Merit Resources Website Privacy Policy

Overview

Merit Resources respects, and takes your privacy very seriously. We make use of any personal information that you provide to us for the purpose of serving you better. This statement is provided so that you will know how and what we collect, how it may be used by Merit Resources and to make you aware of certain conditions that may apply to information you provide or that we collect about you.

This Privacy Policy applies to all information that you provide to Merit Resources and that Merit Resources maintains electronically, whether you provide the information through Merit Resources.com, or via other means.

This Privacy Policy does not apply to any information that you may provide to third parties; for example, other sites linked to Merit Resources’ Web sites. You should contact those third parties directly to determine their respective privacy policies. As used herein, the terms “Merit Resources,” “we,” “our” and “its” when referring to Merit Resources, Inc. and its related companies are used only for convenience and are not intended to be an accurate description of ownership, operation or corporate/legal relationships.

What We Collect?

We may collect information about your use of our website including what areas of the site you visit and services or links you access. Collected information can include type of computer hardware or software, IP address or referring website addresses.
If you are a current, former or prospective client of Merit Resources, we may collect information such as your business name, location, information about your employees and your payroll, information about your insurance and other benefit plans, certain legal and financial information and information relating to legal proceedings and information about your finances.

If you are an employee or client of Merit Resources, we collect and maintain a variety of personal information about you and, if applicable, your company and employees. This information may be collected through paper forms submitted by you. For employees, the information we maintain includes, among other things:

Name, phone number and address (street and email).
Age, marital status and occupation.
Information about job history and employment status.
Information about salary and benefits, including health benefits, time off, retirement plans, social security or taxpayer identification number.
Recruiting and training history.
Information about family members such as their names, addresses and social security numbers.
We may make some or all of this information available for you or your worksite employer's use. For clients, examples of this information include:

Your location.
Your number of worksite employees.
The gross payroll of worksite employees assigned to your location.
Your SIC codes.
Information about insurance and other benefit plans.
How We Collect Information:

We Collect information From:

Applications, questionnaires and other forms you submit (information such as your name, address and income).
Your transactions with us and others.
Our communications with you.
Public sources.
List vendors and membership lists.
Web-based tools when you visit our Web sites, including “cookies”.
Depending on the use that you make of Merit Resources’ Web site, we may also collect your Internet Protocol (IP) Address (which is the unique address of your computer), information about your interests and preferences, and, if you decide to send us your resume, information included in your resume. From time to time, we may conduct surveys or offer contests or other promotional events, and gather additional personal information from you in connection with those events. Merit Resources may store and analyze log files from user sessions.

Use of Cookies.
Cookies are a standard technology used to store small pieces of information on your hard drive for your browser. They personalize and streamline your use of Merit Resources’ Web sites, or identifying which parts of a site you have previously visited. They also enable us to pre-populate, or automatically fill out, forms and schedules. They enable us to tailor the information you receive and to assist third party organizations with whom we have strategic alliances by identifying you as a Merit Resources client, employee or Merit Resources website user. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, unless you have configured yours not to accept them.

Other Information collection.
If you send us your resume, we use that information to assist you with job placement. Merit Resources may also collect the name of the domain from which you access the Internet (e.g., aol.com); the date and time you access Merit Resources's Web sites; and the Internet address of any Web site from which you link directly to Merit Resources's Web sites; as well as collecting and storing other information in a user’s log file. A user’s log file tells Merit Resources where a user comes from when entering a Merit Resources Web site; which part of the Merit Resources Web site the user visits as well as where the user goes when leaving the Merit Resources Web site; and how much time the user spends in the Merit Resources Web sites. In addition, Merit Resources may collect e-mail addresses and other personal information from persons who are not current employees or clients of Merit Resources.

How Information Could be Used and Shared:

Merit Resources Use:
Your personal information may be used during the course of your employment or client relationship with Merit Resources. Additionally, your information may be used to assist you or provide you with other available services. We may allow you to edit and update personal information online or via a form you can fill in with personal information and download and/or print. Your information may also be used for other things such as:

Contacting You.
Merit Resources uses your personally identifiable information to communicate with you in the course of your employment or client relationship. We may also contact you to inform you of products and services provided by Merit Resources’ strategic alliances or other third-party organizations. While we must be able to contact you for matters relating to your employment or your client relationship, if you do not wish to receive e-mail communications from Merit Resources regarding strategic alliance offers or other third-party products and services, you may opt out of receiving such communications by following the procedure set forth as listed in related email communications by Merit Resources or by the procedure as listed below. Merit Resources will continue to contact you for matters relating to your employment or your client relationship.

Rewarding Use of Merit Resources websites.
Merit Resources may use information it collects in order to reward or provide incentives to employees, client companies or other Merit Resources Web site users for visiting Merit Resources Web site; using services provided on the Merit Resources Web site; or for visiting the Web sites of Merit Resources’ strategic alliances.
Other Third Party Use:
We may share your information among related companies of Merit Resources, even if the related company is not a party to your client service or employment agreement. In addition, we may from time to time transfer our database of employee information to third-party contractors who analyze such information on behalf of Merit Resources for the purpose of, among other things, targeting e-mails to employees regarding strategic alliance offers, or who mail marketing materials to employees regarding strategic alliance offers. Additionally, we may from time to time transfer our database of employee information to a third-party contractor who provides employment verification services on behalf of Merit Resources. Such third-party contractors are contractually bound to hold all such information in confidence and do not share such information with any parties other than Merit Resources.

Your Worksite Employer:
If you are an employee, most of your personal information is also available to your individual worksite employer. However, Merit Resources does not provide information regarding your physical and/or mental health to any third party for any purposes, unless compelled by a governmental or legal authority.

Governmental Authorities, Compliance with Law and Protection of Merit Resources and Others
We provide information to governmental authorities when required to do so by law (for example, we report information regarding your compensation and withholding to the U.S. Internal Revenue Service and state taxing authorities). Merit Resources will also provide personally identifiable information to third parties if compelled to do so by an appropriately empowered governmental or legal authority, or, as necessary, to protect Merit Resources’ rights or the rights of third parties.
Benefit Plan Providers.

Merit Resources will also provide personally identifiable information to its third-party benefit providers in conjunction with the administration of its benefit plans.

Medical Emergencies.
If necessary to respond to an apparent medical emergency, Merit Resources may disclose selected employee information.

Strategic Alliances.
Merit Resources has entered into marketing agreements, strategic alliances and other relationships with third-party organizations that may offer or provide products and services to you, sometimes under discounted or preferential terms. We sometimes agree to give these third parties (including potential parties to strategic alliances) aggregated, non-personally identifiable information about our clients, employees or visitors. If you initiate an inquiry with respect to a third party’s product or service by clicking on the icon or link relating to such product or service on Merit Resources’ Web sites, we may furnish such third party with certain personal information regarding you for the purpose of, among other things, pre-populating forms or facilitating the exchange of information between you and the third party. If you do not wish to have any of your personal information furnished to such third-parties, do not access any of the third-party products and services included on Merit Resources’ web sites.

Content Linked at Other Sites:
Merit Resources’ Web sites may provide you with links to other web sites. We are not responsible for those sites and cannot control the use of information that you submit once you leave Merit Resources’ website and reach other sites, nor can we control the content offered on those sites or on links from those sites. Please be aware that these third parties may have a different privacy policy than Merit Resources. Their web sites may also provide less security than Merit Resources.
You should contact any third-party web sites directly to determine their privacy policies.

Our Comitment to Security:
We are all responsible in some way for the safety and security of our personal and account information, and at Merit Resources, we’re making it a top priority. No data transmission over the Internet can be guaranteed to be 100% secure, so while Merit Resources strives to protect your personal information, we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information that you transmit to Merit Resources. What follows is a brief overview of how we undertake this responsibility.

We maintain physical safeguards, such as secure areas in buildings; electronic safeguards, such as passwords and encryption; and procedural safeguards, such as customer authentication procedures to prevent ID theft.

Access to information about you is restricted to authorized employees obtaining that information for business purposes.
We carefully select and monitor the outside companies that we hire to perform services for us, such as equipment or mail vendors. We require them to keep customer information safe and secure, and do not allow them to use or share the information for any purpose other than the job they are hired to do.

We train our employees on security procedures, and we conduct regular audits to verify our compliance with the procedures.
Here are some of the things we do with our technology and internal training to ensure that your information in our systems is protected:

We use firewall systems and intrusion detection software to prohibit unauthorized access.
We encrypt sensitive information that is transmitted over the Internet.
We build information security right into our systems and networks using only the latest internationally recognized security standards, regulations, and industry-based ’best practices’.
We require our associates to take information security awareness training and to apply this training to their job every day.
This is not a children’s website
Merit Resources does not knowingly solicit data from children, and we do not knowingly market to children.

Merit Resources employees and privacy
Merit Resources trains all Merit Resources employees about the importance of privacy. It is Merit Resources's policy to give access to your information only to those employees who require it to carry out the responsibilities of their jobs.

You may tell us not to solicit you by mail, telephone or e-mail for products and services that are not directly related to your employment role and that are outside our regular communications with you. If you tell us not to solicit you, we will not allow information about you that is shared among affiliates within the organization to be used for that purpose.

You may tell us not to share personal information about you with outside companies, except we may disclose information as required or permitted by law. For example, required disclosures are made to outside auditors, while permitted disclosures are made to vendors assisting us.

Changes in these policies and practices
Merit Resources reserves the right to change its privacy policies and practices periodically, without providing individual notice, by updating this Privacy Policy notice. This Privacy Policy was created on December 7, 2007. You agree that it is your responsibility to monitor such updates and that your continued use of Merit Resources's Web sites after such revisions have been made constitutes your full acceptance of such revised terms and conditions.

More information
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please write to:

Merit Resources
Attn: Website Administration (Privacy Policy Inquiry)
4410 114th Street
Des Moines, IA 50322

Fax: 515-727-1241
Telephone: 800-336-1931

Email address: Website-admin@meritresources.com.