Privacy Policy
Privacy Disclosure
The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) and various other federal and state privacy regulations generally prohibit any financial institution, directly or through its affiliates, from sharing nonpublic personal information about you with a non-affiliated third party unless the institution provides you with a notice of its privacy policies and practices, such as the type of information that it collects about you and the categories of persons or entities to whom it may be disclosed.
Hallmark Financial Services, Inc. (“HFS”), through its subsidiaries, provides insurance products and services and is firmly committed to its affirmative and continuing obligation to respect the privacy of its current, former and prospective policyholders and to protect the security and confidentiality of their nonpublic personal information. Therefore, proper handling of your personal information is one of our highest priorities. We collect and utilize information we believe is necessary to efficiently administer our business, to advise you about our products, and provide you with outstanding customer service. We want you to know why we collect personal information about you, what we do with that information and explain to you our commitment to protect the information collected.
In order to provide you with quality insurance products and the service you deserve, it is necessary for us to collect nonpublic personal information about you and, in certain situations, to share that information with others. The following notice describes our policies and practices with regard to your nonpublic personal information.
Protection of Your Personal Information:
Not only is the protection of nonpublic personal information a legal requirement, it is also a good business practice. We maintain appropriate physical, electronic and procedural safeguards to maintain the confidentiality and security of your nonpublic personal information. We restrict access to nonpublic personal information about you to those employees who need access to that information to provide products or services to you. When information is shared with companies performing work on Hallmark’s behalf, we protect your personal information where required by law with contractual confidentiality agreements that obligate those companies to keep confidential any information about you furnished to them.
We provide training to our employees on the importance of maintaining the confidentiality and security of your nonpublic personal information. Employees who violate our privacy policies are appropriately disciplined.
Categories of Information that We Collect:
We collect and use only that nonpublic personal information required for us to provide services and products requested by you and to administer your business with us such as underwriting and processing your policies and the administration and handling of claims.
We may collect nonpublic personal information about you from the following sources:
- Information that we receive from you on applications and other related forms such as your name, address, telephone number, and social security number;
- Information about your transactions with us, our affiliates or others such as your underwriting information, driving record, claim history, policy number, premium, payment history, and claim information;
- Information that we receive from consumer credit reporting agencies such as your credit history.
The nonpublic personal information collected may come from persons such as independent insurance agents, brokers, policyholders, or persons involved in the claim adjustment process such as claimants, witnesses to an accident, repair facilities, hospitals, doctors and attorneys.
If you visit our website, www.hallmarkgrp.com, we automatically track and collect information regarding your visit including your IP address; domain server, type of computer, type of web browser and the pages you viewed on our site. This information (Traffic Data) is information that unless you have specifically entered identifying information somewhere in the site, does not personally identify you, but rather is helpful for marketing purposes or for improving your experience on the Site. We currently do not collect nonpublic personal information through your use of our corporate website. You may view the website privacy statement by clicking the “Terms & Conditions” sections of the site.
Categories of Information that We Disclose and Parties To Whom We May Disclose Information:
We do not disclose any nonpublic personal information about our customers or former customers to anyone, except as required or permitted by law. Hallmark does not sell or distribute for sale any nonpublic personal information. Nor do we disclose your personal information to any person, company or organization not affiliated with us for their own marketing purposes. Any phone information collected with SMS consent to contact elected will not be shared with any third party or affiliates.
However, we may disclose nonpublic personal information about our policyholders (current, former and prospective) with affiliated and non-affiliated third parties as necessary to service an insurance policy or claim or as permitted or required by law. We may disclose nonpublic personal information we collect about you to third parties with whom we contract to perform business functions such as record keeping, policy administration, claim administration, billing, computer related services, distribution of materials, and joint marketing of our products and services.
We understand the importance and seriousness of protecting the confidentiality and security of your nonpublic personal information. We respect and appreciate the trust that you, as a valued policyholder, have placed with us and we continuously strive to earn and maintain that trust.
Access To and Correction of Your Information:
You have a right to know the nature and substance of the recorded personal information contained in our files about you. You may review and/or for a reasonable fee, receive a copy of the information upon written request at the address shown below. You must properly identify yourself and reasonably describe the information you seek. Your request should contain your name, address, all policy and claim numbers issued to you by us and a copy of your drivers license or other personal identification. Upon receipt of your request, we will furnish to you within thirty (30) business days the nature and substance of locatable, retrievable and available recorded personal information. We will also furnish you with a list of all persons or organizations to whom the information has been disclosed within the past two years. If the source of information about you was a consumer credit reporting agency or other institution, we will identify those sources so you can contact them if you so desire. You may also request that we correct, amend or delete any recorded personal information. If we do not make the requested change(s), you have the right to provide, for insertion in our file, a concise written statement setting forth what you think is the correct, relevant or fair information and a concise statement of the reasons why you disagree with our decision not to correct, amend or delete recorded personal information. Your statement will become a part of our file and included with any future disclosures.
Changes to Our Notice of Privacy Policy and Insurance Information Practices:
We reserve the right to change our privacy policies and insurance information practices. If we make any material changes to our policies or practices, we can provide you with a copy of a revised notice.
Opt-out Statement:
If you prefer we do not disclose personal identifying information or personal financial information about you to nonaffiliated third parties, you may opt out of those disclosures (other than disclosures allowed by law). You may do so by sending us a letter informing us of your election to opt out at the address shown below.
If you have any questions regarding the content of this notice, you may call us at (817) 348-1600 or you may write to us at:
Hallmark Financial Services, Inc. Attention: Compliance
Two Lincoln Centre
5420 Lyndon B. Johnson Freeway
Suite 1100
Dallas, TX 75240
This notice is being provided on behalf of the following companies:
- Hallmark Financial Services, Inc.
- Hallmark Insurance Company
- American Hallmark Insurance Company of Texas
- Hallmark Specialty Insurance Company
- Hallmark National Insurance Company
- Hallmark County Mutual Insurance Company
- Texas Builders Insurance Company
- Hallmark American Insurance Company
- American Hallmark Insurance Services, Inc.
- Hallmark Specialty Underwriters, Inc.
- Aerospace Insurance Managers, Inc.
- American Hallmark General Agency, Inc.
- Effective Claims Management, Inc.
- Hallmark Claims Service, Inc.
California Consumer Privacy Act Notice
This Notice was last updated on June 22, 2020
This California Consumer Privacy Act Notice (“Notice”) is provided on behalf of Hallmark Financial Services, Inc., its affiliates and subsidiaries (“HFS”, “we,” “us” or “our”).
Overview:
This Notice provides information regarding the rights of California residents under the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”). Under the CCPA, California residents have certain privacy rights intended to provide them with a way to control their Personal Information. A more detailed summary of your rights can be found below. If this Notice does not apply to you, for example if you are not a California consumer, please refer to our Privacy Policy.
What is Personal Information?
The CCPA defines Personal Information as information that “identifies, relates to, describes, is reasonably capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly, with a particular consumer or household.” The CCPA also specifies what information does not fall into the definition of Personal Information, for example information that is publicly available from government records, consumer information that is deidentified or aggregate consumer information, or information that is covered by certain laws such as the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) or the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act.
Categories of Personal Information We Collect:
The table below describes the Personal Information we may have collected about California residents in the past 12 months.
| Categories of Personal Information | Illustrative Examples | Collected |
| A. Identifiers | Such as name, postal address, telephone number and email address, social security number, driver’s license number or other similar identifiers. | Yes |
| B. Personal Information as defined in the customer records law (Cal. Civ. Code § 1978.80(e)) | Such as insurance policy number, social security number, address, telephone number, driver’s license or state identification card number, education, employment, employment history, medical information, or health insurance information. | Yes |
| C. Characteristics of protected classifications under California or federal law | Such as race, color, national origin, sex, age, physical or mental disability, veteran and military status, citizenship, marital status, medical condition. | Yes |
| D. Commercial Information | Such as records of personal property, products or services purchased, obtained, or considered, or other purchasing or consuming histories or tendencies. | Yes |
| E. Biometric Information | Individual’s physiological, biological, or behavioral characteristics, including imagery of the iris, retina, fingerprint, face. | No |
| F. Internet or other electronic network activity information | Browsing history, search history, and information regarding a consumer’s interaction with an internet website or application. | Yes |
| G. Geolocation Data | Such as GPS. | Yes |
| H. Audio, electronic, visual, thermal, olfactory, or similar information | Such as images and audio, video or call recordings. | Yes |
| I. Professional or Employment-Related Information | Such as work history and prior employers, compensation, and evaluations. | Yes |
| J. Non-public Education Information | Such as education records or grades. | Yes |
| K. Inferences drawn from other Personal Information | For example, a profile about a consumer reflecting the consumer’s preferences, characteristics, and behavior. | Yes |
Sources from which the Personal Information is Collected:
We collected the Personal Information listed above from a variety of sources in relation to the products and services we provide and any related activities. The categories of sources from which Personal Information is collected include:
- You, or your representatives, whether directly or indirectly (for example, when you fill out forms or other documents during the processing of a claim).
- Agents and brokers.
- Third parties that perform professional services and with whom we interact in the course of our business (for example, law firms, or adjusters).
- Vendors or other service providers we engage in conjunction with our business.
- Public records sources including government and reporting agencies.
- Our subsidiaries and affiliates.
Business or Commercial Purpose for Collecting Personal Information:
The purpose for which we collect and use the Personal Information depends on our relationship with you or our interaction.
- To provide the services you required from us such as issuing insurance policies and binders, providing insurance quotes, calculating applicable premium payments, and processing claims.
- For auditing purposes.
- To provide customer service.
- To support our day-to-day business operations.
- To detect or prevent security incidents.
- To protect against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activities.
- To maintain our systems, including debugging or repairing errors.
- To verify information submitted to us including verifying your identity.
- In the course of legal proceedings or government audits or exams.
- In relation to internal processes related to our business such as processing payments, advertising, maintaining accounts, and performing analytic services.
Categories of Personal Information Disclosed for a Business Purpose:
In the preceding 12 months we have not sold any Personal Information subject to the CCPA. This includes information of consumers we actually know are less than 16 years of age.
We may disclose the Personal Information we have collected about you for business purposes and in relation to the services we provide to our customers. In the preceding twelve months, we may have disclosed to the categories of third-parties listed below the following of the above-listed categories of Personal Information: Categories A to D, F, and H to K.
Categories of Third Parties with Whom We Share Personal Information:
The categories of third parties with whom we share Personal Information depends on our relationship with you. We share Personal Information with the types or groupings of third parties listed below:
- Claims adjusters, appraisers, investigators, attorneys and law firms, medical professionals.
- Other insurance companies.
- People or organizations as authorized by you.
- Data analytics providers.
- Government entities.
- Attorneys and other licensed professionals, such as tax experts.
- Insurance agents and brokers.
- Companies and organizations we engage with in relation to human resources activities and employment matters.
- Companies and individuals that represent California residents, such as their accountants.
- Vendors that provide goods and services to us.
- Our affiliates.
Your Rights under the CCPA:
If you are a California resident, you have the following rights:
- Right to request disclosure of the following information covering the 12 months preceding your request:
- The categories of Personal Information we collected about you;
- The categories of sources from which the Personal Information was collected;
- The business or commercial purpose for collecting Personal Information;
- The categories of Personal Information about you, if any, that we disclosed for a business purpose;
- The categories of third parties with whom we shared your Personal Information; and
- The specific pieces of Personal Information about you we have collected.
- Right to request deletion of the Personal Information. If you exercise this option, we may still retain your Personal Information as permitted under applicable law.
- Right to non-discrimination for exercising your rights under the CCPA.
How to Make a Verifiable Consumer Request:
If you are a California resident, you may make a verifiable consumer request for the items listed above in 1. and 2. twice within a twelve (12) month period by:
- Calling us at 877.832.6642 ext. 1735; or
- Submitting your request Consumer Information Request Form.
You (or your authorized representative or you on behalf of your minor child) will need to provide certain information to identify you including your policy number, claim number, agency code or any other identifying information created during our transaction with you. If the person submitting the request is your representative, we will require proof of authority to act in your behalf.
We will respond to requests submitted pursuant to this Notice by disclosing the required information or following up on the deletion request within the timelines prescribed by the CCPA. The process we will follow to verify your request will vary depending on the request. We will first acknowledge our receipt of your request and then we will verify your identity. This step may require that we contact you to obtain additional information. If we are able to verify your identity, we will determine whether we need additional information from you to process your request and then search our records. We may not be able to honor your request in some instances, for example, if we cannot verify your identity or if an exception applies.
Contact for More Information
If you have questions or concerns about our privacy policies and practices, you can call us at 877.832.6642 ext. 1735 or email us at Privacy@hallmarkgrp.com.
Changes to This Disclosure:
We may change or update this Notice from time to time. Revised versions of this Notice will be posted with a new “Last Updated” date.
