Privacy Policy

The last update to our Privacy Policy was posted on 6 May 2023. This Privacy Policy governs the privacy terms of our Website, www.themeritsystem.com, as owned and operated by The Merit System, Limited. (theMeritSystem).

Definitions

"Non-Personal Information" (NPI) is information that is not personally identifiable to you and we automatically collect when you access our Website with a web browser.

"Personally Identifiable Information" (PII) is non-public information that is personally identifiable to you and obtained in order for us to provide you with products and services. PII may include information such as your name, address, phone number, credit card information, and other related information that you provide to us or that we obtain about you.

The terms "us" or "we" or "our" refers to The Merit System, Limited (theMeritSystem), the owner of this Website.

A "Visitor" is someone that merely browses our Website.

A "Member" is someone who has registered with our Website to use our Service. Members will fall under two categories: managers, and employees.

A "User" is a collective identifier that refers to either a Visitor or a Member.

All text, information, graphics, audio, video, and data offered through our Website, whether free to all or part of our paid services, are collectively known as our "Content".

Our Commitment to Your Privacy

Our Privacy Policy tells you what PII theMeritSystem may collect from you, how we may share your PII, and how you can limit our sharing of your PII.

theMeritSystem is committed to providing an exemplary online experience as well as securing the privacy of all our users. We take your privacy seriously, and we will work with you to ensure that your information is protected. theMeritSystem and our affiliates respect your privacy and recognise the need for appropriate protection and management of the PII you share with us.

Links to Other Websites

Our Website may contain links to other websites. You understand that these websites are not under our control and are not subject to our Privacy Policy. These websites will likely have their own privacy policies. We have no responsibility for these websites and provide links to these websites solely for your convenience. You acknowledge that your use and access of these websites is solely at your own risk. It is your responsibility to check the privacy policies and other legal documents of these websites to see how they treat your personal information.

Information We Collect

There is no need to reveal or provide any PII when you visit our Website. You can browse our Website to find out more about theMeritSystem and what we do. As you do so, we may receive and store certain types of NPI as you interact with our Website. We may also analyse this NPI for trends and statistics as to how people use our Website.

If you decide to join our Website and thereby use our Services, you will fill out an online form providing such PII as your name, and email address. We will store this information for contacting you. In addition, when a manager registers their organisation for the first time, they will need to provide the address of their organisation. 

How Information is Used

We use the PII that you provide for our internal purposes, such as providing you with our Services and informing you of our new products, services, and offers as provided by theMeritSystem.

There are times that we may have to disclose your PII to comply with laws; to assist law enforcement and governmental agencies in preventing or investigating fraud or other crimes, or in response to a court order. In such instances, we will only provide the PII requested and your PII will only be used for such legal purposes.

Changing Your Information

You may change your PII at any time using facilities found on our Website. Within the Settings option, you can choose to opt out from receiving notifications.  In addition, you can remove yourself from our mailing list by clicking the unsubscribe link located at the bottom of our email. If at any time you need assistance, just send us an email with your request.

Opting Out of Sharing Information

You can always opt out of future unaffiliated third-party disclosures of your information. Such opt-out will not affect disclosures otherwise permitted by law including but not limited to: (i) disclosures to affiliates, (ii) disclosures to third-party service providers who provide certain services for our business, such as credit card processing, computer system services, shipping, data management, or promotional services, (iii) disclosures to third parties as necessary to fulfil your requests, (iv) disclosures to governmental agencies or law enforcement departments or otherwise required to be made under applicable law, (v) previously completed disclosures to third parties, or (vi) disclosures to third parties in connection with subsequent contests or promotions you may choose to enter, or third-party offers you may choose to accept.

Our Email Policy

You can always opt out of receipt of further email correspondence from us or affiliates. We will not sell, rent, or trade your email address to any unaffiliated third-party without your permission. You understand that email is not considered a secure form of communication. Generally, any information you disclose in an email may be viewed by hackers while such information is en route to us. As such, take care in what you disclose in any email that you send to us.

Our Security Policy

We have constructed our Website and Services using sophisticated encryption and authentication tools to protect your PII. When we collect your PII through our Website, we encrypt it and prevent unauthorised access to it by using industry standard technologies, such as encryption software, routers and firewalls. Unfortunately, due to the very nature of the Internet and hackers, we cannot completely guarantee that your PII is 100% protected. Once we receive your PII, we have industry standard security measures and polices that protect against the loss or misuse of your PII; again, we cannot completely guarantee against such loss or misuse. We strongly urge you to protect any password you may have for our Service and not share it with anyone. You should always log out of our Service when you are done using it, especially if you are sharing a computer with someone else or are using a public computer.

Cookies

Our Website may send a "cookie" to your computer. A cookie is a small piece of data that is sent to your browser from a web server and stored on your computer's hard drive. A cookie cannot read data off your hard disk or read cookie files created by other sites. Cookies do not damage your system. We use cookies to identify which areas of our site you have visited, so the next time you visit the site, we can better personalise the content that you see on our Website. Most browser software can be set to disable the use of Cookies. However, if you disable Cookies, you may not be able to use certain functionality on our Website correctly or at all. We never place PII in Cookies.

Web Beacons

We may also use web beacons to collect NPI about your use of our Website as well as those of our affiliates, and your use of special promotions or newsletters. The information we collect by Web Beacons allows us to statistically monitor the number of people that open our emails and why they opened our emails. Our Web Beacons are not used to track your activity outside of our Website or those of our affiliates. We do not link NPI from Web Beacons to PII without your permission. 

The Employee Record

Every Member is allocated an Employee Record. The Employee Record comprises of several data points such as: the employee's attendance score, performance score, colleague descriptors, attendance counter and votes or badges awarded to the employee. The Employee Record is viewable by other members who register to use the theMeritSystem service. Your real name is never revealed to other members on your Employee Record, however all other aspects of your Employee Record will be viewable. If you apply for a role or enter a competition through the theMeritSystem service, your job application which includes your Employee Record and any other information which you choose to add to the application [i.e. previous work experience] will be viewable by other members on the website. Again, your real name will not be revealed within the job application. 

Changes to Our Privacy Policy

As necessary to address changes in laws as well as our business practices, we may modify our Privacy Policy, in whole or in part, to address these changes. We will typically notify users by some message on our Website home page or via email that our Privacy Policy has changed. We will also change the "Last Updated" date at the beginning of this Privacy Policy. Any changes we make to our Privacy Policy are effective as of this Last Updated date and replace any prior Privacy Policies. We encourage you to review our Privacy Policy periodically to make sure you still agree with it.

Questions About Our Privacy Policy

If you have any questions about our Privacy Policy, please send us an email at help@themeritsystem.com. 

We look forward to helping you.