Your privacy is important to us.
Calls may be recorded for quality control training.
Harmful or abusive language may result in your interaction being terminated and your access to the service being restricted. We encourage respectful behaviour during all interactions.
Please note: failure to abide by this policy may result in your interaction being terminated.
Our commitment to protecting the privacy of those who use our service(s)
We are committed to providing you the best possible service at all times.
Calls and texts to DCGT services may be monitored for training and quality assurance purposes.
We take your privacy and security very seriously. Security controls are in place to ensure the protection of your information. We will not share or disclose your personally identifiable information; however, we do reserve the right to disclose any personal information to the authorities as required or permitted by law, as well as to authorize the engagement of law enforcement or medical services to initiate emergency services or a safety check when necessary.
In addition, we collect and store information, including non-identifying demographic content of interactions, which we use to create aggregate statistical information and for the purpose of quality assurance, as well as research aimed at contributing to the advancement of crisis intervention services. Data will be collected, stored and used only for the purpose of facilitating better help to clients, ensuring quality assurance and for clearly defined research objectives that we determine could contribute to the development of leading practices in distress and crisis response.
Our mandate is to maintain and enhance long-term relationships with our donors, service users and other stakeholders. We also recognize that information is precious, and our donors, service users and other stakeholders trust us to treat that information appropriately; we are committed to protecting the confidentiality of this data. The following principles reflect our pledge to safeguard personal information:
We are accountable for your personal information. We are responsible for all personal information in our possession. All employees, agents and authorized service providers of DCGT are required to protect the confidentiality of your personal information. We take every precaution to ensure its confidentiality. The data you provide to us is only for DCGT purposes, as outlined herein.
We keep your personal information and the transactions you have with us in strict confidence.
We never disclose your personal information to a third party unless we have your consent or it is a life-threatening situation.
We collect, use and disclose personal information only for certain purposes that we identify to you. We collect, use or disclose information only for use by DCGT to:
We obtain personal information about you lawfully and fairly.
Personal information collected will be limited to that required for the purposes identified by us.
DCGT holds various special events to build public awareness and raise additional funds. Some of these events require the gathering of personal information, and we will inform you of the purpose for which the information is being requested. We use this information only for purposes related to this event.
We will obtain your consent. We collect, use or disclose your personal information with your permission. Your permission may be expressed orally, in writing or may be implied, and you may give it to us orally, electronically or in writing.
You may withdraw your permission to collect, use and disclose your personal information at any time, subject to legal and contractual restrictions and reasonable notice.
We keep your personal information accurate and up-to-date. We maintain appropriate procedures to ensure that personal information in our possession is accurate and up-to-date. You are entitled to seek a correction of your personal information if you believe that the information in our possession is not correct.
If you believe any of the information we have collected about you is incorrect or incomplete, you have the right to ask us to change it or delete it.
If your personal information is inaccurate or incomplete, we will make the necessary changes.
We do not sell your personal information.
We will limit how long we keep information. We will keep your personal information only as long as it is necessary to satisfy the purposes for which it was obtained, or as required by law.
When we destroy personal information, we will use safeguards to prevent unauthorized parties from gaining access to that information during the process.
We safeguard your personal information. DCGT will protect your personal information by safeguards that are appropriate to the sensitivity of that information. Access to your personal information is restricted to DCGT employees, volunteer supporters and authorized service providers who need it to do their jobs.
We maintain appropriate technical and organizational safeguards to protect your personal information against loss, theft, unauthorized access, disclosure, copying, use or modification.
We have developed security procedures to safeguard and protect personal information against loss, theft, unauthorized disclosure, copying, and unauthorized use or modification. We will maintain appropriate safeguards and security procedures that reflect the types of documents, including electronic or paper records, organizational measures, including security clearances and limiting access on a “need-to-know” basis, and technological measures, such as the use of passwords and encryption.
We collect only the domain name (e.g., Hotmail, etc.) and not the email address of visitors to our website. Donors on the site are linked to an industry-standard secure payment service for credit card transactions. Our site uses “cookies” — small files containing information that track a visit to a website. These temporary files follow the flow through the site in order to improve service to visitors and cannot be used to obtain any personally identifiable details.
Your browser can be set to notify you before receipt of a cookie, so that you can decide whether or not to accept it (you can also set your browser to turn off cookies, but if you do so, some areas of our site may not function properly).
We will be open about our privacy practices. DCGT will make readily available to you specific information about our policies and practices relating to the management of personal information.
We allow you to access your personal information. You may ask whether we hold any personal information about you, ensure that it is accurate, and see that information, as provided by law. You also have the right to know:
o How we collected your personal information;
o How we are using it;
You may register a complaint. You may register a privacy-related complaint by contacting DCGT. We will explain our procedure and inform you about other complaint procedures available. We will investigate all complaints. If an objection is justified, we will take all appropriate steps to repair the situation, including changing our policies and practices if necessary. Personal information relating to volunteers, job applicants and employees is subject to similar protocols.
This policy applies to complaints (“Complaints”) received from individuals who are not affiliated with DCGT (i.e., not Staff, Volunteers, Management, or Directors).
We value all feedback and are committed to handling Complaints fairly and professionally.
Process for Handling Complaints:
Referral:
Upon receipt, Complaints are directed to the appropriate Staff member, usually the relevant Program Manager.
Response:
The Staff member will:
Timelines:
Escalation:
Oversight:
The Executive Director will regularly review all logged Complaints to identify and address any recurring issues or trends.
Accessibility:
Information about how to submit a Complaint, along with an outline of this process, will be made readily available, including on the DCGT website.
DCGT is committed to listening to our community. You can share your feedback with us in any of the following ways:
Distress Centres of Greater Toronto Box 243, Adelaide P.O. Toronto, Ontario M5C 2J4
