The Gift of Education ("TGOE") knows that you care how information about you or about your child/student is used and shared, and we appreciate your trust that we will do so carefully and sensibly. This notice describes our privacy policy. By visiting TGOE’s website (www.thegiftofeducation.com), you are accepting the practices described in this privacy policy.
The information we gather from account holders and gift givers helps us personalize and continually improve your TGOE experience. Here are the types of information we gather.
Information Account Holders Give Us: We receive and store information when you create an account. When you create an account, we gather your name, address, e-mail address, and phone number, as well as a username and password you create. We also allow you to register an unlimited number of children/students, and we collect each child/student’s name, birthday and college fund information. A child/student’s college fund information includes the child’s name, the fund’s name, an address, account number, web address and phone number. TGOE stores the college fund information but does not make it available to the public. A separate history is also kept for each registered child/student, but is accessible only to the account holder.
Information Gift Givers Give Us: We receive and store information when you give a gift to a child who is registered with TGOE. In particular, we gather your name and e-mail address. TGOE does not see or have access to credit card information you use in making a gift. Credit card information is processed through braintreepayments.com. For information about Braintree’s security, visit https://www.braintreepayments.com/privacy
Information about you and your child/student is an important part of our business, and we are not in the business of selling it to others. We share such information only as described below and with third-party service providers follow practices at least as protective as those described in this privacy policy.
Third-Party Service Providers: We employ other companies to process credit card information and provide banking services. These include Braintree, a PayPal company, and Wells Fargo. They have access to personal information needed to perform their functions, but may not use it for other purposes.
Business Transfers: As we continue to develop our business, we might sell or buy subsidiaries or business units. In such transactions, your information generally is one of the transferred business assets but remains subject to the promises made in any pre-existing privacy notice (unless, of course, you consent otherwise). Also, in the unlikely event that TGOE, or substantially all of its assets are acquired, your information will of course be one of the transferred assets.
Protection of TGOE and Others: We release account and other personal information when we believe release is appropriate to comply with the law; enforce or apply our Terms & Conditions of Use and other agreements; or protect the rights, property, or safety of TGOE, our users, or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organizations for fraud protection and credit risk reduction. Obviously, however, this does not include selling, renting, sharing, or otherwise disclosing personally identifiable information from you for commercial purposes in violation of the commitments set forth in this privacy policy.
With Your Consent: Other than as set out above, you will receive notice when information about you might go to third parties, and you will have an opportunity to choose not to share the information.
We work to protect the security of your personal and financial information during transmission by using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) software, which encrypts information you input. We currently use high-grade 256-bit SSL encryption, and our SSL Certificate is provided by Symantec, the industry leader for secure online transactions.
Third-party service providers used by TGOE also encrypt their online transactions. For more information about Braintree Payments, please visit: https://www.braintreepayments.com/privacy. For Wells Fargo, please visit: https://www.wellsfargo.com/privacy_security/.
Credit Card and financial information is collected on the website and transmitted to the appropriate third parties during gift processing. TGOE DOES NOT retain credit card numbers or financial account information on their server.
Additionally, a personal login and password is required to access your account information. It is important for you to protect against unauthorized access to your password and to your computer. Be sure to sign out when finished using a shared computer. To sign out when using TGOE, click the "Sign Out" link at the top of any TGOE screen.
Our site includes links to other Web sites. These links and Web sites are not a part of the gifting process, and TGOE does not share information with them.
TGOE gives you access to information about your account and your interactions with TGOE for the limited purpose of viewing and, in certain cases, updating that information. As a customer, you will be able to view account information and history, including:
TGOE gives you the option of making a child/student’s profile public or private. The default profile is public. If the profile is public, the child/student’s profile will be searchable. The only information disclosed on the profile, however, is the name of the child and information provided by the parent. There is an option for a picture of the child/student and a written description. TGOE does not share the child’s birthday, address, hometown, or college fund information. If a child/student’s profile is private, the child will not show up in a search. The profile will still be active on the website, but the only way it can be viewed is if the parent shares a link directly to the child’s profile. TGOE does not share or disclose any information about the account holder. The account holder’s name will show up in a search, if the profile is public. The account holder’s name will be attached or linked to a child/student’s profile.
IF you have created an account with TGOE, you can view the gifts given, per each student/child, with the following details: the date the gift was given, the student/child’s name and gift amount.
Account holders of the student/child’s profile for which a gift has been given have access to the following information: the date the gift was given, the gift giver’s name, email address and the gift amount.
As discussed above, you can always choose not to provide information, even though it might be needed to register a child/student, make a gift or to take advantage of such TGOE features as tracking gift giving history and adding, modifying, or removing child/student profiles. You can add or update certain information on pages such as those referenced in the "Which Information Can I Access?" section. If you do not want to receive e-mail or other mail from us, please let us know at info@thegiftofeducation.com (If you do not want to receive Terms & Conditions of Use and other legal notices from us, such as this privacy notice, those notices will still govern your use of TGOE’s website, and it is your responsibility to review them for changes.)
While TGOE provides a service related to a child’s educational funds, TGOE does not market to, or provide services for, children. Rather, TGOE is a business that markets to, and provides services for, adults who are planning for their children’s future education. If you are under 18, you may use TGOE’s website only with the involvement of a parent or guardian.
If you choose to visit TGOE’s website, your visit and any dispute over privacy is subject to this privacy policy and our Terms and Conditions of Use, including limitations on damages, resolution of disputes, and application of the law of the state of California. If you have any concern about privacy at TGOE, please contact us with a thorough description, and we will try to resolve it. Our business changes constantly, and our privacy policy and the Terms & Conditions of Use will change also. We may e-mail periodic reminders of our notices and conditions, but you should check our Web site frequently to see recent changes. Unless stated otherwise, our current privacy policy applies to all information that we have about you and your account. We stand behind the promises we make, however, and will never materially change our policies and practices to make them less protective of customer information collected in the past without the consent of affected customers.
Terms & Conditions of Use. For TGOE’s Terms & Conditions of use, please click here.
You provide most such information when you register, search, give, or communicate with customer service. For example, you provide information when you register a child/student; search for a child; place a gift order for a child/student; provide information to set up your account; or communicate with us by phone, e-mail, or otherwise. As a result of those actions, you might supply us with such information as your name, address, and phone numbers; your child/student’s name; credit card information; e-mail addresses of your friends and other people; content of e-mails to us; personal description and child/student’s photograph; and financial information.
Examples of the information we collect and analyze include the Internet protocol (IP) address used to connect your computer to the Internet; login; e-mail address; password; computer and connection information such as browser type, version, and time zone setting, browser plug-in types and versions, operating system, and platform; gift history; the full Uniform Resource Locator (URL) clickstream to, through and from our Web site, including date and time; cookie number; children/students you viewed or searched for; and the phone number you used to call our 800 number. We may also use browser data such as cookies, Flash cookies (also known as Flash Local Shared Objects), or similar data on certain parts of our Web site for fraud prevention and other purposes. During some visits we may use software tools such as JavaScript to measure and collect session information, including page response times, download errors, length of visits to certain pages, page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks, and mouse-overs), and methods used to browse away from the page. We may also collect technical information to help us identify your device for fraud prevention and diagnostic purposes.
Examples of information you can access easily at TGOE include up-to-date information regarding recent gifts; personally identifiable information (including name, e-mail, password, password, and address); child/student accounts; and your account information.