Effective Date: November 1, 2007
Grasp Business Brokers Inc., d/b/a MerchantPortfolios.com respects
the privacy of visitors to our website. Please read this Privacy
Statement portfolio, residual, or ISO so that you understand
what information we collect through our website and what we do
with that information. This Privacy Statement applies only to
information collected online through the MerchantPortfolios.com
website and does not describe the ways in which we may collect
or use information obtained offline or through any means other
than our website. If you have any questions about this Privacy
Statement, please contact Customer Service.
THE INFORMATION WE COLLECT
The information we gather falls into two categories: (1) information
supplied by visitors to the site when they list a portfolio,
residual, or ISO for sale, perform a search, enter a sweepstakes
or other promotional contest, or inquire about a portfolio, residual,
or ISO listed for sale or about another product or service offered
through our website; and (2) tracking information gathered as
visitors navigate through our website and review our email newsletters
and other email messages. Third-party providers featured on or
linked to by our website, such as vendors of products and services
offered through our site, may be gathering information, as well,
through processes we don't control.
Searches and Listings:
To make use of certain features on our site, visitors need to provide limited
information about themselves and their interests so that we can tailor the
information we provide to their needs. For example, to help you find the
portfolio, residual, or ISO you want, we need to know what kind of portfolio,
residual, or ISO desire. We ask you to provide this information when you
perform a search. We use this information to help you find the portfolio,
residual, or ISO you're looking for. If you find a listing that interests
you and we make contact, we'll share with the seller the contact information
you supply to us. The listings that appear on our website include our toll-free
telephone number that can be used to contact us. If you call using our toll-free
number, we may provide the seller with the date, time, and duration of your
call, as well as the number from which your call originated. When you list
a portfolio, residual, or ISO for sale, we ask for information on the portfolio,
residual, or ISO and on how you can be contacted by us. We also ask sellers
to execute an exclusive listing agreement as well as to describe the exact
item that you are selling. We use this information to create your ad and
to set up your account.
Sweepstakes and Other Promotions:
From time to time, we may offer sweepstakes or other promotions on our website.
If you enter a sweepstakes or promotional contest, we'll ask you to provide
information about yourself (such as your name, address, and email address).
Among other things, we'll need this information to contact you if you win,
and we may also use this information for marketing purposes. We may share
this information with any co-sponsor of the contest or sweepstakes; we'll
identify the co-sponsor in the contest rules. We may also share this information
with shipping or fulfillment companies or other third-party service providers
that help administer our promotions, such as by conducting drawings, and/or
delivering prizes to winners. If you don't want us to collect the information
requested in the contest or sweepstakes registration form or to provide it
to co-sponsors, please do not enter the contest or sweepstakes.
Online Surveys:
From time to time, we survey our users to measure their satisfaction with our
site and other sites and to help us learn more about our audience and how
they interact with our site. Third-party research firms often conduct these
surveys on our behalf. We use the survey results to help us improve the services
we offer to you. Except in the circumstances described below in the "Other
Disclosures" section of this policy, we will not share, without your
consent, any personally-identifying information you submit in response to
an MerchantPortfolios.com survey with any company other than the research
firm conducting the survey. We will, however, take the information you provide
and aggregate it on an anonymous basis with data collected from other survey
participants. We may use and disclose that pool of anonymous information
as we see fit, without identifying you personally.
You may also find on our site invitations to participate surveys
conducted by our advertisers, whose privacy practices we don't
control. These invitations will usually link to an online survey
form that is hosted either by the advertiser conducting the survey
or by a third-party research firm working on the advertiser's
behalf. When you access an advertiser's survey through our website,
use and disclosure of any information you submit will be governed
by the advertiser's privacy policy (or by the privacy policy
of the advertiser's research firm), which may differ from ours.
If you can't find the applicable privacy policy via a link either
from the advertiser's survey invitation or from the online survey
form, you should contact the advertiser directly for more information.
Email Addresses:
If you provide us your email address, we may email you about
our website or our services, or to inquire about your experience
using our website or sites operated by others. From time to
time, we'll also send you emails that may include industry
information, special promotions and other commercial offers
that we think may be of interest to you. Though we hope you'll
find these communications informative and useful, if you don't,
you can always unsubscribe by following the simple instructions
included in each email. And you can opt-out of receiving these
types of commercial offers at all by indicating, when you list
a portfolio, residual, or ISO for sale or inquire about a portfolio,
residual, or ISO listed on our website, that you'd prefer not
to receive these communications.
Cookies:
To help us tailor our website to the needs and interests of our visitors, we
keep track of the pages visited by our users by placing a cookie, a small
entry in text file, on your hard drive. The cookie contains an ID number
that allows us to track the pages you've visited. We aggregate this data
with data on the pages visited by other users to track overall visitor traffic
patterns. We use this information to improve our site by making it more responsive
to the needs of our users. We also use cookies to make sure you don't see
the same ad repeatedly during a single visit to our site. Cookies don't reveal
personally identifying information; the only personal information a cookie
can contain is information you supply yourself. Cookies can't read unrelated
data off your hard drive. Our advertisers and third parties that provide
products and/or services through our site may also assign their own cookies,
a process we don't control. The help function on most web browsers contains
information on how to set your browser to notify you before accepting a cookie
or to disable cookies entirely. However, if you don't accept cookies, you
won't be able to take advantage of various features on our site that are
available to other visitors. Our "Find Your Portfolio, residual, or
ISO" feature, for example, won't work properly if you configure your
browser not to accept cookies.
Web Beacons:
To help us (and in some cases our advertisers) keep track of how many users
are accessing particular pages and listings within our website, and to track
users respond to ads we place on third-party websites, we may place a small
file, called a web beacon, on some of our pages and on some of the listings
we distribute. In combination with cookies, these web beacons allow us (or
our advertisers) to track the number of users who view particular pages and
listings to fine tune the advertising messages delivered to users of this
and other websites. We may use "clickstream" data collected using
web beacons and cookies to help us tailor the content of promotional messages,
including email messages, to the perceived interests of our users. Advertising
networks with which we are affiliated and third-party advertising services
that we use may also use web beacons on our site to gather similar anonymous "clickstream" information,
which is used to fine tune advertising messages delivered to our visitors
and visitors to other websites. (See "Data Collected in Connection with
Ad Serving and Targeting," below, for more information regarding the
information.)
Browser Level Information:
Our web server automatically collects limited information about
your computer configuration when you visit our site, including
the type of browser software you use, the operating system
you're running, the resolution of your computer monitor, the
website that referred you, and your IP address. (Your IP address
is a numerical address that is used by computers connected
to the Internet to identify your computer so that data (such
as the web pages you want to view) can be transmitted to you.
We also use IP address information for systems administration
and trouble shooting purposes. Your IP address does not tell
us who you are.) We use this information to make our site as
useful as we can for as many users as possible.
Data Collected in Connection with Ad Serving and Targeting MerchantPortfolios.com
works with leading third-party advertising companies, including
DoubleClick, Advertising.com and Tacoda. Their services include
targeting and serving some of the advertisements, promotions,
or other marketing messages you see on the pages of our site
and other websites. Anonymous tracking information called "clickstream" data
is collected from our website and other websites so that DoubleClick,
Advertising.com, Tacoda, MerchantPortfolios.com, and others can
use such information, sometimes in conjunction with similar anonymous
information gathered through other websites, to deliver advertisements
tailored to match the perceived interests of consumers. This
clickstream data does not identify you personally and does not
include your name, address, email address or telephone number,
but it may include the IP address of your computer. Clickstream
data is used for marketing research, targeting advertising, and
other similar purposes. We also use DoubleClick software to serve
our own ads and collect similar information in the process. DoubleClick,
Advertising.com and Tacoda may also use cookies and/or web beacons
to collect anonymous information directly from our users. If
you would like to know more about DoubleClick's information gathering
practices and opt-out procedures, please see the privacy statement
on the DoubleClick website. To opt out of DoubleClick's ad targeting
program, please click here. If you would like to learn more about
Advertising.com's information collection practices and opt-out
procedures, please see the privacy statement on the Advertising.com
website. For more information on Tacoda's information collection
practices and opt-out procedures, please read the privacy policy
posted on the Tacoda website.
USE AND DISCLOSURE OF INFORMATION
When we present information to our advertisers-to help them
understand our audience and confirm the value of advertising
on our website--it is usually in the form of aggregated statistics
on traffic to various pages within our site. We may collect,
or have a third party collect on our behalf, aggregated statistical
information about how visitors use and navigate around our site,
such as the number of users who visit various pages within the
site, what they click on, whether they scroll up or down on particular
pages, fill out forms, etc. This aggregated information does
not identify you personally. We use this information to improve
our site. We may also disclose this aggregated information to
third parties.
LINKS AND FEATURES OFFERED IN CONJUNCTION WITH OTHER PROVIDERS
To make our website more valuable to our visitors, we feature
some products and services that come from other providers. Finance,
legal, and appraisal services, for example, are made available
through cooperative arrangements with companies that specialize
in providing such services. We share with these third parties
such information as is necessary for them to provide the products
or services. We have a strategic marketing relationship with
our parent company, GRASP Business Brokers Inc., d/b/a GRASP
Business Associates. When you visit our site to search or list
items online (on MerchantPortfolios.com), you may be redirected
to a web page hosted by GRASP Business Brokers Inc. to complete
your transaction. Any information you submit on forms that appear
on web pages hosted by GRASP Business Brokers Inc. will be collected
and used pursuant to the Merchant Portfolio’s.com privacy
policy. (You can tell which site hosts the page you're viewing
by looking at the location bar at the top of your web browser.
If it says "MerchantPortfolios.com," you're on a page
hosted by MerchantPortfolios.com. If it says "graspbusiness.com," you're
on a page hosted by GRASP Business Brokers, Inc.) Of course,
our site includes links to other websites, and provides access
to products and services offered by third parties, whose privacy
policies we don't control. When you access another website or
purchase products or services or conduct other transactions through
our website, use of any information you provide is governed by
the privacy policy of the operator of the site you're visiting
or the provider of such products or services. When you provide
information in the course of obtaining products or services through
our site, use of any information you provide may be governed
by the privacy policy of the provider of those products or services.
The provider's privacy policy may differ from ours. If you can't
find the privacy policy of any of our provider partners via a
link either from their site's homepage or from the pages on which
the products or services are offered, you should contact the
provider directly for more information.
OTHER DISCLOSURES
We may occasionally release information about our visitors when
release is appropriate to comply with law, to enforce our Visitor
Agreement, or to protect the rights, property or safety of visitors
to our site, our customers, the public or MerchantPortfolios.com.
As our business grows, we may buy or sell various assets. In
the unlikely event that GRASP Business Brokers Inc., d/b/a MerchantPortfolios.com,
one of its business units, or substantially all of its assets
is acquired by another company, information on our visitors would
be among the transferred assets. If you choose to unsubscribe
in response to an email message that we send on behalf of an
advertiser, we will share your email address and opt-out instructions
with the advertiser to ensure that your email privacy preferences
are honored. Similarly, if we ask a third-party company to send
its customers email offers on our behalf, we will share with
that company (or its agent) a list of email addresses collected
from website visitors who have opted out of our email program
to ensure that their privacy preferences are honored. We may
allow others to search some of our databases (our listings database,
for example) and to analyze the data they find there or aggregate
it with other data, either for their business purposes, or ours.
Though some of the information in our databases may be personally
identifying (such as the contact information included in a portfolio,
residual, or ISO listing), we'll only allow searches of the portions
of our database that contain information that is otherwise publicly
available on our website. When we use other companies to help
us operate our site or improve the services we offer to you,
we may provide them with information about our visitors that
is necessary for them to perform their services. We require that
these companies commit to use the information only to perform
the services that we request.
SECURITY
Information we gather on our website is stored within MerchantPortfolios.com-controlled
databases (or databases hosted on our behalf) on servers maintained
in protected environments. However, no physical or electronic
security system is impenetrable. We cannot guarantee the security
of our servers or databases, nor can we guarantee that information
you supply won't be intercepted while being transmitted to us
over the Internet. And, of course, any information you include
in a portfolio, residual, or ISO listing that is posted on our
website is available to anyone with Internet access.
CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY STATEMENT
The web is an evolving medium. If we need to change our privacy
policy at some point in the future, we'll post the changes to
this Privacy Statement on this website and update the reference
to the effective date to reflect the date of the amendment. By
visiting MerchantPortfolios.com, you agree that your visit, and
any dispute over privacy, is governed by this Privacy Statement
and our Visitor Agreement. |