Privacy policy

What you give us

We only ask for what we need to answer you or provide what you asked for. Each form collects:

• Contact form: your name, email address, phone number (optional), what your message is about, your message and the language you want us to reply in.
• Volunteer sign-up: your name, email address, phone number (optional), the kinds of volunteering you are interested in and when you are free.
• Partnership enquiry: your organization (optional), your name, your email address and your message.
• Job seeker registration: your name, email address, phone number (optional), the kind of work you want, your language, an optional resume (PDF or Word, up to 4 MB) and your agreement that we may contact you about jobs and training.
• Newsletter sign-up: your email address.
• Accessibility problem report: a description of the problem. Contact details are optional.

Donations are not taken on this website. You give by Interac e-Transfer through your own bank, so your bank handles the payment and we never see your bank or card details. We see the name, email address, message and amount that come with the transfer, and we use them to thank you and to issue your tax receipt.

If you email, call or visit us, we keep what you tell us so we can help you.

Please do not put sensitive details in a form or a resume. That includes your Social Insurance Number, immigration file numbers, health information and bank or card numbers. If you need help with something sensitive, call us instead.

What we collect automatically

Our hosting provider records technical details when your browser asks for a page: your IP address, browser and device type, the page requested and the time. We use these records to keep the site running and secure.

We count visits with Vercel Web Analytics, which does not use cookies and does not follow you from one website to another. It reports totals such as how many people viewed a page, where they came from (for example, a search engine), their country, and their device and browser type. We use it to see which pages help people and which need work, not to identify anyone.

Cookies

We do not use advertising or tracking cookies. The site sets two small cookies of its own, only so it works the way you asked:

• NEXT_LOCALE remembers whether you chose English or Afaan Oromoo. It ends when you close your browser.
• sca_lang_picked remembers that you have already seen the language question on a phone. It lasts one year.

Because both only make the site work as you asked, there is no cookie banner. You can delete them in your browser settings at any time. Staff who preview unpublished pages receive a temporary preview cookie. Visitors never do.

Other services this website uses

We use these services to run the site. Some receive your IP address and browser details when your browser contacts them.

• Vercel hosts the website and provides analytics and server logs.
• Sanity stores the site's text and photos. Your browser loads photos from Sanity's servers and may connect to Sanity to check for new content. No form submissions are stored in Sanity.
• Resend delivers form messages to SHCA's inbox by email. SHCA does not store form submissions in a database on this website.
• OpenStreetMap shows the map on the Contact page and on events that have a location. The map loads from openstreetmap.org, run by the OpenStreetMap Foundation in the United Kingdom, as soon as you open the page. Its privacy policy applies to the map.
• YouTube appears on pages with a video. We show a preview picture from YouTube's servers when the page loads. The video itself loads only when you press play, using YouTube's privacy-enhanced mode. Google's privacy policy applies from then on.
• Google Maps opens in a new tab when you choose Get directions. Google's privacy policy applies once you click.
• Facebook is a link only. We do not embed Facebook buttons, trackers or advertising tools. Facebook's policy applies once you follow the link.
• Mailing list provider: [Name of the provider SHCA uses for the newsletter, or delete this line if staff send it from their own email].

Fonts are served from this website, not from Google.

Why we use your information

• To reply to your message and help you with what you asked.
• To sign you up as a volunteer, answer a partnership enquiry or contact you about jobs and training, if you asked us to.
• To send you the newsletter, if you subscribed.
• To thank donors and issue tax receipts.
• To fix problems, keep the site secure and understand how it is used.
• To meet our legal duties.

We never sell, rent or trade your information. We do not use it for advertising, and no decision about you is made by a computer alone.

Your consent

When you send us a form, you agree that we may use what you sent us as this policy describes, to deal with your request. We send the newsletter only to people who asked for it, and every email has a way to unsubscribe. We contact job seekers about jobs and training only because they ticked the box to say we could.

You can withdraw your consent at any time, for example by using the unsubscribe link or by contacting us. Withdrawing does not undo what we did before, and it may mean we can no longer provide a service that needs the information.

Who sees your information

Staff and volunteers see it only when they need it for their work. The services listed above handle it to provide their service to us. We share your information with an employer, training provider, partner or agency only when you ask us to or agree to it, for example to refer you to a service or pass on your resume. We also share it where the law requires, or to protect someone's safety in an emergency.

Where it is stored

Vercel, Resend and Sanity may process and store information on servers outside Canada, including in the United States. Information there can be accessed under the laws of that country. OpenStreetMap is run from the United Kingdom.

How long we keep it

• Contact messages and accessibility reports: [2 years].
• Volunteer and partner enquiries: [2 years] after our last contact.
• Job seeker details and resumes: [12 months], then deleted unless you ask us to keep them.
• Newsletter addresses: until you unsubscribe.
• Donation and tax receipt records: [6 years], as the rules for tax receipts require.
• Analytics are totals that do not identify you, and server logs are kept by Vercel for a short time.

When the time is up, we delete the information or make it anonymous.

How we protect it

The site uses an encrypted connection (HTTPS). Form messages go straight to SHCA's email, not into a database on the website. Only staff and volunteers who need them can read them. No website or email can be made completely secure, so we also ask you to share only what is needed.

If a breach creates a real risk of significant harm to you, we will tell you and the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Alberta, as the law requires.

Your rights

You can ask us to:

• show you the personal information we hold about you,
• correct it if it is wrong,
• delete it, or stop using it for something you no longer agree to,
• stop sending you emails.

We may ask you to confirm who you are before we share or change anything. We will answer within [30 days]. If we cannot do what you ask, we will tell you why.

Children

This website is for adults and families. Programs for children and youth are arranged with a parent or guardian. The forms are not meant for anyone under 13, and we do not knowingly collect their information. If a child has sent us details, tell us and we will delete them.

Questions and complaints

Please contact us first and we will do our best to put things right. If you are not satisfied, you can contact the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Alberta (oipc.ab.ca) or the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (priv.gc.ca).

Changes to this policy

If we change how we handle your information, we will update this page and its effective date. For a big change, we will also say so on the home page or in the newsletter.

Contact us about privacy

Ask a question, see or correct your information, withdraw your consent or make a complaint by calling or emailing us. Tell us what you need and we will reply within [30 days].