Answer Financial Online Privacy Statement

EFFECTIVE: 02/15/2023

This Online Privacy Statement (“Privacy Statement”) describes the privacy practices of Answer Financial Inc. and the affiliated companies whose websites link to this Privacy Statement (“Answer Financial,” “we” “our” or “us”). This Privacy Statement explains the information we collect, why we collect it, how we use and share it, and the choices you can make regarding your information. More information about Answer Financial affiliates is in the Affiliates section at the end of this Privacy Statement.

Answer Financial’s insurance customers may also receive a privacy statement for insurance products and services upon sale and annually thereafter. Those customer privacy statements may contain additional privacy information relating to your customer relationship with us. Those privacy statements and this Online Privacy Statement should be read together.

INFORMATION WE COLLECT AND HOW WE COLLECT IT

Answer Financial collects personal and other information about you. Personal information is information that identifies, relates to, describes, is reasonably capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked (directly or indirectly) with you. Other, non-personal information does not reveal an individual’s identity such as information that has been de-identified or aggregated. The type and amount of information we collect varies based on what products and services you have with us.

We collect personal information about you in several ways from several sources. We collect personal information directly from you including when you sign up for services, buy a product, subscribe to a membership or mailing list, set up an account with us, or during the quoting, registering, or application processes. We and service providers working on our behalf collect personal information from you such as IP address, browsing history and other internet activity information when you use one of our websites, view our emails or otherwise engage with us through a computer or mobile device (“Sites”). We also collect personal information about you from third parties such as consumer reporting agencies, service providers, marketing companies and data providers.

We collect the following categories of personal information:

CATEGORIES EXAMPLES
PERSONAL IDENTIFIERS Name, alias, signature, postal address, phone number, date of birth, unique personal identifier, online identifier, email address, internet protocol (IP) address, state identification card number, account name, Social Security number, driver's license number, passport number, or other similar identifiers.
PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS Age, race, ancestry, national origin, citizenship, religion, marital status, medical condition, physical or mental disability, sex (including gender, gender identity or gender expression), pregnancy, childbirth and related medical status, sexual orientation, veteran or military status, genetic information (including familial genetic information) or other descriptions of your physical characteristics (e.g., height).
COMMERCIAL INFORMATION Service or product related information including policy coverage information, premiums, account name, policy number, payment history, claims history, records of personal property, products or services purchased, obtained, or considered, or other purchasing or consuming histories or tendencies, account log-in, bank account number, credit or debit card number, other payment or financial information, health insurance information, driving record, credit information, medical history, or family member information.
BIOMETRIC AND MULTIMEDIA INFORMATION Fingerprint, audio, electronic, visual, or similar information.
INTERNET OR OTHER ELECTRONIC NETWORK ACTIVITY INFORMATION Browsing history, search history, information regarding your interaction with our website, application or advertisement, links you use or web pages you visit while visiting our site or applications, browser type, internet service provider (ISP), cookies, and mobile device information including device identifier or other information.
GEOLOCATION DATA Physical location, or movements.
PROFESSIONAL OR EMPLOYMENT INFORMATION Employment history, some contents of mail, e-mail and messages on company devices, applications or communication platforms.
EDUCATION INFORMATION Education records.
INFERENCES Inferences drawn from any personal information collected to create a profile reflecting preferences, characteristics, psychological trends, predispositions, behavior, attitudes, intelligence, abilities, and aptitudes.

Sensitive Personal Information

Some personal information we collect is defined under the law as sensitive personal information. Sensitive personal information we may collect includes:

  • Social Security number, driver’s license number, state identification card number, or passport number.
  • Financial account number, debit card number, or credit card number in combination with any required security code.
  • Precise geolocation information.
  • Racial or ethnic origin.
  • Contents of mail, email, and text messages where we are not the intended recipient of the communication.
  • Biometric information used for identification.
  • Personal health information.
  • Sexual orientation or sexual history.

USE OF YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

We use your personal information for business purposes including to:

  • Provide and maintain your services and products. We may use your personal information to provide or maintain your service, products, or membership including to set up a product or service or provide a product or service, maintain your account, service your policy, change your policy, complete a transaction, or respond to customer service requests or other inquiries. We may also collect information about other parties from you to carry out necessary services and/or requests, including adding another driver to an existing policy. If you provide us personal information about others, or if others give us your personal information, we will use the information consistent with the reasons for which it was provided.
  • Improve, develop, and analyze our Sites, services, and products. We use your personal information and other information to:
    • analyze, improve, develop, or deliver our Sites, products and services and develop new services, products or features using algorithms, analytics software, and other similar methods,
    • conduct actuarial or research studies to maintain, protect and develop our networks, services, and products and protect our customers, and
    • analyze how visitors use our Sites to improve the Sites and enhance and personalize your experience.
    We collect some information used for these purposes using analytics software, cookies, and other tracking technologies. For more information about the collection and use of this information, see Cookies and Other Tracking Technologies below.
  • Communicate with you about your service or product. We may communicate with you about your product, service, account, policy, or membership, provide you transaction confirmations, payment alerts or other service or product related messages via mail, email, or other available methods.
  • Provide marketing communications. We may use your personal information to send you communications about products, services, features, and options we believe may interest you. We may send communications via e-mail, or regular mail.
  • Comply with legal requirements and protect safety and security of our business. We may use your personal information to comply with laws, regulations, or other legal obligations, to assist in an investigation, or to enforce terms and conditions. We may use your personal information to protect and defend our rights, network, Sites and other property and the rights of third parties including affiliates and customers. We may also use your personal information to prevent suspected fraud, threats to our network or other illegal activities, prevent misuse or for any other reason permitted by law.
  • Update or correct our records. We may receive personal information about you from other sources, including publicly available databases or third parties from whom we have purchased data, and combine that personal information with other personal information we have about you to update our records. For example, we may obtain change of address information from public sources and use that personal information to update or correct your address.

We use sensitive personal information only as reasonably necessary to perform or maintain the services or provide goods you requested, to perform services on behalf of the business such as maintaining or servicing accounts, processing payments, to provide analytics services or similar services, to detect security incidents, resist malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal actions and to prosecute those responsible for those actions, to ensure customers and other peoples’ physical safety, for short-term use such as non-personalized advertising as part of our current interactions, to verify or maintain the quality or safety of service, improve, upgrade or enhance service, or other reasons that do not require an opt-out of this use.

We do not market any products or services to children under the age of thirteen or knowingly collect any information from children under the age of thirteen. We do not knowingly sell or share for cross-context behavioral advertising the personal information of consumers under the age of sixteen. Our website is not intended for children.

SHARING YOUR INFORMATION

We do not sell your personal information. We also do not share personal information for cross-context behavioral advertising as defined under California law. We may share your personal information with our affiliates for business purposes consistent with the uses described in this Privacy Statement. We may also share personal information about you with third parties whenever you consent to or direct such disclosure or sharing. We may share information with others in an aggregated or de-identified form that does not reasonably identify you. We strive to work with companies that share our commitment to privacy.

We may share any of the categories of personal information described above with service providers and other third parties for business purposes or as required or permitted by law including with:

  • Companies involved in insurance and other business transactions: We share your personal information with other companies that play a role in an insurance transaction with you. We may also share your personal information to participate in insurance support organizations.
  • Authorized agents or brokers: Answer Financial operates through agents and brokers who sell services and products on behalf of certain insurance and other companies. We may share your personal information with those agents or brokers to provide you with the services you’ve requested. They may use your personal information in the manner described in this Privacy Statement.
  • Service providers: Personal information may be shared with service providers who perform services on our behalf for a business purpose including service providers that:
    • help complete transactions, handle a claim, service your policy or service your membership,
    • engage in credit reporting or payment processing,
    • provide marketing and advertising, email, or other communication services,
    • provide services that support our online activities including providing tracking technologies, web hosting and analytics,
    • provide tax and accounting, legal services, delivery, and data enhancement services,
    • provide technology services and enhance security, privacy, and fraud protections,
    • provide data analytics services or conduct research or actuarial studies, and
    • provide support to our operations.
  • Marketing and advertising partners: We may also share personal and other information with service providers and third-party online advertising and marketing partners. We may share personal information with other financial institutions or other companies with whom we have a joint marketing agreement. The Cookies and other Tracking Technologies section below has more details about these activities.
  • Third parties in connection with a business transaction: Personal information may be disclosed to third parties in connection with a corporate transaction, such as a merger, sale of any or all of our company assets or shares, reorganization, financing, change of control or acquisition of all or a portion of our business by an affiliate or third party, or in the event of a bankruptcy or similar proceedings.
  • Law enforcement, regulators, and other parties for legal reasons: Personal information may be disclosed to third parties, as required by law or subpoena, or if we reasonably believe such action is necessary to:
    • comply with the law and the reasonable requests of regulators, law enforcement or other public authorities,
    • protect our or others safety, rights, or property, and
    • investigate fraud or to protect the security or integrity of our Sites or any product or services.

HOW LONG WE KEEP YOUR INFORMATION

We retain personal information in accordance with applicable laws or regulatory requirements and also for as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes for which it was collected and to fulfill the business or commercial purposes that are explained in this Privacy Statement.

COOKIES AND OTHER TRACKING TECHNOLOGIES

Technologies and Information Collected: When you visit our Sites, we and our service providers automatically collect information about your use of and access to these Sites. We collect this information through a variety of tracking technologies, including cookies, Flash objects, web beacons (also called pixel tags), embedded scripts, location-identifying technologies, and similar technology (collectively, “tracking technologies”). Information we collect automatically about you may be combined with other personal information we collect directly. The information collected in this manner includes:

  • The website from where you accessed the Site, where you went to when you left the Site, how frequently you visit the Sites, when and whether you open emails or click the links contained in emails, pages you visit on our Sites, the links you click and ads you view, or your location when you access our Sites,
  • Information about the computer, tablet, smartphone or other device you use, such as your IP address, browser type, Internet service provider, platform type, device type/model/manufacturer, operating system, date and time stamp, a unique ID that allows us to uniquely identify your browser, mobile device, and other similar information,
  • Analytics information collected by us or via third party analytics tools, to help us measure traffic and usage trends for the Sites and to understand more about the demographics and behaviors of our users.

Use of the information: The information collected through tracking technologies allows us to provide you with an improved, enhanced, and personalized customer experience, to monitor and improve our Sites and for other internal purposes such as:

  • Remembering information so that you will not have to re-enter it during your visit or the next time you visit the Sites,
  • Provide custom, personalized content and information, including targeted content, communications, and advertising,
  • Identify and contact you across multiple devices,
  • Provide and monitor the effectiveness of our Sites,
  • Perform analytics and detect usage patterns on our Sites,
  • Diagnose or fix technology problems,
  • Detect or prevent fraud or other harmful activities, and
  • Otherwise to plan for and enhance our Sites.

Our service providers include Google. To learn more about Google’s privacy practices, click here. To access and use the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on, click here.

Your choices regarding cookies: If you prefer not to accept cookies, most browsers will allow you to manage cookies in your browser settings to disable or block cookies, remove existing cookies, automatically accept cookies or to notify you when you receive a cookie. Options available may vary by browser. However, if you disable, modify, or reject cookies, some parts or functionalities of our Site may be inaccessible or not function properly. For example, disabling cookies may require you to repeatedly enter information to take advantage of services.

Targeted Online Advertising and Do Not Track: We or our marketing and advertising service providers may use information about your activities on our Sites or other websites, to help tailor our advertisements or offers to what may interest you — also called interest-based or targeted advertising. The information is collected using the tracking technologies explained above. To limit interest-based advertising click here.

You may continue to see generic or non-targeted ads about our products and services if you opt-out of interest-based advertising. Although we do our best to honor the privacy preferences of our visitors, we are currently not able to respond to “Do Not Track” signals from your browser.

PRIVACY RIGHTS AND CHOICES

Various federal and state laws provide privacy rights to consumers including the right to know, access, delete, or correct personal information, the right to opt-out of sharing of personal information with affiliates for marketing or the right to opt-out of receiving email marketing. These rights differ by state and also by the type of products and services you have with Answer Financial. For example, the rights to know, access or delete under the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”) do not apply to personal information that is subject to certain federal and state laws governing insurance or health information.

Privacy Rights Under CCPA and Similar State Laws

California residents have certain rights under CCPA to access, correct and delete personal information, and other rights described below. While these rights apply only to some of the personal information we collect, for transparency and for your convenience you can submit a request no matter where you live.

 

Right to Know and Access Your Personal Information: You have the right to request the specific pieces of personal information we have collected about you and the right to know:

  • the categories of personal information we’ve collected,
  • the categories of sources from which personal information was collected,
  • the business purpose for collecting the personal information, and
  • the categories of third parties with whom we disclose or share personal information.

Right to Deletion of Personal Information: You have the right to request deletion of personal information collected from you, subject to certain exceptions including that we need the personal information to:

  • Complete a transaction or provide a good or service you requested, service your account, or take other actions reasonably anticipated or aligned within the context of our ongoing business relationship,
  • Detect security incidents, protect against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity, or prosecute those responsible for such activities,
  • Comply with a legal obligation, or
  • Otherwise use your personal information, internally, in a lawful manner that is compatible with the context in which you provided the information.

Right to Correct Personal Information: You have the right to request we correct any inaccurate information we have about you. We may request that you provide documentation to support your request and we will correct your information unless we determine that the personal information is more than likely accurate.

Non-Discrimination Rights: We don’t discriminate against you if you exercise any of the privacy rights described in this privacy statement.

Verified Requests: To protect you and your personal information, we will only respond to requests to know, access, delete or correct that we have been able to properly verify through our authentication processes. To verify your identity, you will be asked to provide several pieces of personal information, such as name and demographic information, which we only use to verify your identity or authority to make the request.

Submitting a Request: To submit an access, correction or deletion request, please click here to submit an online request or call us at 1-888-982-9111. Responses to a verified request may take up to 45 calendar days, or longer depending on the nature of the request. If additional time is needed, we will notify you of the additional time. We may only respond to two access requests within a 12-month period.

A California resident may use an authorized agent to submit a request to delete, request to correct or a request to know. If you are an agent submitting a request, please send an email to us at privacy@answerfinancial.com with the following information: your contact information, identify the type of request, the name of the consumer you are submitting the request on behalf of along with either a) a letter signed by the consumer authorizing you as the agent to submit a CCPA request on the consumer’s behalf, or (b) a valid power of attorney issued pursuant to California Probate Code sections 4121 to 4130. We may contact the consumer to verify your authority and/or to authenticate the consumer. We may deny a request from an agent that does not submit proof that they have been authorized by the appropriate California resident to act on their behalf.

California Consumer Request Metrics: The chart below lists the number of access and deletion requests Answer Financial received, complied with and denied from residents of California in 2023 along with the average amount of days it took to complete a request.

Metrics: 2023 Access My Data Requests for California Residents Quantity
Number of Requests Received 0
Number of Requests Complied with in whole or in part 0
Average Days to Complete a Request n/a

Metrics: 2023 Delete My Data Requests for California Residents Quantity
Number of Requests Received 8
Number of Requests Complied with in whole or in part 4
Number of Requests Denied* 5
Average Days to Complete a Request 34.1

* Answer Financial's practice is to delete personal information after it is no longer needed for business purposes. These business purposes are explained in our Privacy Statement.

 

OTHER SPECIFIC PRIVACY RIGHTS AND CHOICES

Insurance Customers’ Right to Access, Review and Correct Personal Information: Answer Financial insurance product customers can request to see or access their recorded personal information at any time. To do this, please email us at privacy@answerfinancial.com or send a letter to 4804 Laurel Canyon Blvd. Ste 820, Valley Village, CA 91607 with your request. Proper identification may be required to fulfill the request. If you believe our information is incomplete or inaccurate, you can request that we correct it and we will make corrections if possible. Please note we may not be able to provide information relating to investigations, claims, litigation, and other matters. We will respond to all such requests within a reasonable time. We can’t change information provided to us by other companies like consumer reporting agencies. You will have to contact them directly.

You may also call us to correct the information.

Email Marketing Choices and Other Notifications: We may send you email marketing communications about products, features and services that may be of interest to you. To opt out from receiving marketing and promotional emails from us, please send us a request by email at marketing@answerfinancial.com, click the unsubscribe link located at the bottom of the communication, or contact us a request by mail at the following address:

Answer Financial Inc.
Attn: Marketing Department
4804 Laurel Canyon Blvd. Ste 820
Valley Village, CA 91607

If you opt out from receiving marketing emails, we may still send you non-marketing emails such as emails about your products or services, responses to your requests and inquiries, or notices of updates to terms and conditions or our privacy practices.

Vermont residents: We won't share your personal information with Answer Financial companies for marketing purposes except as allowed by Vermont law.

SOCIAL MEDIA, LINKS AND EXTERNAL SITES

Links to other company’s websites may be provided on the Answer Financial Sites as a convenience to you. If you choose to go to these external websites, you will be subject to the privacy practices of those external websites; Answer Financial is not responsible for the privacy practices of those websites. We encourage you to be aware when you leave our Site to read the privacy policies or statements of every website you visit, as those privacy policies or statements may differ from ours. Our Privacy Statement applies solely to the Sites where this Privacy Statement appears.

Our website includes Social Media features, such as the Facebook Like button and widgets, such as the Share This button or interactive mini-programs that run on our site. These features may collect your IP address, which page you are visiting on our website, and may set a cookie to enable the feature to function properly. Social Media features and widgets are either hosted by a third party or hosted directly on our Site. Your interactions with these features are governed by the privacy policy of the company providing it.

SECURITY

Protecting your personal information is important to us. We use a combination of reasonable technical, administrative, and physical safeguards to protect your personal information. However, no website, mobile application, database, or system is completely secure or “hacker proof.” So, we cannot guarantee its absolute security. You are also responsible for taking reasonable steps to protect your personal information against unauthorized disclosure or misuse.

We limit access to your personal information to those who need it to do their jobs. We comply with all applicable federal and state data security laws.

CONTACT US

If you should have questions or concerns about our privacy practices, please contact us at privacy@answerfinancial.com.

CHANGES TO OUR PRIVACY STATEMENT

We may periodically update or revise this Privacy Statement. The effective date at the top of the document shows when this Privacy Statement was last revised. We will let you know when we update the Privacy Statement by changing the date or other appropriate means.

ANSWER FINANCIAL AFFILIATES

List of affiliates on which behalf this notice is provided and amongst which information may be shared:

Insurance Answer Center, LLC
Right Answer Insurance Agency, LLC