Privacy Policy

Last updated 17 March 2024.

This privacy policy sets out how MentorMeet uses and protects your personal data.

1. Important information and who we are

Privacy policy

This privacy policy gives you information about how MentorMeet collects and uses your personal data through your use of this website, including any data you may provide when you register with us OR purchase a service.

This website is not intended for anyone under the age of 18 and and we do not knowingly collect data relating to children. If you think you may have uploaded personal data of someone under the age of 18 please contact us.

Controller

MentorMeet is the controller and responsible for your personal data (collectively referred to as “MentorMeet”, “we”, “us” or “our” in this privacy policy).

2. The types of personal data we collect about you

Personal data means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified.

We may collect, use, store and transfer different kinds of personal data about you which we have grouped together as follows:

• Identity Data includes first name, last name, any previous names, username or similar identifier, marital status, title, date of birth and gender.
• Contact Data includes billing address, delivery address, email address and telephone numbers.
• Financial Data includes bank account and payment card details.
• Transaction Data includes details about payments to and from you and other details of products and services you have purchased from us.
• Device and location Data includes internet protocol (IP) address, your login data, browser type and version, time zone setting and location, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system and platform, device ID and other technology on the devices you use to access this website.
• User Data includes your username and password, purchases or orders made by you, your interests, preferences, feedback and survey responses.
• Usage Data includes information about how you interact with and use our website, products and services.
• Marketing and Communications Data includes your preferences in receiving marketing from us and our third parties and your communication preferences.
• Personal Data does not include information that is (i) deidentified, anonymised, aggregated, publicly available information, or business contact data (unless the Applicable Data Protection Law otherwise considers such information as Personal Data), (ii) Usage Statistics; or (iii) any information that the Applicable Data Protection Law specifically states does not constitute Personal Data.

3. How is your personal data collected?

We use different methods to collect data from and about you including through:

• Your interactions with us. You may give us your personal data by filling in online forms or by corresponding with us by post, phone, email or otherwise. This includes personal data you provide when you:
  • apply for our products or services;
  • create an account on our website;
  • purchase or subscribe to a service;
  • request marketing to be sent to you;
  • enter a competition, promotion or survey; or
  • give us feedback or contact us.
• Automated technologies or interactions. As you interact with our website, we will automatically collect Device and Location data about your equipment, browsing actions and patterns. We collect this personal data by using cookies and other similar technologies.
• Third parties or publicly available sources. We will receive personal data about you from various third parties [and public sources] as set out below:
• Device and Location data is collected from the following parties:
  • analytics providers such as Google based outside the UK;
  • Stripe the payment processor.

• Contact, Financial and Transaction Data is collected from providers of technical, payment and delivery services such as Stripe based outside the UK.

4. How we use your personal data

Legal basis

The law requires us to have a legal basis for collecting and using your personal data. We rely on one or more of the following legal bases:

• Consent: We rely on consent only where we have obtained your active agreement to use your personal data for a specified purpose, for example if you subscribe to an email newsletter.
• Performance of a contract with you: Where we need to perform the contract we are about to enter into or have entered into with you.
• Legitimate interests: We may use your personal data where it is necessary to conduct our business and pursue our legitimate interests, for example to prevent fraud and enable us to give you the best and most secure customer experience. We make sure we consider and balance any potential impact on you and your rights (both positive and negative) before we process your personal data for our legitimate interests. We do not use your personal data for activities where we judge that our interests are overridden by the impact on you (unless we have your consent or are otherwise required or permitted to by law).
• Legal obligation: We may use your personal data where it is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation that we are subject to.

Purposes for which we will use your personal data

We have set out below, in a table format, a description of all the ways we plan to use the various categories of your personal data, and which of the legal bases we rely on to do so. We have also identified what our legitimate interests are where appropriate.

Direct marketing

You will receive marketing communications from us if you have requested information from us or purchased goods or services from us and you have not opted out of receiving the marketing.

We may also analyse your Identity, Contact, Technical, Usage and Profile Data to form a view which products, services and offers may be of interest to you so that we can then send you relevant marketing communications.

Third-party marketing

We will get your express consent before we share your personal data with any third party for their own direct marketing purposes.

Opting out of marketing

You can ask to stop sending you marketing communications at any time by using the Contact us form and letting us know that you would like to opt out of marketing communications.

If you opt out of receiving marketing communications, you will still receive service-related communications that are essential for administrative or customer service purposes for example relating to order confirmations for services.

5. Disclosures of your personal data

We may share your personal data where necessary with the parties set out below for the purposes set out in the table Purposes for which we will use your personal data above.

• With other users and Site visitors. Once you register as a seller, your username, country, and additional information for your profile regarding your activity is made public and is visible to all users of the Site. This information includes photos you upload, your published profile, ratings and reviews, and additional information you may choose to add to your profile. We may also offer you the opportunity to participate and post content publicly in forums, blogs and on other similar features. Please be aware that certain information, such as your user name and profile, together with the content uploaded by you, will be publicly displayed when you use such features. Your information will also be shared with other users when you message or otherwise communicate with them. When you publish your information and/or share your data with other MentorMeet users, you do so at your own risk. If you choose to share personal information with other users, including Sellers providing you a service via MentorMeet, such personal information is shared with other users as separate controllers. While our Terms of Service require Sellers to keep the information shared with them confidential, MentorMeet
• cannot ensure that all users will do so and it is your responsibility to ensure that other users will comply with your standards.
• With users with whom you interact. We share personal information to help facilitate interactions between users. For example, if you are a Buyer we may share certain information about you (such as the fact it is your first purchase on MentorMeet) with the Seller to ensure the services you receive from the Seller will fit your needs; such sharing of information is limited in scope, and is intended to improve the services provided by the Seller and your user experience;
• With Service Providers. We share personal information for business purposes with service providers that provide us with services for the purpose of operating the Site, opening and operating your account as well as providing ancillary services and solutions. These include, among others, hosting services, billing and payment processors and vendors, fraud detection and prevention services, CRM systems, forum hosting, community management services, data and cybersecurity services, web analytics and performance tools, translation tools, IT SaaS services, session recording, communication systems, mailing systems, data optimization and marketing services, data enrichment services, legal and financial advisors and technical consultants. Consistent with applicable legal requirements, we take appropriate technical and organizational measures to require third parties to adequately safeguard personal information and only process it in accordance with our instructions;
• For legal reasons. We share personal information with law enforcement agencies, public authorities or other parties in order to respond to a subpoena or court order, judicial process or to regulatory authorities, if we believe we are required to do so by law, or that doing so is reasonably necessary to comply with legal processes; when we believe it necessary or appropriate to disclose personal information to law enforcement authorities, such as to investigate actual or suspected fraud or violations of law, breaches of security, or breaches of this Policy; to respond to claims against us; and to protect the rights, property, or personal safety of MentorMeet, our customers, or the public;
• For payments and fraud detection. We share personal information with payment processors, fraud detection agencies and similar third parties for the purpose of facilitating payments done via the Site, securing the Site and protecting it against fraud, unauthorised transactions (such as money laundering), claims or other liabilities;
• Third parties to whom we may choose to sell, transfer or merge parts of our business or our assets. Alternatively, we may seek to acquire other businesses or merge with them. If a change happens to our business, then the new owners may use your personal data in the same way as set out in this privacy policy.

We require all third parties to respect the security of your personal data and to treat it in accordance with the law. We do not allow our third-party service providers to use your personal data for their own purposes and only permit them to process your personal data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.

6. International transfers

Some of the personal information you provide to us will be stored or processed on our behalf by third party suppliers and data processors and may be located in other jurisdictions, such as the United States, whose laws may differ from the jurisdiction in which you live. Whether to third parties or internally, there are also transfers of personal information from the European Economic Area (“EEA”) to countries outside of the EEA not deemed to provide an adequate level of data protection from a European data protection perspective, such as the United States. With regard to data transfers to such recipients outside of the EEA we provide appropriate safeguards, in particular, by way of entering into European Union (EU) standard contractual clauses as amended from time to time, and/or equivalent data transfer safeguards. We will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that your personal information is treated securely and in accordance with this Policy.

7. Specific provisions for EU, EEA and UK Users

This section of the Policy applies to you if you are in the EU, the European Economic Area (EEA) or UK.

The Controller (within the meaning of the EU and UK General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”)) for the processing of personal data as described in this Privacy policy is: MentorMeet

Under applicable EU regulation, you have the following rights in respect of your personal information:

• to obtain information about how and on what basis your personal information is processed and to obtain a copy;
• to rectify inaccurate personal information;
• to erase your personal information in limited circumstances where (a) you believe that it is no longer necessary for us to hold your personal information; (b) we are processing your personal information on the basis of legitimate interests and you object to such processing, and we cannot demonstrate an overriding legitimate ground for the processing; (c) where you have provided your personal information to us with your consent and you wish to withdraw your consent and there is no other ground under which we can process your personal information; and (d) where you believe the personal information we hold about you is being unlawfully processed by us;
• to restrict processing of your personal information where: (a) the accuracy of the personal information is contested; (b) the processing is unlawful but you object to the erasure of the personal information; (c) we no longer require the personal information for the purposes for which it was collected, but it is required for the establishment, exercise or defence of a legal claim or (d) you have objected to us processing your personal information based on our legitimate interests and we are considering your objection;
• to object to decisions which are based solely on automated processing or profiling;
• where you have provided your personal information to us with your consent, to ask us for a copy of this data in a structured, machine-readable format and to ask us to share (port) this data to another data controller; or
• to obtain a copy of or access to safeguards under which your personal information is transferred outside of the EEA.Under certain circumstances, you may have the right to object, on grounds relating to your particular situation, to the processing of your personal data by us and we may be required to no longer process your personal data. Moreover, if your personal data is processed for direct marketing purposes, you have the right to object at any time to the processing of personal data concerning you for such marketing, which includes profiling to the extent that it is related to such direct marketing. In this case your personal data will no longer be processed for such purposes by us.To exercise your rights please contact us.In addition to the above, you have the right to lodge a complaint with a supervisory authority for data protection. Please note that the right of access and the right to erasure do not constitute absolute rights and the interests of other individuals may restrict your right of access or erase in accordance with local laws. We will ask you for additional data to confirm your identity and for security purposes, before disclosing data requested by you. We reserve the right to charge a fee where permitted by law. We will decline to process requests that jeopardise the privacy of others, are extremely impractical, or would cause us to take any action that is not permissible under applicable laws. Additionally, as permitted by applicable laws, we will retain where necessary certain personal information for a limited period of time for record-keeping, accounting and fraud prevention purposes.Specific Provisions for US ResidentsThis section of the Policy applies to you, if you are a US resident, depending on where you live and subject to certain exceptions.During the last twelve (12) months we have collected the following categories of personal information from users:

• Information that you chose to upload or otherwise provided by you to MentorMeet, which may include: (i) Identifiers and personal information, such as name, postal addresses, online identifiers, email addresses, passport number or driving license number, social security number; (ii) characteristics of protected classifications, such as gender; facial image; audio, electronic or similar information; (iii) professional or employment-related information; (iv)education information; (v) commercial information; (vi) Audio or other sensory information, for example if you provide audio-based services on MentorMeet.
• Information we collect when you use MentorMeet, including (i) Identifiers and personal information, such as online identifiers, internet protocol (IP) addresses, access device and connection information such as browser type, version, and time zone setting and browser plug-in types and versions; (ii) commercial information, including products or services purchased, obtained, or considered, or other purchasing or consuming histories or tendencies; (iii) Internet or other electronic network activity information, including, but not limited to log-in and log-out time, the duration of sessions, the content uploaded and downloaded, viewed web-pages or specific content on web-pages, activity measures; (iv) Location information.
• Information that we collect or receive from third parties, such as service providers, advertisers, and third-party accounts you link with MentorMeet, including: (i) Identifiers and personal information, such as name, online identifiers, email addresses, internet protocol (IP) addresses, access device and connection information such as browser type, version, and time zone setting and browser plug-in types and versions; (ii) Professional or employment-related information; (iii) Internet or other electronic network activity information, including, but not limited to log-in and log-out time, the duration of sessions, the content uploaded and downloaded, viewed web-pages or specific content on web-pages, activity measures; (iv) Commercial information; and (v) Location information.
• Inferences drawn from any of the information identified above to create a profile about you.

You are entitled to the following rights, subject to certain exceptions, in relation to personal information related to you:

• You have a right to request access to the personal information we have collected about you over the past 12 months, including: (i) the categories of personal information we collect about you; (ii) the categories of sources from which the personal information is collected; (iii) the business or commercial purpose for collecting your personal information; (iv) the categories of third parties with whom we have shared your personal information; (v) the specific pieces of personal information that we have collected about you.
• You have a right to request that we delete personal information related to you that we collected from you under certain circumstances and exceptions.
• You have a right to correct the personal information you provided us with.
• You have a right to opt out of selling your personal information.
• You have a right to opt out of targeted advertisement.
• You also have a right not to be discriminated against for exercising your rights.
• You also have a right to submit your request via an authorised agent. If you use an authorised agent to submit a request to access or delete your personal information on your behalf, the authorised agent must: (1) be a person or business entity registered with the relevant Secretary of State to conduct business in the relevant state; (2) provide proof of such registration; and (3) provide documentation or other proof indicating that they are authorised to act on your behalf. We may also require you to verify your identity directly with us, and directly confirm with us that you provided the authorised agent permission to submit the request.To make such requests, kindly contact us.We will verify your request using the information associated with your account, including email address. Government identification may also be required.

8. Data security

We have put in place appropriate security measures as required my applicable legislation to prevent your personal data from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal data to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need to know. They will only process your personal data on our instructions and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality.

9. Data retention

How long will you use my personal data for?

We will only retain your personal data for as long as reasonably commercially necessary to fulfil the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or reporting requirements but in any case, precluding the following no longer than is required by applicable law. We may retain your personal data for a longer period in the event of a complaint or if we reasonably believe there is a prospect of litigation in respect to our relationship with you.

To determine the appropriate retention period for personal data, we consider the amount, nature and sensitivity of the personal data, the potential risk of harm from unauthorised use or disclosure of your personal data, the purposes for which we process your personal data and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal, regulatory, tax, accounting or other requirements.

By law we have to keep basic information about our customers (including Contact, Identity, Financial and Transaction Data) for six years after they cease being customers for tax purposes.

In some circumstances you can ask us to delete your data: see below for further information.

In some circumstances we will anonymise your personal data (so that it can no longer be associated with you) for research or statistical purposes, in which case we may use this information indefinitely without further notice to you.

10. Your legal rights

You have a number of rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data.

No fee usually required

You will not have to pay a fee to access your personal data (or to exercise any of the other rights). However, we may charge a reasonable fee if your request is clearly unfounded, repetitive or excessive. Alternatively, we could refuse to comply with your request in these circumstances.

What we may need from you

We may need to request specific information from you to help us confirm your identity and ensure your right to access your personal data (or to exercise any of your other rights). This is a security measure to ensure that personal data is not disclosed to any person who has no right to receive it. We may also contact you to ask you for further information in relation to your request to speed up our response.

Time limit to respond

We try to respond to all legitimate access requests within two months. Occasionally it could take us longer than a month if your request is particularly complex or you have made a number of requests.

11. Contact details

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or about the use of your personal data or you want to exercise your privacy rights, please contact us.

Complaints

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK regulator for data protection issues (www.ico.org.uk). We would, however, appreciate the chance to deal with your concerns before you approach the ICO so please contact us in the first instance.

12. Changes to the privacy policy and your duty to inform us of changes

We keep our privacy policy under regular review.

It is important that the personal data we hold about you is accurate and current. Please keep us informed if your personal data changes during your relationship with us, for example a new address or email address.

13. Third-party links

This website may include links to third-party websites, plug-ins and applications. Clicking on those links or enabling those connections may allow third parties to collect or share data about you. We do not control these third-party websites and are not responsible for their privacy statements. When you leave our website, we encourage you to read the privacy policy of every website you visit.