Privacy Policy

Your privacy is very important to smitten creative boutique inc. (“smitten”).

smitten complies with the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (“PIPEDA”). For more information about PIPEDA, please visit Industry Canada’s Privacy for Business website at http://www.privacyforbusiness.ic.gc.ca.

What Personal Information does smitten collect?

The types of Personal Information that smitten may collect from you from time to time includes: your name, mailing address, telephone number, e-mail address, billing address, credit card number, credit card expiration date and credit card security code. In addition, from time to time, smitten may ask you to provide more detailed information regarding your interests, occupation, and background. Furthermore, smitten may sometimes ask our customers to complete surveys in order to get a better sense of who they are and what topics may be of interest to them, as such, some of the information obtained from these surveys may be Personal Information. Personal Information obtained from a customer survey will be treated in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

Why does smitten collect your Personal Information?

smitten collects your Personal Information for the purposes listed below:

(a)    to provide you with our “Tickled Pink” email;

(b)    to send you other information from promotional partners, etc. via email; and

(c)     to request your feedback and/or suggestions for smitten via occasional questionnaires and polls.

In addition, from time to time, smitten may use your Personal Information for the following purposes:

  • To understand your needs and preferences, including to contact and communicate with you and to conduct surveys, research and evaluations;
  • To engage in business transactions, including the purchase and/or sale of merchandise involving smitten;
  • To contact you in order to provide you with customer support or to provide you with information about products and features;
  • And for any other purpose that smitten may indicate to you from time to time.
How does smitten collect your Personal Information?

When you subscribe to receive smitten’s “Tickled Pink” newsletter, you will submit Personal Information.

A confirmation e-mail will be sent to the specified e-mail address advising of your intent to receive information from smitten.

Within this e-mail you will also be asked to verify your intent to receive information from smitten. This will be done by clicking on a hotlink confirming your acceptance of all terms and conditions outlined in smitten’s privacy policy.

In addition, when you make a purchase from smitten, you will enter your Personal Information to process transactions and receive your shipment.

Information Sharing and Disclosure

smitten may disclose your Personal Information to third parties for the reasons set forth below.

(a) Disclosure to Service Providers:

smitten may disclose your Personal Information to other companies that provide services on our behalf, including, our software developers (including website developers and hosts), data processing, document management, shipping services and office services. smitten will only provide to those third party service providers the information necessary to deliver the services. smitten will, whenever possible, enter into agreements with these third party service providers to protect the Personal Information that smitten discloses to them. However, smitten bears no responsibility for any other use of such Personal Information by the Service Providers.

(b) Disclosure to Promotional Partners:

In some situations, smitten may also disclose Personal Information of Users to organizations that may be partners in promotional activities (“Promotional Partners”).  In such instances, this will only be done if our Promotional Partners agree to use such information solely for the specific, proposed promotional activity and in accordance with this Policy. Information provided by a Promotional Partner to smitten will be treated in accordance with this Policy. However, smitten bears no responsibility for any other use of such Personal Information by that Promotional Partner.

Please note that there are circumstances where the use or disclosure of Personal Information may be justified or permitted or where smitten is obliged to disclose information without consent.  Such circumstances may include:

-Where smitten believes in good faith that the law requires it;

-Where smitten believes, upon reasonable grounds, that it is necessary to protect the rights, privacy, safety or property of an identifiable person or group;

-Where it is necessary to protect the rights or property of smitten and collect any money owing; or

-Where the information is public.

Where obliged or permitted to disclose information without consent, smitten will not disclose more information than is required. smitten does not sell or otherwise disclose to third parties any Personal Information that it has obtained.

Maintenance and Security of Personal Information

smitten retains Personal Information about users as long as smitten believes it is necessary to fulfill the purpose for which it was collected.  Currently, smitten holds the Personal Information in the City of Toronto.  Personal Information about users that is maintained on our systems is protected using industry standard security measures. However, we cannot guarantee that the information submitted to, maintained on, or transmitted from our systems will be completely secure and transmission of information over the Internet is susceptible to possible loss, misrouting, interception and misuse.

Control of your Personal Information

At smitten, we want you to be able to maintain control over how your Personal Information is used. In particular:

You can “opt-out” of some or all of the identified purposes, uses and disclosures listed above provided you notify smitten of your intention to opt-out which purposes, uses and disclosure you desire to opt-out from. In order to provide smitten with this information please contact smitten’s Chief Privacy Officer at the address listed in the “Contact Us” section of this Privacy Policy.

You always have the option to instruct us not to use your name, address, e-mail address, etc. beyond providing you with the service or information you requested. See “Contact Us” below.

All e-mail communications sent by smitten will include the identification of the sender and an “Unsubscribe” option. If smitten determines not to provide you access to your Personal Information, we will provide an explanation.

Individuals may request the correction of their Personal Information, and smitten will make the necessary correction(s) and will contact all third parties with whom a customer’s Personal Information has been disclosed to request that they make those corrections requested.

How do we protect your Personal Information?

We make every reasonable effort to protect against the loss, misuse, and alteration of Personal Information under our control.

Only authorized employees and suppliers have access to your Personal Information.

smitten retains your Personal Information for as long as it is necessary to fulfill the identified purpose or as otherwise required or allowed by law. When that need has ended, your Personal Information will be removed from our system and destroyed in a manner that ensures your security

If an individual believes that their Personal Information on file is not correct, they may request an update of that information by sending a request to the person indicated below. smitten reserves the right not to change any Personal Information but will append any alternative text the individual concerned believes appropriate.  An individual may also request that smitten delete an individual’s Personal Information from smitten’s system and records.  However, due to technical constraints and the fact that smitten backs up its systems, Personal Information may continue to reside in smitten’s systems after deletion.  Individuals, therefore, should not expect that their Personal Information would be completely removed from smitten’s systems in response to an accepted request for deletion.

smitten reserves the right to decline access to Personal Information where the information requested:

a)       Would disclose the Personal Information of another individual or of a deceased individual;

b)      Would disclose business confidential information that may harm smitten or the competitive position of a third party;

c)       Is subject to solicitor-client or litigation privilege;

d)      Could reasonably result in:

i)         serious harm to the treatment or recovery of the individual concerned;

ii)       serious emotional harm to the individual or another individual; or

iii)      serious bodily harm to another individual;

e)       May harm or interfere with law enforcement activities and other investigative or regulatory functions of a body authorized by statute to perform such functions;

f)        Is not readily retrievable and the burden or cost of providing would be disproportionate to the nature or value of the information; or

g)       Does not exist, is not held, or cannot be found by smitten.

Where information will not or cannot be disclosed, the individual making the request will be provided with the reasons for non-disclosure.  Where information will be disclosed, smitten will endeavour to provide the information in question within a reasonable time and no later than thirty (30) days following the request.

smitten will not respond to repetitious or vexatious requests for access. In determining whether a request is repetitious or vexatious, smitten will consider such factors as the frequency with which information is updated, the purpose for which the information is used, and the nature of the information.

To guard against fraudulent requests for access, smitten will require sufficient information to allow it to confirm the identity of the person making the request before granting access or making corrections.

Consent

Your provision of Personal Information to smitten means that you agree and consent that smitten may collect, use and disclose your Personal Information in accordance with this Policy.  If you do not agree with these terms, you are requested not to provide any Personal Information to smitten. Certain services can only be offered if you provide Personal Information to smitten.  Consequently, if you choose not to provide us with any required Personal Information, smitten may not be able to offer you certain services.

If you do not wish to receive information regarding the products and services offered by smitten and its trusted affiliates, independent contractors and business partners please send an email to the person indicated in the Contact Us section at the end of this Policy.

Cookies

smitten uses "cookie" technology to monitor activity on the website. The cookie identifies your browser with a unique, random number. The cookies we use do not reveal any personal information about you. Cookies help us understand which parts of smitten’s website are the most popular, where our visitors are going, and how much time is spent there. We use cookies to study traffic patterns on our site to give our visitors the best experience possible. 

Miscellaneous

Searches – For your convenience, search functions are provided on smitten’s website. In order to learn more about what kind of information our visitors are seeking, and in order to improve our services, smitten will keep a log of those words that are searched.

Hyperlinks – For your convenience, smitten’s website sometimes contains hyperlinks to websites managed by third parties. By activating these hyperlinks, you will leave smitten’s websites for those of the third parties, which may have different privacy policies and practices than smitten. smitten cannot be held liable for the use of such third party websites.

Amendment of practices and this Policy

This statement is in effect and was last revised as of July 22, 2015.  smitten will from time to time review and revise its privacy practices and this Policy.  In the event of any amendment, an appropriate notice will be posted on this website. Policy changes will apply to the information collected from the date of posting of the revised Policy to smitten’s website as well as to existing information held by smitten.

Contact Us

If you have any questions, concerns, complaints or access requests relating to this Privacy Policy the collection of your Personal Information, or our site in general, please contact:

Susan Zuzinjak
smitten creative boutique inc.
510 King Street East, Suite 325
Toronto, ON M5A 0E5
CANADA
416.782.2300

susan@smittencreative.com