GRACE CHURCH SOFTWARE PRIVACY POLICY


Effective: September 1, 2018

This Privacy Policy details the policies of Grace Church (“Grace” or “We”) with respect to the handling of its users (“User” or “You”) personally identifiable information submitted to or otherwise collected by Grace through its website(s) and in the course of providing pastoral care and services (collectively the “Services”).  Grace will use and disclose personal information in accordance with the terms of this Privacy Policy.

Information from Website Browsers

If you’re just browsing the website, we collect the same basic information that most websites collect.  We use common internet technologies, such as cookies and web server logs.  This is information we collect from everybody, whether they have an account with Breeze ChMS (“Breeze”) or not.

The information we collect about all visitors to our website includes the visitor’s browser type, language preference, referring site, additional websites requested, and the date and time of each visitor request.  We also collect potentially personally-identifying information like Internet Protocol (IP) addresses.

Information from Users with Breeze Accounts

Grace uses Breeze to connect members of Grace through the internet.  Grace does not control or operate Breeze.  All of Breeze’s policies and procedures, including its privacy policies, are its own and not controlled by Grace.  Breeze’s policies can be found at www.breezechms.com/terms-of-service.  If you create an account with Breeze, Breeze requires some basic information at the time of account creation, and may collect and use other information as described in its policies and terms-of-service.

Grace may use Breeze to communicate with you after you create an account with Breeze.  This could include using your “User Personal Information.”

“User Personal Information” is any information about one of our users which could, alone or together with other information, personally identify him or her.  Information such as a user name and password, an email address, a real name, and a photograph are examples of “User Personal Information.”

User Personal Information does not include aggregated, non-personally identifying information.  We may use aggregated, non-personally identifying information to operate, improve, and optimize our website and service.  

User Personal Information is collected in order to:
  • Create your Breeze account, and to provide the services you request.
  • Identify you on the Breeze forum for the benefit of Grace.
  • Fill out your Breeze profile and share that profile with other Breeze users and Grace employees if you ask us to.
  • Communicate with you, through email, if permission if given by you, and only for the approved purposed.  Please see our section on email communication for more information.

We limit our use of your User Personal Information to the purposes listed in this Privacy Statement.  If we need to use your User Personal Information for other purposes, we will ask your permission first.  You can always see what information we have, how we’re using it, and what permissions you have given us in your user profile.  

What Information Grace Does Not Collect

We do not intentionally collect sensitive personal information, such as social security numbers, genetic data, or health information.  Although Grace does not request or intentionally collect any sensitive personal information, we realize that you might store this kind of information in your account, such as in a repository.

We do not intentionally collect information that is stored in your repositories or other free-form content inputs.  Information in your repositories belongs to you, and you are responsible for it, as well as, for making sure that your content complies with Breeze’s Terms of Service.  Grace employees do not access private repositories unless required to for security or maintenance, or for support reasons, with the consent of the repository owner.
If your repository is public, any other account user (including us) may view its contents.  If you have included private or sensitive information in your public repository, such as email addresses, that information may be indexed by search engines or used by third parties.  

If you’re a child under the age of 13, you may not have an account on Breeze’s Grace forum.  Grace does not knowingly collect information from or direct any of our content specifically to children under 13. If we learn or have reason to suspect that you are a user who is under the age of 13, we will unfortunately have to close your account.  Please see Breeze’s Terms of Service for information about account termination.

How We Share the Information We Collect

We do not share, sell, rent, or trade User Personal Information with third parties for their commercial purposes.  We do not disclose User Personal Information outside Grace, except in the situations listed in the section below on Compelled Disclosure.

We may only share User Personal Information with your permission, so we can perform services you have requested.

We may share User Personal Information with a limited number of third-party vendors who process it on our behalf to provide or improve our service, and who have privacy restrictions in place similar to our own Privacy Policy, such as Breeze and PayPal.  Our vendors perform services such as payment processing, network data transmission, and other similar services.

We do not host advertising on Grace.  We or you may occasionally embed content from third party sites, like Breeze or PayPal, when using our website or the Breeze Grace forum, which may contain limited advertising.

Our Use of Cookies and Tracking

Cookies

Grace uses cookies to make interactions with our service easy and meaningful.  We use cookies, and other similar services, to improve website performance, provide customized viewing options, compile statistical reports on website activity, for fraud reduction, or for security purposes. We also use cookies to recognize visitors or a previous visitor of our website, or to pre-populate website forms.

A cookie is a small piece of text that our web server stores on your computer or mobile device, which your browser sends to us when you return to our site.  Cookies do not necessarily identify you if you are merely visiting Grace; however, a cookie may store a unique identifier for each logged in user.  The cookies Grace sets are essential for the operation of the website, or are used for performance or functionality.  By using our website, you agree that we can place these types of cookies on your computer or device.

Tracking

“Do Not Track” is a privacy preference you can set in your browser if you do not want online services to collect and share certain kinds of information about your online activity from third party tracking services.  We do not track your online browsing activity on other online services over time and we do not permit third-party services to track your activity on our site beyond our basic Google Analytics tracking, which you may opt out of here. https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout/  Because we do not share this kind of data with third party services or permit this kind of third party data collection on Grace for any of our users, and we do not track our users on third-party websites ourselves, we do not need to respond differently to an individual browser’s Do Not Track setting.

If you are interested in turning on your browser’s privacy and Do Not Track settings, the Do Not Track website has browser-specific instructions.

How Grace Secures Your Information

Grace takes all measures reasonably necessary to protect User Personal Information from unauthorized access, alteration, or destruction; maintain data accuracy; and help ensure the appropriate use of User Personal Information.  We follow generally accepted industry standards to protect the personal information submitted to us, both during transmission and once we receive it.

No method of transmission, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure.  Therefore, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.

Grace’s Global Privacy Practices and Notice to European Users

Information that we collect will be stored and processed in the United States in accordance with this Privacy Statement.  However, we understand that we have users from different countries and regions with different privacy expectations, and we may try to meet those needs upon request.

Resolving Complaints

If you have concerns about the way Grace is handling your User Personal Information, please let us know immediately, or if you want Grace to correct your User Personal Information that is stored with Grace, please submit your request in writing to the address below:

Grace Church
2112 Hargrove Road
Tuscaloosa, AL 35405
Phone: (205) 462-1144

You may also email us directly at gracechurch@gracechurchtuscaloosa.com with the subject line “Privacy Concerns”.  We will respond within 30 days at the latest.

How We Respond to Compelled Disclosure

Grace may disclose personally-identifying information or other information we collect about you to law enforcement in response to a valid subpoena, court order, warrant, or similar government order, or when we believe in good faith that disclosure is reasonably necessary to protect our property or rights, or those of third parties or the public at large.

How You Can Access and Control the Information We Collect

If you’re already a Breeze Grace user, you may access, update, alter, or delete your basic User profile information by editing your user profile or contacting Breeze directly.

Data Retention and Deletion

Grace will retain User Personal Information from Breeze for as long as your account is active or as needed to provide you services.

We may retain certain User Personal Information indefinitely, unless you delete it or request its deletion.  For example, we don’t automatically delete inactive user accounts, so unless you choose to delete your account, we will retain your account information indefinitely.

If you would like us to delete your User Personal Information, you may request us to do so by any means of notification listed above.  We will retain and use your information as necessary to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements, but barring legal requirements, we will delete your full profile (within reason) within 30 days.

How We Communicate with You

We will use your email address to communicate with you, if permission if given by you, and only for approved purposes.  

Depending on your email settings, Grace may occasionally send notification emails about changes in a repository you are watching, forum updates, new features, requests for feedback, important policy changes, or Grace community events.

Changes to Our Privacy Statement

We reserve the right to modify this Privacy Policy at any time.  You should review this Privacy Policy frequently.  If we make material changes to this policy, we may notify you on our Website, by a blog post, by email, or by any method we determine.  The method we choose is at our sole discretion.  We will also change the “Last Updated” date at the beginning of this Privacy Policy.  Any changes we make to our Privacy Policy are effective as of this Last Updated date and replace any prior Privacy Policies.