Privacy Policy

Effective Date: 7/22/2021
Last Updated Date: 7/22/2021

 

Our Commitment to Privacy

Your privacy is important to us.  Healthcare Financial Management Association (“HFMA“) has developed this Privacy Policy to provide you information about how HFMA collects and processes the information (including personal information) you provide us by personal interaction, post, email or through the HFMA website (including www.hfma.org).  

Information We Collect

HFMA is the sole owner of the information collected on this site. We will not sell, share, or rent this information to others in any way that differs from what is disclosed in this statement. HFMA collects both anonymous and personal information from our users at several different points on the website. 

a. Information collected directly

We may collect personal information about you – such as your name, address, telephone number, fax number, email address, etc. – directly from you. For example, personal information may be collected when you apply to become a member of (or renew a membership in) HFMA or Healthcare Financial Management Educational Foundation, register for programs or events hosted by a HFMA itself or with others, participate in an online survey or competition, subscribe for a service or publication we provide, provide online feedback, post comments on our blogs, download whitepapers or other content, create an account on the HFMA Website or otherwise provide us information.  Generally, the information we collect includes your:

• Identity information, such as your name, gender, birthdate, and headshot.
• Contact information, such as company you work for, your title, phone, and email address.
• Demographic information, such as your race/ethnicity, educational degrees, and professional certifications.
• Profile information, such as your username and password, feedback and survey responses, social profile information (e., social characteristics that identify you on social media sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook) and preferences and interests.
• Financial information, such as payment information (credit card numbers and bank account information), as well as information about payments to and from you and the details of benefits, events, programs, and services purchased by you.
• Other information relevant to the provision of benefits, events, programs and services offered by the HFMA

b. Automatically collected information.

We use cookies and other similar technologies to automatically collect information when you access or use an online benefit or service or visit the HFMA Website, such as an IP address, browser type, domain name, page views, a date/time stamp, clickstream data, links clicked, features used and similar device and usage information.

c. Third Parties or Publicly Available Sources

We may receive personal information about you from collaboration or affiliation partners of a HFMA, and other third parties, such as analytics providers, advertising networks, social media platform providers and search information providers. We also may receive personal information about you from public sources.

Our Use of Your Personal Information

Personal information means information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include information where the identity (or identifiers) has been removed (anonymous information).

We may use personal information for the following purposes:

a. To Process Transactions

We use personal information to process transactions in the ordinary course of our business, such as membership applications and registrations for events, programs and services. 

b. To Provide Membership Benefits, Events, Programs and Services

Personal information (such as members’ names and contact information, “Membership Information“) is used by HFMA to support and provide, and enable you to participate in, membership benefits, events, programs (e.g., educational programs, survey programs, testing and certification programs, etc.) and services.    

c. To Manage Our Relationship with You

HFMA may use your personal information to provide you with support; respond to your requests; solicit your feedback (e.g., through a review or survey); notify you about changes to our website terms of use or privacy or cookie policy; verify your identity; store preferences; and otherwise manage our relationship with you.

d. To Enable Member-to-Member Communication, Networking, Data Analytics & Improvement

HFMA may use your personal information to enable members to communicate, network and share information with each other on social media platforms, through online benefits and services (including online surveys and analytics tools) and otherwise. 

We may use personal information to better understand and assess your preferences and how you access and use the HFMA Website, our online content and the get insights to develop or improve new content, benefits, events, programs or services, relationships and experiences, news or information that may be of interest to members, prospective members, site users and others. 

e. To Invoice and Enable Payment

HFMA use personal information to invoice and process payments for benefits, events, programs and services and to collect and recover money owed to us. 

f. For Marketing and Promotions

We may use personal information for marketing and promotional purposes, such as to send you news and newsletters, or to otherwise contact you about memberships, benefits, events, programs or services we think may interest you.  You may specify, as part of your online member profile, the type of emails you want to receive from us.  You may also unsubscribe from all communications from us. However, electing not to receive any of these communications may mean that you will not receive important notices about your membership or benefits, events, programs or services that may be useful to you.

g. For General Business Administration, Legal Compliance, IT & Customer Support

We may use your personal information for general business administration (including accounting and recordkeeping) and legal compliance purposes (including to enforce, establish or defend our legal rights, or to protect the rights of third parties) and to support the HFMA Website and other HFMA computing systems (including troubleshooting, testing, system maintenance, support, reporting and hosting of data). 

Our customer support also uses personal information to identify, contact, verify, troubleshoot or assist or answer queries/product questions or concerns.

h. For De-Identification, Aggregation and Analysis

We may de-identify your personal information and aggregate it with information provided by others to conduct analyses (such as to understand how an industry or a segment is growing, changing, and adapting), to analyze information about HFMA benefits, events, programs and services, and for other purposes. De-identified data may be derived from your personal information but is not considered personal information under law as this data does not directly or indirectly reveal your identity.  

If you Fail to Provide Personal Information

If you fail to provide personal information, we may have to restrict or cancel your participation in the applicable benefit, event, program, or service to be provided pursuant to a membership agreement with you or your organization or other agreement.  

Third-Party Websites

HFMA Website, Print and electronic communications, publications delivered by HFMA may contain links to other sites that such as HFMA advertisers, sponsors and other third parties. These third-party sites may have their own privacy policies or no policy at all. The HFMA Privacy Policy does not apply to such other sites.

 HFMA has no control over and is not responsible for the content displayed on such sites, nor over the measures, if any, that are taken by such sites to protect the privacy of user information. Users should check the privacy policy of any third-party site before providing personally identifiable information to it.

Cookie Policy

 HFMA collects certain personal and non-identifiable information through the use of ”cookie” technology and/or Internet Protocol (“IP”) address. Cookies are small text files a website can use to recognize repeat users and facilitate the user’s ongoing access to and use of the site. This information might include the browser used by the user, the type of computer, the operating systems, the Internet service providers, general geographic location, a job segment/title, or other non-identifiable behavior profiles. The HFMA system automatically gathers information about the areas the user visits on the site and about the links the user may select from within the site to other sites. HFMA uses cookies and/or your IP address to help identify you, track your shopping cart, and identify member login information for verification.

HFMA cannot control the use of cookies by advertisers or third parties displaying data on the HFMA site or whose sites a user visits or links to from the HFMA site. Most browsers are set to accept cookies. You can set yours to refuse cookies, or to alert you when cookies are being sent.

When you visit HFMA websites you may receive cookies from third-party websites or domains, that allows these companies and others, to collect certain anonymous information when you visit our website. These companies may use non-personally identifiable information during your visits to this and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services likely to be of greater interest to you. These companies use these cookies or third-party web beacons to deliver the services they are providing on our behalf. We endeavor to identify these cookies before they are used so that you can decide whether you wish to accept them. More information about these cookies may be available on the relevant third party’s website. You can learn more about this behavioral advertising practice and/or opt out of cookie remarketing at the National Advertising Initiative.

Sharing Your Personal Information

We may employ third party companies and individuals to facilitate our Service (“Service Providers”), provide Service on our behalf, perform Service-related services, or assist us in analyzing how our Service is used.

These third parties have access to your Personal Data only to perform these tasks on our behalf and are obligated not to disclose or use it for any other purpose.

We may share your personal information with the following categories of third parties:

• Our professional advisors, such as lawyers, accountants, and auditors.
• Government and/or regulatory authorities.
• Third parties to whom we outsource certain services, such as IT services (compute power, database storage, applications, and other IT resources);
• Third parties with whom we have a collaboration, affiliation or other contractual arrangement and who use your information to provide (or assist HFMA in providing) benefits, events, programs and services to HFMA members or use your information for their own purposes;
• HFMA Chapters outside of the United States; 
• Accreditation or certification bodies;
• Other members (and representatives of such members) and sponsors of HFMA;
• Data aggregation and analytics companies;
• Third party processors (such as payment service providers, shipping companies);
• Debt collection agencies and tracing agencies;
• Any relevant party, claimant, complainant, government agency or court, to the extent necessary for the establishment, exercise or defense of legal rights in accordance with applicable law;
• Any relevant party for the purposes of prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offenses or the execution of criminal penalties, including safeguarding against and the prevention of threats to public security in accordance with applicable law; and
• Any relevant third-party acquirer(s), in the event we sell or transfer all or any portion of our business or assets (including in the event of a reorganization, dissolution or liquidation).

How can I opt out?

This site gives you the option to remove your information from our database so you will not receive future communications or receive our services. It is not possible for a user to delete his or her profile from our database completely, nor is it feasible to delete all traces of a user’s activity in the system. Messages posted in public forums such as message boards are examples of user activities that are not feasible to delete. However, you may request deletion of your personal information from HFMA or update your personal information.

Cross-Border Data Transfer

The HFMA are located in the United States.  When you submit personal information to us, or when others provide personal information to us, we will receive it and process it in the United States.  In order to provide the benefits, events, programs and services, we also may need to transfer your personal information to locations in other jurisdictions.  If you are based in the European Economic Area (EEA), this will involve transferring your personal information to individuals and entities located in countries outside the EEA.  

Data Retention Period

In general, we will retain relevant personal information of you for at least five (5) years from the date of our last interaction with you or for longer where required by our regulatory obligations or where we believe necessary to establish, defend or protect our legal rights and interests or those of others.  We may then destroy such files without further notice or liability.

Public forums

HFMA may provide interactive forums, chat rooms, news groups, bulletin boards, and other interactive areas (“Interactive Areas”) on the site. If you use any of the Interactive Areas, you are solely responsible for your own communications and the consequences of posting those communications. HFMA does not assume any responsibility for the truthfulness, accuracy or reliability of any material posted on any Interactive Area, or of consequences of any Interactive Area communications on or arising from use of the site. 

Likewise, HFMA does not assume any responsibility for messages posted on the site and forwarded to third parties. In cases where you feel threatened or believe someone else is in danger, you should contact your local law enforcement agency immediately. 

HFMA reserves the right but is not obligated to record the dialogue in public chat rooms. HFMA does not screen communications in advance and is not responsible for screening or monitoring material posted by users, or any other person or entity. If notified by a user of communication(s) which are allegedly improper, HFMA may, but is not obligated to, investigate the allegation and determine in its sole discretion to remove or request the removal of the communication(s). HFMA reserves the right but is not obligated to remove or edit communications posted on the site without notice. In addition to the removal rights described above, HFMA reserves the right to terminate a user’s access to any or all Interactive Areas at any time, with or without notice, in the exercise of its sole discretion.

Your Legal Rights

You have the following rights in relation to the personal information we hold about you:

a. Your right of access

If you ask us, we will confirm whether we are processing your personal information and, if necessary, provide you with a copy of that personal information (along with certain other details). If you require additional copies, we may charge a reasonable fee.

b. Your right to correction (rectification)

If the personal information we hold about you is inaccurate or incomplete, you are entitled to request to have it corrected. If you are entitled to have information corrected and if we have shared your personal information with others, we will let them know about the rectification where possible. If you ask us, we will also tell you, where possible and lawful to do so, with whom we have shared your personal information so that you can contact them directly.

c. Your right to erasure

You can ask us to delete or remove your personal information in some circumstances, such as where we no longer need it or if you withdraw your consent (where applicable). If you are entitled to erasure and if we have shared your personal information with others, we will let them know about the erasure where possible. If you ask us, we will also tell you, where it is possible and lawful for us to do so, with whom we have shared your personal information with so that you can contact them directly.

d. Your right to restrict processing

You can ask us to restrict the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances, such as where you contest the accuracy of that personal information or you object to us. If you are entitled to restriction and if we have shared your personal information with others, we will let them know about the restriction where it is possible for us to do so. If you ask us, we will also tell you, where it is possible and lawful for us to do so, with whom we have shared your personal information so that you can contact them directly.

e. Your right to data portability

You have the right, in certain circumstances, to receive a copy of personal information we’ve obtained from you in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format (Microsoft Word or Microsoft Excel), and to reuse it elsewhere.

f. Your rights in relation to automated decision-making and profiling

You have the right not to be subject to a decision when it’s based on automatic processing, including profiling, if it produces a legal effect or similarly significantly affects you, unless such profiling is necessary for entering into, or the performance of, a contract between you and us. 

g. Your right to withdraw consent

If we rely on your consent (or explicit consent) as our legal basis for processing your personal information, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time.

h. Your right to lodge a complaint with the supervisory authority

If you have a concern about any aspect of our privacy practices, including the way we’ve handled your personal information, you can report it to the relevant supervisory authority.

Please note that some of these rights may be limited where we have an overriding legitimate interest or legal obligation to continue to process the personal information, or where the personal information may be exempt from disclosure due to applicable law.

Contact Details

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or want to exercise your rights set out in this Privacy Notice, please contact us at [email protected].  Your request will be forwarded to the HFMA Data Protection Manager.