MEMBERS' PRIVACY STATEMENT
PRIVACY STATEMENT:
- Effective on: 4/8/05; Version # v. 040804
- The Houston Association of Realtors® (hereafter referred to as HAR”) and Houston Realtors Information Service, Inc. (hereafter referred to as “HRIS”) are also strongly committed to the protection and security of the information provided it by the professionals who are members, affiliates or service providers of HAR.com. Your privacy and trust are so important to us that we want to advise you of our practices with regard to any information you provide us by and through this Web site.
- Houston Association of Realtors is a licensee of the TRUSTe Privacy Program. TRUSTe is an independent, non-profit organization whose mission is to enable individuals and organizations to establish trusting relationships based on respect for personal identity and information by promoting the use of fair information practices. This privacy statement covers the site www.har.com. Because this Web site wants to demonstrate its commitment to our users’ privacy, it has agreed to disclose its information practices and have its privacy practices reviewed for compliance by TRUSTe.
As you may or may not be aware, our site was created to facilitate the ability to promote HAR REALTOR® members and organizations as well as its affiliates and service providers to the general public in a way that is responsive to the statistical evidence of more and more homebuyers and homesellers using the Internet to search for REALTORS® as well as properties. At the same time, it was created to support the need and ability of our REALTORS® to have their own Web sites.
WHAT INFORMATION WE COLLECT:
Generally speaking, our Web site is informational. To gain access to the members-only resources, professionals are given a login and password. We do not collect any personally identifiable information from members, affiliates or service providers online unless they voluntarily create a profile or complete our service provider or advertising forms. During this process we collect contact information such as name, business address, telephone number, and email address. We also collect licensing information such as TREC license which we then verify against TREC database using online database on their website. Real estate license information is a public information and anyone can verify the same by visiting http://www.trec.state.tx.us
W e collect credit card billing information, credit card number and expiration from members during online financial transactions. This sensitive information is then verified and processed via secure connection to Authorize.net using SSL, This information is used for processing payments only and not for any other purpose.
In addition to the information members, affiliates and service providers voluntarily submit, we may collect your IP (Internet Protocol) address to administer our site and best serve our members. When a web browser or email application requests a web page or email from another computer on the Internet, it automatically gives that computer the address where it should send the information. This is called the computer's "IP address." This "address" does not contain any personally identifiable information.HOW WE USE THE INFORMATION:
We will not sell, rent, or exchange any data collected through the HAR.com Web site from our members, affiliates or service providers except as provided in this Privacy Statement.
HAR and/or HRIS will use your information to provide requested services such as access to Realtor Web site and Realtor Finder. HAR and/or HRIS may, occasionally, use your email address to contact you for association business, weekly newsletters updated information, surveys or promotions. HAR and/or HRIS use mailing address and/or email address to send print and/or online version of Houston Realtor magazine. Please be sure to notify us immediately if you no longer wish to receive emails from HAR and/or HRIS. Members have a choice to call 713.629.1900 and ask for member service department and tell them that you want to opt out from direct mailing list. You can also send an email to unsubscribe@har.com with the subject containing the word “Unsubscribe”.
Your contact and other information is available to visitors to the HAR Web site by way of the HAR Online Membership Director. This service is a member benefit and is made available to further the objectives of promoting our members, affiliates and service providers. Members can deactivate their memership for the purpose of being de-listed from the membership directory by calling 713.629.1900 and ask for membership services department and request them to revoke their membership with HAR.
We use an outside credit card processing company, "E-commerce Network", to bill you for membership dues . This company does not retain, share, store or use personally identifiable information for any other purposes.
HAR and/or HRIS may disclose, transfer, sell or assign information obtained through this Web site, or otherwise in its possession, to third parties as a result of a sale, merger, consolidation, change in control, transfer of substantial assets, reorganization or liquidation of HAR and/or HRIS. you will be notified via email or prominent notice on our Web site for 30 days of any such change in ownership or control of your personal information
HAR and/or HRIS may also make information obtained through this Web site, or otherwise in its possession, available to law enforcement personnel and agencies when requested to do so or as required by law.
YOU HAVE CHOICES:
HAR and HRIS offer you the opportunity to correct, update and amend information by faxing information to us or you can log on at https://ims.har.com at any time to make change yourself or Verify Your Information at any time. If you have any concerns, please feel free to notify us by e-mail or phone and we will make every effort to correct, update or amend your information. You may contact us by e-mail at memberservices@har.com and we will help you in any way possible. ph 713.629.1900. fax 713.961.4869
Cookie technology is employed when you wish to access the HAR Web site with your login and password. The purpose of their use is to better serve our members, affiliates and service providers. The purpose of the use of cookies is to better serve our visitors. Cookies that are used in the HAR Web site are called "Session Cookies". Session cookies are use to control the current state of the website and contain the information that is useful only to the computer memory. The information does not contain any personal information of the person visiting our website. In case you did not know, "Cookies" are small text files sent by Web servers to be stored on the hard drive of Web site users. These files often contain personalization settings or unique identifiers for successful logging in to the password-protected part of our Web site, to keep track of your information and to help us understand the movements of users within and between Web sites.
DATA SECURITY:
We also want you, our members, affiliates and service providers to know that we take the security of your information very seriously. We use industry accepted tools and procedures that protect the files in our data system and have established an offline privacy policy regarding the membership and other information maintained by HAR and HRIS. SSL encryption is used to transmit sensitive data such as credit card numbers to the site. You need to be aware that due to the open communication nature of the Internet we cannot guarantee that communication between you and us and us and you will be free from unauthorized access by third parties nor can HAR or HRIS be responsible for members', affiliates' and service providers' information stolen from our Web site by information harvesting software which may have the ability to scrape data, such as your email address, from our Membership Directory.
BUSINESS & PRIVACY ISSUES WITH LINKS TO OTHER SITES:
Neither HAR nor HRIS are responsible for the availability of or the business and privacy practices of other Web sites which are linked from HAR.com. We provide these links for information and service. We do not take responsibility for the contents, advertising, products or other materials made available through any other Web site nor for their data collection practices. We refer you to their Privacy Statements and Policies to learn how they collect and use information about you.
Occasionally when linking to another site, you may still see our site's logo or frame. This is to provide you with a seamless experience when visiting our Web site. In these cases you are no longer on har.com and are now on a different Web site whose information collection practices may differ from ours. The privacy policy of the site you are on will govern how information collected from you is used. On these pages, you will see our site address in the location bar of your browser and we will take steps to notify you when you leave our site and go to a third party Web site.
PRIVACY STATEMENT CHANGES:
HAR and HRIS reserve the right to change or amend its Members' Privacy Statement to address new issues of privacy and information security and to reflect changes to our Web site or business practices. Any new changes and/or amendments will be noted on our Home Page and will always be posted in this section of the HAR Web site.
If we make material changes to this policy in how we use your personal information, we will notify you here, by email, or by means of a notice on our home page.
QUESTIONS ABOUT OUR PRIVACY STATEMENT:
If you have any questions about this Privacy Statement or the practices of this Web site, you can send an e-mail to: privacy@har.com. 3693 Southwest Freeway Houston , TX 77027 Phone (713) 629-1900.
If you do not receive acknowledgment of your inquiry or your inquiry is not satisfactorily addressed, you should then contact TRUSTe through the TRUSTe Watchdog Dispute Resolution Process at http://www.truste.org/consumers/watchdog_complaint.php . TRUSTe will serve as a liaison with the Web site to resolve users concerns