General
Houston & Kokare LLC (“Houston & Ko” “we,” “our” or “us”) is committed to protecting the privacy of individuals in all aspects of our business operations. We strictly abide by privacy laws, regulations and best international privacy standards to provide you with safer and more reliable services.
Please read this Privacy Policy carefully to understand our policies and practices regarding your information and how we will treat it. By using or accessing the Houston & Ko Website (“the Website”) or any of our services, you agree to be bound by this Privacy Policy. Remember that your use of the Website is at all times subject to our Terms of Use, which incorporates this Privacy Policy. Any terms used in this Privacy Policy shall have the definitions given to them in the Terms of Use.
Our Privacy principles
In protecting your privacy, we are guided by the following principles:
- We only collect personal information that is necessary in relation to our provision of the Services;
- We strive to maintain the highest standards of transparency regarding our collection and processing of your personal information;
- We only use information for the purposes specified in this Privacy policy; and
- Except as otherwise provided in this Privacy Policy, we do not share or sell your personal information to third parties.
Collection of personal information
Houston & Ko may ask you to provide the following information to enable you access the Website, the Services or to be admitted into the Houston & Ko network, either as a Client or Freelancer:
- Names
- Contact information including Email, WhatsApp, Skype contact details
- Identification documents
- Professional qualifications and background
- Employment status
- LinkedIn profile URL
- Curriculum vitae or Resume
- Skill sets, language, tech and tool skills
- Freelancer hourly rates, availability, interest in projects, invitations sent to contacts
- Billing and personal address
- Tax information
- Date of birth
- Payment and billing details including bank account and payment provider details
- Professional photos (where applicable)
- Freelancer’s business registration document
We may also collect personal information provided to us in certain circumstances including when you contact us; when you respond to our request for information, electronically or otherwise; and when you submit your personal information to us for any reason. In addition, we may record video and phone calls for quality assurance and training purposes.
Automatically collected Information
When you access the Houston & Ko Website and Services or Houston & Ko Account, we automatically record and store certain information by using cookies and other types of technology such as Google Analytics and HubSpot. Examples of information that we might collect are LinkedIn profile details; Internet Protocol addresses, your geographic location; date and time of your visit; device and browser types and identifiers, referring and exit page addresses and software and system types.
Information from Third Party Sources
Houston & Ko may supplement the information collected from you with additional information about you from other sources including publicly available and third-party databases or services that provide information such as LinkedIn, corporate websites and job board websites.
In addition, we may conduct necessary background checks to verify the professional background, criminal convictions, among other facts. If applicable to you, your consent to the collection of such additional data will be solicited at such time, pursuant to applicable laws.
Use of cookies and related technologies
Like many other sites, we use cookies and other similar technologies to collect information about your usage of the Website and the Services, including your preferences and your browsing behavior so that we can offer better personalized services to you. Cookies are small text files that are stored on the browsers or devices you use to access the Website.
Although cookies do not disclose your identity, you may disable cookies them at any time. Doing so will, however, affect our ability to track your preferences and as such, you may have to manually adjust your preferences every time you visit the Website.
To find out more information about our use of cookies, please see our Cookie Policy accessible at https://houstonandko.com/cookie-policy
Use of personal information
We use the personal information we collect about you or that you provide to us to:
- To personalize and optimize your experience as part of our provision of the Services;
- To perform screening process, which evaluates prospective Freelancer’s language skills, personality, domain-specific knowledge, technical skills, competence and professionalism before matching professional Freelancer with Clients;
- To provide and maintain our Service;
- To notify you about changes to our Service;
- To allow you to participate in interactive features of our Service when you choose to do so;
- To provide customer support;
- To communicate with you from time to time;
- To provide support and assistance in relation to the Services;
- To diagnose or fix technology problems in relation to the Website; and
- To gather analysis or valuable information so that we can improve our Service.
Communications
Subject to any restrictions under applicable laws, we may send periodic promotional or informational emails to you. You may opt-out of such communications by clicking the unsubscribe link in the email. Alternatively, you could send us an email at va@houstonandko.com. Please note that it may take up to ten (10) business days for us to process opt-out requests.
Sharing of information
Houston & Ko does not share your personal information with third parties except when you agree to be bound by our Freelancer or Client Terms and Conditions, in which case your information with sharing of your personal information in relation may be shared in connection with provision of the Services.
We may also share your information with our trusted third party service providers who may process personal information on our behalf. Such third party service providers include those engaged to host our data (including your personal information), websites and Services; providing payment processing services; or performing other administrative services for us. Although we have been carefully vetted these third parties, we shall not be responsible or liable for any of their acts or omissions. Additionally, Houston & Ko may share your personal information pursuant to any governmental, court and law enforcement requests under any law or regulation.
Children
Both the Website and the Services are not intended for persons who have not attained the age of majority. Accordingly, Houston & Ko does not knowingly collect personal information from children.
In case we learn that we have collected personal information relating to a child, we shall immediately delete such information from our databases.
Retention and storage of personal information
We use commercially reasonable safeguards to help keep the personal information collected through the Website secure.
We shall retain personal data collected for a reasonable time frame, which will vary depending on the nature of the data and whether the data may be needed for future legitimate use. When your Personal Information is no longer needed for the purpose for which it was obtained, we will take reasonable steps to destroy such Personal Information.
Your European Union Privacy Rights
Residents in the European Union are entitled to certain additional rights with respect to personal information that we hold about them. These rights include:
- the right to access;
- the right to rectification;
- the right to erasure;
- the right to restrict processing;
- the right to object to processing;
- the right to data portability; and
- the right to withdraw consent.
If you have any questions or concerns regarding how to exercise any of your rights, please send us a detailed message to va@houstonandko.com, then we will serve you.
Changes and updates to the Privacy Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we make changes, we will revise this Privacy Policy to reflect such changes and revise the “last updated” date included at the end of this policy. We may provide you additional notice (such as to your e-mail address) if the changes are material.
Your continued use of our Website and Services following the posting of changes to this Policy will mean you agree with, and consent to be bound by, the new revised Privacy Policy. Therefore, please check the Privacy Policy periodically for updates.
Your control over personal information
You may at any time request for correction or deletion of your personal information by contacting us at va@houstonandko.com.
Contact us
If you have any questions or comments regarding this Privacy Policy, please contact us at va@houstonandko.com.
Effective date of the Privacy Policy: 29th day of March2021
Last updated on: 29th day of March 2021