Privacy Policy
Introduction
This Privacy Policy is for the Rivers Foundation NPC (referred to as “the Foundation”). It applies to all persons who provide their Personal Information to the Foundation through this website.
The Foundation respects your privacy and the importance of ensuring that your Personal Information is stored and used in a manner that complies with the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA). Should you have any queries regarding the security or integrity of your Personal Information, please don’t hesitate to contact us at [email protected].
What is Personal Information?
Personal Information includes information that assists the Foundation or any person in identifying you. This could be, for example, your name, surname or ID number, or information about how to contact you, such as your email address or residential address. Personal Information does not include information that is collected for statistical purposes and which cannot be linked to you or used to identify you.
How does the Foundation collect your Personal Information?
Through this website, your Personal Information is collected when you:
- send us a message through our contact form;
- sign up for a monthly debit order;
- request a Section 18A tax certificate.
We also collect information about how the website is used, through Google Analytics (see Does this website use cookies? below).
Card donations are handled by PayFast. You enter your card details on PayFast’s own website, and the Foundation never sees or stores them.
What Personal Information does the Foundation collect, and why?
Contact form
Your name, email address, contact number (if you provide it) and your message. This is used only to reply to you.
Debit orders
Your name, contact number, email address and residential address; the amount and day of your debit order; your bank details (bank, branch, account holder, account type, account number and branch code); and your acceptance of the debit order mandate, with your typed signature and the date. This is used to set up and collect the monthly debit order you have requested, and to contact you about your donation. It is shared only with our bank, which processes the debit order.
Section 18A tax certificates
Your name (or your company’s name), contact number, email address and residential address; your South African ID or passport number (and date of birth, with a passport), or your company registration number; your tax reference number; and the value, method, reference and date of your donation. This is used to issue the Section 18A tax certificate you have requested, and to contact you about it.
The Foundation does not use your Personal Information for any other purpose, and does not sell it or share it with anyone except as described in this policy.
How does the Foundation keep your Personal Information safe?
Your Personal Information is sent over an encrypted connection to the system that receives our forms, which is operated on the Foundation’s behalf by Rivers Church NPC. Only Foundation staff who need it, and who have been given access, can see it after signing in. Debit order and tax certificate details are restricted further, to the staff who handle them. Our notification emails never include these details.
How long does the Foundation keep your Personal Information?
Bank details, and ID, passport, company registration and tax reference numbers, are deleted from our system 30 days after you submit the form. By then your debit order will have been set up, or your certificate issued.
We keep a record of your debit order mandate (your name, the amount, the debit day, your signature and the date) for as long as your debit order runs, and afterwards for as long as we need it to answer a query about a payment or as the law requires. A record of each tax certificate issued is kept for as long as the law requires. Other Personal Information is kept only for as long as we need it for the purpose it was given.
Does this website use cookies?
Yes. Our forms use a cookie that protects them against misuse. We also use Google Analytics, through Google Tag Manager, which sets cookies to count visits and see how people use the website: for example, which pages are visited, roughly where visitors are from, and what kind of device they use. This information is collected by Google on our behalf, is reported to us in aggregate and is not used to identify you. Google’s use of it is described in its privacy policy.
You can refuse or delete cookies in your browser’s settings, or install the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on. The website, including the forms, still works without the analytics cookies.
How do I access, update or delete my Personal Information?
You may ask to see the Personal Information the Foundation holds about you, ask us to correct or delete it, or object to how it is used, by emailing [email protected].
Changes to this policy
Changes may be made to this policy from time to time, and you are requested to review it at least once a year. The date and version at the top show when it was last updated.
Acceptance of this policy
By providing us with your Personal Information through this website, you consent to the Foundation using it in the manner described in this policy.