Posted Date: December 20, 2023
Effective Date: January 1, 2024

Renew Financial Group LLC (“Program Administrator”, “RF”, “we” or “us”) is dedicated to protecting the privacy of your information. This privacy policy (the “Policy”) covers any non-public private information that you provide us in connection with the Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) Program (the “Program”) by contacting our call center, utilizing our website(s) or through our consumer or contractor application portals (“Systems”). We manage the Program Call Center and daily activities of the Program (“Program Services”). Sometimes you may be required to use our Systems to access Program Services. Below is a summary of our Privacy Policy provisions.

TYPES OF INFORMATION WE COLLECT

We collect two types of information – “personal information” (as defined in this Policy) and “anonymous information”.  We may use these two types of information to create a third category of information – “aggregate information”.  Some data collected may qualify under multiple categories.

The categories of information we collect are:

  • Identifiers, including real name, alias, postal address, unique personal identifier, online identifier, Internet Protocol address, email address, account name, social security number, driver’s license number, passport number, or other similar identifiers.
  • Characteristics of protected classifications under applicable laws, including age, date of birth and military or veteran status.
  • Commercial information, , including records of personal property, products or services purchased, obtained, or considered, or other purchasing or consuming histories or tendencies.
  • Internet or other electronic network activity information, including IP address, browsing history, search history, geo-location data collected through cookies and similar technologies.
  • Sensory data, including audio recordings.
  • Professional or employment-related information, including the business or organization an individual represents, their title with that business or organization and information relating to their role with the business or organization.
  • Sensitive Personal Information, including social security, driver’s license, state identification card, or passport number, account log-in, financial account, credentials allowing access to an account, geolocation, racial or ethnic origin, or union membership. Each type of Sensitive Personal Information may also fall under another category of personal information.
  • Demographic data, including age, date of birth, location and zip code. 
  • Inferences drawn from other personal information or data, including consumer’s preferences, credit characteristics, investment trends, financial behavior, household size.

HOW WE COLLECT YOUR INFORMATION

We collect information you provide to us when you request to access Program Services and/or request information from us related to Program Services.   We collect information through a variety of technologies as discussed below.   When you contact us with a question or suggestion, we collect your name, email address, and telephone number. We only use personal information to respond to and/or resolve your question or concern.

Information Collected from Other Sources:

We also may collect information about you from the following sources to update or supplement the information you provided. In some instances, applicable law may require you to authorize the third party to share your information with us before we can obtain it.

Consumer reporting agencies: We may receive information regarding your credit history from a consumer-reporting agency. We use this information to approve and process your financing application (“Application”), and to offer you Program products that may be of interest to you.

Outside sources: We may request and/or receive information regarding you and your property from others who may or may not have relationships with you, in order to process and approve your Application. We use this information to verify eligibility for the Program financing or to verify representations you make in your Application.

Your Contractor: You may request your contractor provide us information about you/ your project.

Certain information that we collect about you may be publicly available via government records, telephone books, and other widely available media (i.e. the Internet).

Information from cookies or other tracking technologies:

We collect information you provide to us when you request to access Program Services and/or request information from us related to Program Services.   We collect information through a variety of technologies (“Technical Information”), such as cookies, tags, software development kits, application program interfaces, and Web beacons, including when you visit our sites and applications or use our applications on third-party sites or platforms using one or more devices, whether or not you are logged in or registered.  We collect information using analytics tools, including when you visit our sites or applications or use our applications on third-party sites or platforms. 

Cookies and automated technologies

When you interact with our Systems, or open emails we send you, we obtain certain information using automated technologies, such as cookies, web server logs, web beacons and other technologies. A “cookie” is a text file that websites send to a visitor’s computer or other internet-connected device to uniquely identify the visitor’s browser or to store information or settings in the browser. A “web beacon,” also known as an internet tag, pixel tag, or clear GIF, is a tiny graphic image that may be used in our websites or emails.

We use these automated technologies to collect information such as the types of service used, and number of users we receive daily. Our web servers automatically log information about your computer, but we do not use this information to identify you personally.

We set some of these automated technologies ourselves, but others are set by third parties who deliver services on our behalf. For example, we may use other companies’ web analytics services (described below), which use automated technologies to help us evaluate how you use our websites.

You have the ability to accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can modify your browser setting to decline cookies. If you reject cookies by changing your browser settings then be aware that this may disable some of the functionality on the Website.

We may not control all the data you provide to us depending on how it is provided.  If you provide information to us on a third-party site or platform, the information you provide may be separately collected by the third-party site or platform.  The information we collect is governed by our Policy, and the information the third-party collects is governed by the third-party site or platform’s privacy practices.  Our sites and applications may contain links to other sites or applications not controlled by us and we are not responsible for the privacy practices of those sites.   We encourage you to be aware when you leave our sites or applications and to read the privacy policies of those sites and/or applications prior to providing them with your personal information..

Information provided through third-party sources

Third-party analytics services 

We may use third-party analytics service providers to help us with our online services. The analytics providers that administer these services use technologies such as cookies, web beacons, and web server logs to help us analyze how you use our online services. We may disclose your site-use information (including IP address) to these analytics providers, and other service providers who use the information to help us figure out how you and others use our online services.

Advertisements and Referrals

In addition, we contract with third parties to place advertisements for our products and services and employment opportunities on websites that are not our own. We place these ads where we think they are likely to be most relevant. These advertisements on third-party websites allow us to track responses to our ads. We and our affiliates use this information to track the performance of our advertising and marketing campaigns by using tools like cookies, web beacons and similar technologies. We use these tools to collect and store information about your visits, page visits and duration, and the specific ad or link that the user clicked on to visit the site.

Be advised that we never intend to collect personal information from children under 16 years of age. If we learn or are notified that we have collected this information from a child under the age of 16, we will promptly remove the information from our system.

HOW WE USE INFORMATION

We use your personal information to respond to your requests for Program Services and/or financing and to service products you obtain from us, or to provide you with information about products or services that may be of value to you. These may be our own products and services or products and services from a third-party as indicated on the Privacy Notice for California residents (currently we do not share your personal information with third parties for marketing purposes). We limit the sharing of your personal information to service providers working on our behalf, which is discussed in more detail below, in the section titled “How we share information with others.”

How we use aggregate information:

We may share aggregate information with outside companies (unaffiliated parties) to assist them with assessing the effectiveness of their website content as well as for legally permissible business purposes. We may also share aggregate information with trade associations and/or governments/regulators for industry analysis and other lawful purposes. No personal information about you is shared along with this aggregated information.

We use Technical Information, as may be provided by you or someone on your behalf, for routine website maintenance; to establish that you are a unique user; to assist you in the Application process; and/or for purposes of assessing the effectiveness of our website, products and services. Disabling cookies will still enable you or your representative to access most of the Program website. As a security precaution, to apply for Program financing, or remember your username and password for account access, you or your representative may still be required to enable cookies on your Internet browser. These cookies do not contain any personally identifiable information. We may also use this information to share with our affiliates and other third parties as indicated in our Privacy Notice for California residents.

HOW WE USE INFORMATION

Sharing with Service Providers:

We may share your personal information with service providers who perform functions on our behalf. We require that they protect the security and confidentiality of your information, as well as limiting their use of the information to activities that are reasonably necessary to carry out their work with us and comply with applicable laws and regulations.   Service Providers we share your information with may include, but are not limited to:

  • Parties involved in the financing process (e.g. your county tax collector, program sponsor, or your registered home improvement contractor)
  • Parties who perform services on our behalf (e.g., consumer reporting agencies, companies that provide property valuation services, distribute emails, process payments)
  • Parties who deliver services on our behalf (e.g., company that services pace assessments, companies that provide third-party analytics, online tracking and interest-based advertising)
  • Marketing and advertising partners (e.g., companies that we partner with that advertise and market our products and services on our behalf) 
  • In connection with a sweepstakes, contest, or promotion, home improvement contractors registered with us and authorized to introduce our products and services with you
  • In connection with a survey or act of support or advocacy, governmental authorities with whom we partner with to make our products and services available   
  • With other governmental entities as authorized by law (e.g., counties, municipalities, joint power authorities, and state agencies involved in our products and services)
  • As required by law (e.g., in response to federal or state subpoenas, inquiries from regulatory bodies or law enforcement, or other processes of law)
  • Our auditors and/or professional advisors
  • In connection with corporate transactions or changes (e.g., as part of, or during negotiations of, a merger, consolidation, sale of our assets, as well as equity financing, acquisition, strategic alliance or in any other situation where personal information may be transferred as one of the business assets of Renew Financial)
  • Parties you have specifically authorized (e.g., your attorneys, agents, and designated representatives)
  • To enforce our Terms of Use or rules, to project our rights and property, to comply with legal process, or in other cases if we believe in good faith that disclosure is required by law.

We do not share your personal information with unrelated third-parties for marketing purposes

PROTECTING YOUR INFORMATION

We maintain administrative, technical and physical safeguards designed to reasonably protect your information’s security, confidentiality and integrity.

Whenever we save your personal information, we use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology supporting up to 128-bit encryption to prevent unauthorized parties from viewing personal information transmitted to or from our Systems. Information you submit to us by email is not secure, so please do not send sensitive information in any email to Renew Financial.

YOUR CONTROLS AND CHOICES

We will provide you with the means to access, correct or delete your personal information.  To exercise any of these rights please contact us using any of the methods listed in the CCPA Notice.

You may opt out of receiving promotional messages from Renew Financial by following the instructions in those messages or by informing the caller that you would not like to receive future promotional calls. You may also submit your request to the contact information provided below. If you decide to opt-out, we may still send you non-promotional communications, such as messages about the servicing of your product or service.  

You may opt out of cookies and automated technologies and third-party web analytics services as described above.    

If you request that we do not track (DNT) your data when your web browser sends us a DNT signal, we will not track your data.

CHANGES TO THIS POLICY

We may amend this Privacy Policy from time to time by posting a revised version and updating the “Last updated” date above. We will provide you with notice of material changes as required by law. If you continue to use our Program Services and/or Systems after the ‘Last updated’ date, you consent to any amendments of this policy. We encourage you to periodically review this policy to stay informed about how we protect the personal information we collect.

CONTACTING US

You can contact our privacy team with any questions or concerns regarding this Privacy Policy at:

Renew Financial Group LLC

555 12th St, Suite 1650, Oakland, CA 94607

privacy@renewfinancial.com 

(844) 736-3934

If you believe our Privacy Policy or applicable laws relating to the protection of your personal information have not been respected, you may file a complaint with our privacy team listed above. Please provide as many details as possible, without disclosing any private or sensitive information. We will respond to let you know when you can expect a further response.

*Please note that this policy does not apply to job applicants and/or employee data.