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COLLECTION OF INFORMATION AND DATA (PRIVACY ACT) STATEMENT
Agents, Loss Adjusters, and Policyholders
The following statements are made in accordance with the Privacy Act of 1974 (5 U.S.C. 552a): The Risk Management Agency (RMA) is authorized by the Federal Crop Insurance Act (7 U.S.C. 1501-1524) or other acts, and the regulations promulgated thereunder, to solicit the information requested on documents established by RMA, or by approved insurance providers (AIPs), that have been approved by the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation (FCIC), to deliver federal crop insurance. The information is necessary for AIPs and RMA to operate the Federal crop insurance program, determine, program eligibility, conduct statistical analysis, and ensure program integrity. Information provided herein may be furnished to other Federal, State, or local agencies, as required or permitted by law, law enforcement agencies, courts or adjudicative bodies, foreign agencies, magistrate, administrative tribunals, AIPs contractors and cooperatives, Comprehensive Information Management Systems (CIMS), congressional offices, or entities under contract with RMA. For insurance agents, certain information may also be disclosed to the public to assist interested individuals in locating agents in a particular area. Disclosure of the information requested is voluntary. However, failure to correctly report the requested information may result in the rejection of this document by the AIP or RMA in accordance with the Standard Reinsurance Agreement between the AIP and FCIC, Federal regulations, or RMA-approved procedures and the denial of program eligibility or benefits derived therefrom. Also, failure to provide true and correct information may result in civil suit or criminal prosecution and the assessment of penalties or pursuit or other remedies.
RURAL COMMUNITY INSURANCE SERVICES PRIVACY POLICY
At Rural Community Insurance Services we know how important personal privacy is to you. Because of our interest in protecting your privacy, we have adopted the following privacy policy, continuing our commitment to you, our valued customer:
1. Recognition of Your Expectation of Privacy. We recognize that you expect privacy and security for your personal and financial affairs. We understand the need to safeguard our sensitive information about you that you have entrusted to us within our affiliated family of banks and companies. We maintain standards and procedures designed to prevent misuse of this information.
2. Our Collection, Retention, and Use of Information about You. We collect, retain, and use information about you only where we reasonably believe that it will help administer our business or provide products, services, and other opportunities to you. We collect and retain information about you only for specific business purposes – and we will tell you why we are collecting and retaining it upon your request. We collect information you provide to use on applications or forms. We use information to protect and administer your records, accounts, and funds; to comply with certain laws and regulations; to help us design or improve our products and services; and to understand your financial needs so that we can provide you with quality products and superior service.
3. Our Maintenance of Accurate Information. We have procedures to help assure that your financial information is accurate, current, and complete in accordance with commercial standards. We also have procedures to respond to your requests to correct inaccurate information in a timely manner. While some of these procedures are required by federal or state law, we have implemented additional procedures to maintain accurate, current, and complete financial information, including processes to update information and remove old information.
4. Limiting Employee Access to Information. We have procedures that limit employee access to personally identifiable information to those employees with a business reason to know such information about you. We educate our employees about the importance of confidentiality and customer privacy through standard operating procedures, special training programs, and our policies on ethics. We take appropriate disciplinary measures to enforce employee privacy responsibilities.
5. Security Procedures to Protect Information. We maintain security standards and procedures to help prevent unauthorized access to confidential information about you. We update and test our technology to improve the protection of our information about you and to assure the integrity of our information.
6. Restrictions on Disclosing Information to Parties Outside Our Affiliated Banks and Companies. We do not reveal specific information about your accounts or other personally identifiable data to parties outside our affiliated banks and companies for their independent use unless: (1) you request or authorize it; (2) the information is provided to help complete a transaction initiated by you; (3) the information is provided to a reputable credit bureau or similar information reporting agency; or (4) the disclosure otherwise is lawfully permitted or required. We do not provide account or personal information to non-Rural Community Insurance Services companies for the purpose of independent telemarketing or direct mail marketing of any non-financial products or services of those companies.
7. Maintaining Your Privacy in Business Relationships with Parties Outside Our Affiliated Banks and Companies. Sometimes it is necessary to provide personally identifiable information about you to a party outside our affiliated banks and companies, such as to a vendor or service company that we hire to prepare your account statements or to provide support or services for one or more of our products. These vendors and service companies agree to safeguard our confidential information about you and your products and services with us and must abide by applicable law.
8. Disclosing Our Privacy Commitment to You. We want you to understand our commitment to personal privacy and our use of information. For this reason, we have prepared this Privacy Policy and the Use of Information provisions. These materials will answer most of the important questions that you may have about how we gather, protect, and use information.
These Privacy Policies apply to individuals, and the practices and policies contained in this disclosure are subject to change. We may update this disclosure periodically and will communicate any significant changes to our customers as required by law. The practices and policies contained in this disclosure replace all previous notices or statements regarding this subject.
Effective March 15, 2004.
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