PRIVACY POLICY
ELGIN TRAVEL & CRUISES
(509745 ONT INC.)
Privacy of personal information is an important principle to Elgin Travel. We are committed to collecting, using and disclosing personal information responsibly and only to the extent necessary for the travel products and services we provide. We also try to be open and transparent as to how we handle personal information. This document describes our privacy policies.
What is personal information?
Personal information is information about an identifiable individual.
Personal information includes information that relates to their personal
characteristics (e.g., gender, age, income, home address or phone number,
ethnic background, family status), their health (e.g., health history,
health conditions, health services received by them) or their activities
and views (e.g., religion, politics, opinions expressed by an individual,
an opinion or evaluation of an individual). Personal information is to
be contrasted with business information (e.g., an individual’s business
address and telephone number), which is not protected by privacy legislation.
In addition, due the nature of the travel agency business, we also include
in our policies and staunchly protect therein an individual’s financial
information including checking account information and credit card information.
Who we are?
Our travel agency, Elgin Travel, is a full service agency business, and
we arrange travel products and services for our clients with a wide spectrum
of industry suppliers. Accordingly, we deal with a number of consultants
and third parties that may, in the course of their duties, have limited
access to personal information we hold. These include airlines, railroads,
cruise lines, tour operators, computer reservations system providers,
and other travel-related vendors. We restrict their access to any personal
information we hold as much as is reasonably possible. We also have their
assurance that they follow appropriate privacy principles in accordance
with their own policies under the Personal Information Protection and
Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA).
We collect personal information for the following
purposes:
Like all travel agencies, we collect, use and disclose personal information
in order to serve
our clients. For our clients, the primary purposes for collecting personal
information are as follows: to make and secure reservations, to issue
transportation documents and vouchers, and to provide travel suppliers
with information to complete the necessary purchasing arrangements for
a wide array of travel and tourism products. Examples of the type of personal
information we collect for those purposes include the following: name,
address, telephone, age, credit card information, passport or visa information,
Social Insurance Number, web site cookies, and similar personal information
necessary to properly identify our clients and their entitlement to the
services we arrange. We also collect personal information from our employees
and contractors to assure our proper compliance with employment laws,
remuneration, tax payments, and other employee/contractor functions.
Protecting personal information:
We understand the importance of protecting personal information. For that
reason, we have taken the following steps:
| • | Paper information is either under supervision or secured in a locked or restricted area. |
| • | Electronic hardware is either under supervision or secured in a locked or restricted area at all times. In addition, passwords are used on computers. All of our cell phones are digital, which signals are more difficult to intercept. |
| • | Paper information is transmitted through sealed, addressed envelopes or boxes by reputable companies. |
| • | Electronic information is transmitted either through a direct
line or is anonymized or |
| • | Staff are trained to collect, use and disclose personal information only as necessary to fulfill their duties and in accordance with our privacy policy. |
| • | External consultants and agencies with access to personal information
must enter into |
Retention and destruction of personal information:
We need to retain personal information for some time to ensure that we
can answer any questions you might have about the services provided and
for our own accountability to external regulatory bodies. However, we
do not want to keep personal information too long in order to protect
your privacy. We keep our client files for about 3 years. Our client and
contact directories are much more difficult to systematically destroy,
so we remove such information when we can if it does not appear that we
will be contacting you again. However, if you ask, we will remove such
contact information right away. We keep any personal information relating
to our general correspondence with people who are not our clients, newsletters,
seminars and marketing activities for about 3 months after the newsletter,
seminar or marketing activity is over. We destroy paper files containing
personal information by shredding. We destroy electronic information by
deleting it and, when the hardware is discarded, we ensure that the hard
drive is physically destroyed. Alternatively, we may send some or all
of the client file to our client.
You can look at your information:
With only a few exceptions, you have the right to see what personal information
we hold about you. Often all you have to do is ask. We can help you identify
what records we might have about you. We will also try to help you understand
any information you do not understand (e.g., various industry forms, technical
language, etc.). We will need to confirm your identity, if we do not know
you, before providing you with this access. We reserve the right to charge
a nominal fee for such requests. If there is a problem, we may ask you
to put your request in writing. If we cannot give you access, we will
tell you within 30 days if at all possible and tell you the reason, as
best we can, as to why we cannot give you access. If you believe there
is a mistake in the information, you have the right to ask for it to be
corrected. This applies to factual information and not to any professional
opinions we may have formed. We may ask you to provide documentation that
our files are wrong. Where we agree that we made a mistake, we will make
the correction and notify anyone to whom we sent this information. If
we do not agree that we have made a mistake, we will still agree to include
in our file a brief statement from you on the point and we will forward
that statement to anyone else who received the earlier information.
Do you have a concern?
Our Privacy Policy Manager, Mary Vanzanten, can be reached at Elgin Travel,
417 Wellington Street, St.Thomas, Ontario N5R 5J5 as well by: Phone: (519)
633-6300, to address any questions or concerns you might have. If you
wish to make a formal complaint about our privacy practices, you may make
it in writing to our Privacy Policy Manager. She will acknowledge receipt
of your complaint, ensure that it is investigated promptly and that you
are provided with a formal decision and reasons in writing.
For more general inquiries, the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Canada oversees the administration of the privacy legislation in the private sector. The Commissioner also acts as a kind of ombudsman for privacy disputes. The Information and Privacy Commissioner can be reached at:
112 Kent Street, Ottawa, Ontario K1A 1H3 as well as
by:
Phone: (613) 995-8210
Toll-free: 1-800-282-1376
Fax: (613) 947-6850
TTY: (613) 992-9190
E-mail: info@privcom.gc.ca
We appreciate and value your patronage. At Elgin Travel, privacy
is not a privilege, it’s a right.
