Chugach Electric Privacy Policy
Chugach Electric Association (“Chugach,” also referred to herein using “we,” “our,” and “us”) respects your privacy, and we assure you that we take the protection of your personal information very seriously. We therefor provide this Privacy Policy to disclose our information collection, utilization, and sharing practices for this Site. This Privacy Policy applies to any website or mobile application that includes, displays, attaches, references, or links to this Privacy Policy (each the “Site”). Unless explicitly provided herein, this Privacy Policy does not apply to the practices of companies that Chugach does not own or control or to people that Chugach does not employ or manage. If you do not agree to these terms, do not access the Chugach Site or other related services. The information we receive from you depends on what you do when you visit this Site. Except as described in this policy, we do not sell, rent, share or disclose your personally identifiable information to or with any other organizations.
TYPE AND USES OF INFORMATION WE COLLECT FROM YOU:
Personally Identifiable Information (“PII”) – Generally, you can visit our Site without revealing any personal information about yourself. At times, though, we or vendors operating on our behalf may need information about you, such as when you login, apply for a job, or pay your bill. In order to properly pay your bill, we may combine information you submit on the Site with information we have collected about you as a member from sources other than the Site, such as information that might be collected when you sign up for services with Chugach. Unless otherwise indicated, the information we request is optional, but you may not be able to use parts of our Site without providing such information. We may gather certain personal information from you to help us better serve you through transactions and promotions, as well as to respond to inquiries and information and opportunities. We only collect personally identifiable information when you choose to reveal it to us.
Our Site collects information from our web forms that may be displayed on our Site. At these places, we may ask you to give us contact information (like name, company name, title, account number, member number, email address, phone number, and address, along with answers to questions topical to the web form and an ability to state additional information).
When you email a question to one of our team members, we receive your email address and any other information you choose to include in your email. If you use other web forms to submit inquiries or sign up for mailing lists or other information, we will collect the information you submit. If we receive similar questions from other users, we may post the most frequently asked questions on our site under a “Q & A” section. The question we post may be similar to, or the same as, the question you submitted, but we will not identify you (or anyone else) as the questioner. We also have various web forms for you to voluntarily report outages and we display general area outage information publicly on our Site.
The primary purpose of many web forms is to allow you to request information, products, and services from us, as well as to provide employment information and opportunities. We use the information you provide to process your requests and otherwise provide the products and services you request, as well as to provide support for those products and services. We may use your PII to send you information and advertising about our organization and our products and services including without limitation to provide you with products and services you have expressed interest in, requested, and/or purchased. For example, if you sign up for outage alerts or high bill alerts we may use the information you give to us to provide such alerts. We may also use information you provide to us regarding your account to compare your utility usage against other members and provide you with such comparison information. We reserve the right, but not the obligation, to contact you regarding changes to this Privacy Policy and other matters relevant to the Site.
When you submit an inquiry about a job through the Site, we may ask for information such as your name, address, telephone number, e-mail address, career selection or job interest, work experience, and other information related to employment opportunities including an option to upload your resume. We may use third parties to collect and process such employment related information. We may also require you to use your member account login to view or submit job related information, and therefore member account information about you may be associated with your employment related activities and information submitted by you related to employment. Alternatively, we may require you to create an employment interest related account and similarly associate such employment related account information with your employment related activities and information submitted by you. We may use the information you provide to match your experience and preferences with the job openings we have, and someone from Chugach may contact you about a possible employment opportunity. Please note that by submitting your information regarding employment opportunities with the Chugach, you authorize us to transmit and store your information in our recruitment database.
We may allow you to login using Facebook, Google, or other single sign on methods from third parties. We may collect or transmit information about you to and from such third parties upon your sign-up and in relation to your login using such services. Facebook, Google and other third party services allow you to adjust your privacy settings through those platforms and you should refer to the privacy policies and privacy setting options of those platforms to adjust your privacy settings and review what information is collected, used, and shared.
INFORMATION AUTOMATICALLY COLLECTED:
When you visit our Site, we may collect some information automatically. By collecting this information we get a better understanding of your needs and what products and services we can develop to meet those needs. Some of the information we automatically collect is necessary for the proper functioning of the Site, such as cookies as explained below. All the information we gather helps us understand your preferences and how well our Site is functioning so we can continually improve your online experience with us. We may also use such information to improve our company and its products and services, and to provide you information and advertisements regarding those products and services.
Links, Embedded Content, and Buttons – We may keep track of how you interact with links across our services, including our email notifications. We do this to help improve our services, provide information and advertising, and to be able to analyze aggregate click statistics such as how many times a particular link was clicked on. This Site may contain links to other websites, content embedded in our Site that comes from or relates to other websites and services, and buttons from other websites and services such as social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, and these third parties may use cookies or other tracking devices to collect and track information about you across the Internet. We are not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of these other websites or entities or their data collection practices. You should check the privacy policies of these other websites and entities, particularly when providing personally identifiable information or to find out what other information they collect from users, whether while on their platform or website or in relation to links, buttons, or embedded media on the Site or elsewhere.
Information From Your Computer – We may ourselves, or through our third party service providers, collect information about your computer, such as the browser, operating system, IP address, country and other geolocation data, date and time of visit, whether you are using a mobile device and what type, referring websites, the search engine queries you used to get to our Site, the pages of our Site you visit and your activities on our Site such as what images, videos, or other imbedded media you view, as well as the amount of time spent on our pages, and the number of pages visited. Some of this information may be collected using cookies, as further explained below. This information is used for a variety of purposes to improve our Site and its content, including without limitation to gather broad demographic data, identify trends and statistics, help diagnose problems with our server, and to administer our Site and its content. We may collect and share information between pages of our Site for the proper functioning of our Site, as well as authentication. We may also use this information to provide you with information and advertising regarding our products and services.
Cookies - Our Site may use "cookies" to provide information on your computer. Cookies are pieces of data that a website can send to your browser, which may then be stored on your device. We may use both session and persistent cookies on our own or through our third party service providers as described below. Cookies may save your preferences while you are at our Site, such as allowing for persistent login on pages that require logging in, and we may use them to provide you with tailored information and tracking as you use our Site. Cookies help us, among other things, to determine which areas of our Site are popular by tracking hits to those areas, which may in turn allow us or our third party providers to provide you with targeted information or advertising regarding our products and services. By modifying your browser preferences, you have the choice to accept cookies, to be notified when a cookie is sent, or to reject cookies. The rejection or limitation of cookies by your browser may limit your ability to use the Site.
Third-Party Service Providers - We may use a variety of third-party services to help provide our services, to help us understand the use of our services, provide information and provide advertising regarding our Site and our products and services, to process payments, and to process employment applications, among other services. Third party services providers may include, but are not limited to Google Analytics and a variety of third party social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn. These third-party service providers may collect, store, and share information as further dictated by the privacy policies and disclosures of those third parties.
Google, Inc. may utilize the data collected to track and examine the use of this Site, to prepare Google reports on its activities and share them with other Google, Inc. services. Google, Inc. may also use the data collected to contextualize and personalize the ads of its own advertising network. You may view Google’s privacy policy here and here, with more information located at https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/6004245?hl=en (including information regarding how to control how information is shared through your Ads Settings). You may opt out of Google Analytics data as instructed here: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout/. You can opt out of or modify the settings related to what Google collects through its DoubleClick cookie by visiting the following websites: https://www.google.com/settings/ads/plugin?hl=en and https://www.google.com/settings/ads/anonymous?hl=en.
Facebook similarly provides more information regarding the information it collects and how it is used in relation to advertising along with methods to opt out of collecting and sharing of information here: https://www.facebook.com/settings?tab=ads. General information regarding opt-out from interest-based advertising from companies belonging to the Network Advertising Initiative can be found here: http://www.networkadvertising.org/choices/.
Web Beacons - We may employ Web beacons (also called single-pixel gifs), which are customized links or similar technologies, on the Site and when sending you messages, newsletters, or promotional emails or in using third party service providers. Web beacons allow us to (a) determine whether you have opened, or acted upon, a promotional email and which links you have clicked on in order to deliver to you more focused communications and other content, (b) allow us to count the number of users who have visited certain webpages and effectively deliver services, and (c) enable us to compile aggregated statistics and determine the efficacy of promotions by using Web beacons from third parties.
Combining of Information – Except as set forth in this Privacy Policy, such as for account payment and employment opportunities, we generally do not combine information about you that is collected on the Site with information we have related to you that is collected through means other than through the Site.
SHARING OF YOUR INFORMATION
We will not sell, rent or lease your information to others without your consent, except as provided in this Privacy Policy. In general, the information you provide will be used to support your customer relationship with us and to enhance and improve our Site, products, services, and advertising. We may also share information about you, such as your contact information with prospective Chugach board members for use in their election campaigning, and otherwise according to our Bylaws which can be reviewed here.
We may engage third party service providers, consultants, and independent contractors to perform functions and provide services for us including without limitation those third party service providers mentioned in this Privacy Policy. We may share the information we collect through our Site with these service providers so that they can perform services for us in relation to the Site and our business. For example, we may share your information with our advertising and email vendors so that they can provide services to us such as emailing you about our products and services and for supporting account payment and employment opportunity portals on the Site.
In addition to the situations described above, we may use and disclose visitor information in special instances when we have reason to believe disclosing this information is necessary to investigate, identify, contact, or bring legal action against someone who may be causing injury to or interfering with our rights or property, other Site visitors, or anyone else. We may disclose visitor information when subpoenaed, for government investigations, and when we otherwise believe in good faith that the law requires it.
OTHER INFORMATION PRACTICES
Access to Personal Information for Reviewing, Editing, and/or Removing - If you wish to discuss this Privacy Policy and the information we collect, you may contact us at the address provided in this Privacy Policy. At this time we may not be able to specifically identify and provide you with all of the information we have collected about you for your review, editing, or removal from our databases. In order to provide you with any information, Chugach may, but is not required to, request that you prove your identity to the satisfaction of Chugach.
Security - We take commercially reasonable steps to protect data, particularly financial information, transmitted through our Site, and we rely upon our third party vendors to supply security for the services they provide. We cannot and do not ensure or warrant the security of any information you transmit to us or from our online products or services. You transmit information to us at your own risk and should take all necessary precautions regarding the information you transmit, either to our Site and its related vendors or elsewhere on the Internet.
Children - Protecting the privacy of children is very important to us. For that reason, our Site does not solicit, collect or maintain personally identifiable information from users we actually know are under age 13. If you are a parent or guardian, please contact us if you believe information regarding a child has been collected by us through our Site.
Business Transfers - In the event that we are involved in a bankruptcy, merger, acquisition, reorganization or sale of assets or change in our ownership or control, your information may be sold or transferred as part of that transaction. The promises in this Privacy Policy will apply to your information as transferred to the new entity.
Do Not Track - Presently the Site does not honor “do not track” settings on web browsers and does not offer you the opportunity to request that we not track your use of its services except as otherwise stated in this Privacy Policy.
Changes to this Policy - We may revise this Privacy Policy from time to time. The most current version of the policy will govern our use of your information and will always be available by clicking the Privacy Policy link in the footer of the main page of the Site. Please check this link often for changes. By continuing to access or use the Site after those changes become effective, you agree to be bound by the revised Privacy Policy.
Opt-in – BY ACCESSING, VISITING, BROWSING, USING, OR ATTEMPTING TO INTERACT WITH ANY PART OF THE SITE, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION THE SITE'S FORMS OR ACCOUNT PAYMENT OPTIONS, YOU EXPRESSLY OPT-INTO THE PRIVACY AND DATA SHARING PRACTICES DESCRIBED IN THIS PRIVACY POLICY INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION US CONTACTING YOU BY EMAIL FOR ADVERTISING PURPOSES.
Subject to Terms of Use - This Privacy Policy is further subject to the terms set forth in any website terms of use (see www.chugachelectric.com) or legal disclaimers including without limitation all provisions regarding warranty disclaimers, limits of liability, and dispute resolution mechanisms such as the jurisdiction and forum provisions.
Contacting Us - If you have additional questions about our use of information, please contact us at
Chugach Electric Association, Inc. PO Box 196300
Anchorage, AK 99519-6300
Email: service@chugachelectric.com Phone: (907) 563-7494
Effective Date: May 1, 2017.
© 2017 Chugach Electric Association, All Rights Reserved