The Medical Equipment Lending Society (M.E.L. Society) is committed to safeguarding the personal information entrusted to us by our clients and or volunteers. We manage your personal information in accordance with Alberta’s Personal Information Protection Act and other applicable laws. This policy outlines the principles and practices we follow in protecting your personal information.

This policy applies to The M.E.L. Society and to any person providing services on our behalf. A copy of this policy is provided to any client on request.

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What is personal information?

Personal information means information about an identifiable individual. This includes an individual’s name, home address and phone number, age, sex, marital or family status, an identifying number, financial information, educational history, etc.

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What personal information do we collect?

We collect only the personal information that we need for the purposes of providing services to our clients, including personal information needed to:

• deliver requested products and services

• enroll a volunteer

• send out Society updates and information

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We normally collect client personal information directly from our clients. We may collect your information from other persons with your consent or as authorized by law.

We inform our clients, before or at the time of collecting personal information, of the purposes for which we are collecting the information. The only time we don’t provide this notification is when a client volunteers information for an obvious purpose (for example, producing a credit card to pay rental fee when the information will be used only to process the payment).

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We ask for your express consent for some purposes and may not be able to provide certain services if you are unwilling to provide consent to the collection, use or disclosure of certain personal information. Where express consent is needed, we will normally ask clients to provide their consent orally (in person, by telephone), or in writing (by signing a consent form).

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A client may withdraw consent to the use and disclosure of personal information at any time, unless the personal information is necessary for us to fulfil our legal obligations. We will respect your decision, but we may not be able to provide you with certain products and services if we do not have the necessary personal information.

We may collect, use or disclose client personal information without consent only as authorized by law. For example, we may not request consent when the collection, use or disclosure is to determine suitability for an emergency that threatens life, health or safety.

 

How do we use and disclose personal information?

We use and disclose client personal information only for the purpose for which the information was collected, except as authorized by law. For example, we may use client contact information to recover rented items.

If we wish to use or disclose your personal information for any new business purpose, we will ask for your consent. We may not seek consent if the law allows this (e.g. the law allows organizations to use personal information without consent for the purpose of collecting a debt).

 

What is personal employee information?

Personal employee information is personal information about an employee or volunteer which is collected, used or disclosed solely for the purposes of establishing, managing or terminating an employment relationship or a volunteer work relationship. Personal employee information may, in some circumstances, include a Social Insurance Number, a performance review, etc.

 

We can collect, use and disclose your personal employee information without your consent only for the purposes of establishing, managing or ending the employment or volunteer relationship. We will provide current employees and volunteers with prior notice about what information we collect, use or disclose and our purpose for doing so.