements or to disclose information when we believe in good faith we are compelled to do so by a subpoena, court order or similar legal procedure;
- if we believe in good faith that the disclosure is necessary to prevent physical harm or financial loss or to report suspected illegal activity;
- in top-level aggregated form to attract users and actual or potential clients of ours, as well as to expand, reduce or otherwise make changes to our website;
- to analyze data individually or in aggregate to assist in our internal economic and demographic projections and reports and to display that data;
- in connection with and to facilitate the financing of or a business sale or acquisition of Seahold Plaintiff Financing; and
- as may be otherwise authorized by you.
If your personal information is to be used or disclosed for any new purposes, we will, to the extent required by law, identify these new purposes prior to such use or disclosure and, if required, obtain your consent.
We will not sell any of your personal information that you provide us.
In some cases, personal information may be used, processed and/or stored outside Canada, and therefore may be available to government authorities under lawful orders and laws applicable there (including law enforcement and national security authorities of the applicable foreign jurisdiction). For instance, to facilitate our business practices, your personal information may be processed and stored in the United States, using cloud-based third party data storage services (e.g. Salesforce). Each of these third party services is governed by its own respective privacy policies. You may contact us to find out whether your personal information is being processed and where.
Privacy and the internet
On our website we may also collect information that, alone, cannot be used to identify users. Examples of these types of non-personal information include Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, cookies, Internet tags and navigational data.
An IP address is a number automatically assigned to users’ computers when they access the Internet. This number does not identify the user’s name, e-mail address or other personal information. This information may be used to measure site traffic, to help to understand how people are using this website and to improve the site and services provided.
We use popular information gathering tools, including cookies, log files, web beacons and similar tools to automatically collected information (which may contain personal information) from your computer or mobile device as you use the Site. For instance:
- “Cookies” are small text files that our website sends to your browser, which provides information to us about your general Internet usage, such as recognizing repeat visitors and allowing us to understand how and when pages are visited. We use both session-based and persistent cookies. Session cookies exist only during one session and disappear from your computer when you close your browser software or turn off your computer. Persistent cookies remain on your computer or device after you close your browser or turn off your computer. You may opt to enable a feature in your browser software that will erase or block some or all cookies, however, some parts of this website may no longer function properly if cookies are disabled.
- We may also use web beacons on our website. For example, we may place web beacons in marketing emails that notify us when you click on a link in the email that directs you to our website. Such tracking technologies are used to operate and improve our website and email communications and track the clicking of links or opening of emails.
- We may use our own technology and third party technology to track and analyze usage and volume statistical information to provide enhanced interactions and more relevant communications. For example, we use Google Analytics, which uses cookies to help us analyze how our website is used, including the number of visitors, the websites visitors have come from, and the pages they visit. This information is used by us to improve our website.
- We may also use cookies on your computer or mobile device to show you advertisements for our products that we think may interest you, to track their performance and to track the performance of our advertisements. Cookies in this case might collect and remember information like which browsers visit our website. For example, we used Google AdWords to record the sales performance of our advertising campaigns, and to create an audience to retarget with advertisements. Such information may be provided to third parties but excludes personal information.
- We may also contract with third party advertising networks, which may collect your IP address and other information from web beacons on our website, from emails and on third party sites. These third parties may follow your online activities across different sites and devices, and may also use cookies. These third parties use the information to provide advertisements based on your interests. We do this to help manage and track our marketing efforts. If you wish to learn more/opt out of collection by these third parties, please contact us.
- Internet tags are smaller than cookies and tell the website server information such as the IP address and browser type related to a user’s computer. Tags may indicate how many times a page is opened and which information is consulted.
- Navigational data (including log files) are used for system management, to improve the content of our website, for market research purposes and to communicate information to visitors. This may include the website you came from, your browser type, domain name and time and date of access.
Our website may contain links to other sites. The provision of these links is for your convenience only, and does not constitute an endorsement, recommendation or approval of such other sites. This privacy policy is no longer applicable when you leave our site by way of links or otherwise. Linked sites may or may not maintain their own independent privacy policies and procedures. You should consult these policies and procedures before providing any personal information to these linked sites.
Maintaining the accuracy of your personal information
We use reasonable efforts to keep your personal information as accurate, complete and up-to-date as necessary to fulfill the purposes for which we collect the information so as to minimize the possibility of using incorrect information about you. We may obtain updated information from you or from an agent or contractor of ours.
You or your agents, legal guardian, estate, trustee or person having power of attorney for you, are solely responsible for informing us about changes to your personal information that are necessary to fulfill the identified purposes, such as but not limited to: if your name or address changes, if you die, if a proceeding in bankruptcy, receivership, or insolvency is started by you or against you, if you fail to comply with requirements under an agreement with us, or if you have been provided with a loan from us, if you change lawyers.
Whenever possible, we will correct information given to an outside organization. If a third party has given us information which you tell us is incorrect, if permitted we will give you the name and address of that party, so that you can correct the information.
Safeguarding your personal information
We take commercially reasonable precautions to protect your personal information (regardless of the format in which it is held) against loss or theft, unauthorized access, disclosure, copying, use, or modification, through safeguards appropriate to the sensitivity of the personal information.
Access to your personal information is only given to our employees and third parties who need to know the information and whose duties reasonably so require the information in order to fulfill the identified purposes.
Seahold Plaintiff Financing has adopted physical, procedural and technological procedures, including firewalls, in an effort to keep your personal information safe. Our website uses SSL technology, which is an open protocol for secure data communications across computer networks. However, data transmitted over the Internet is not guaranteed to be secure and Seahold Plaintiff Financing does not guarantee, warrant or represent that the personal information you provide will be transmitted securely or protected completely against interception, loss, misuse or alteration. Seahold Plaintiff Financing accepts no responsibility or liability for any damages that may result where personal information submitted by you has not been securely transmitted, or has been intercepted, lost, misused or altered.
We retain your personal information only as long as necessary or relevant (1) for the identified purposes, (2) as required by law, (3) where we use your personal information to make a decision about you, long enough to allow you access to the information for a reasonable period of time after the decision has been made, and (4) where your personal information is the subject of a request from you, for as long as is reasonably necessary to allow you to exhaust any recourse you may have under the law. Following the applicable retention period, or upon your request (provided that any notice periods and applicable laws have been complied with), we dispose of or destroy your personal information.
Special note about children
Our business and website are not directed towards children, nor do we believe that our business or website will be of interest to children. We recognize, however, the important safety issues regarding children who access the Internet. We do not knowingly collect, use, or disclose personal information from children, and we are committed to complying with all applicable laws and requirements. To remove the information related to a child who has provided personal information to us and permanently remove all such personal information regarding this child from our database, you should contact our Privacy Officer as provided for herein.
Fraud
If we suspect fraud by any user or actual or potential client of Seahold Plaintiff Financing, we may investigate and report any evidence, including personally identifiable information, to law enforcement and to the courts in the course of seeking remedies in law or equity.
Any suspected breaches to the security of the website should be immediately reported to our Privacy Officer as provided for herein. Our data breach policies and protocols are in compliance with all applicable laws.
Language
Where we provided you with a translation of the English language version of this privacy policy or any other documentation, you agree that the translation is provided solely for your convenience and that the English language versions of this privacy policy and any other documentation will govern the privacy policy and your relationship with us. The parties have required that this privacy policy and all related documents be drawn up in English. Les parties ont demandé que cette politique de confidentialité ainsi que tous les documents qui s’y rapportent soient rédigés en anglais.
Governing law
This privacy policy and all actions contemplated by the same shall be governed by and construed and enforced in accordance with the internal laws of the Province of Ontario, Canada, including the principles of conflict of laws thereof. All acts involving the application for and provision of financing or of the website shall be deemed as accessed, entered, perfected or finally accepted, at the place of the location of Seahold Plaintiff Financing’s headquarters, irrespective of the location of the website servers. All acts shall be considered as lastly accepted and perfected by Seahold Plaintiff Financing and at Seahold Plaintiff Financing’s headquarters.
Our privacy policies and practices
Seahold Plaintiff Financing reserves the right to change, modify or update the terms of this privacy policy at any time without notice. Seahold Plaintiff Financing posts the revised privacy policy on the website and indicates the date of the current statement above, so you know when it was last updated. You are responsible for regularly checking this privacy policy for revision. Non-material changes will take effect immediately. Material changes will take effect 30 days after their posting. We will notify you of any material changes prior to such changes taking effect. You expressly agree that the terms of this privacy policy are reasonable and have consented to the terms of this privacy policy as may be changed, modified or updated as provided for herein.
You may challenge the currency, accuracy and completeness of your personal information held by us and ask us to amend the information as appropriate, and you may request access to your personal information under our custody or control for any reason. We will accommodate any such request unless it is prohibited by applicable laws. Where we refuse your request, we will identify the reasons for refusing the request. If a complaint is found to be justified, we will take appropriate measures including, if necessary, amending our policies and practices.
We have appointed a Privacy Officer who shall be accountable for Seahold Plaintiff Financing’s compliance with PIPEDA and this policy. If you have inquiries regarding your personal information held by us or if you wish to address a challenge regarding our compliance with this policy, you may contact our Privacy Officer in writing at the address listed below:
Seahold Financing – Privacy Officer
TEL.:1-888-285-7333
ADDRESS:
500 St. George Street
Moncton, New Brunswick
E1C 1Y3
This privacy policy is subject to applicable privacy laws and Seahold Plaintiff Financing’s right to change it at any time at our sole discretion.