The Redwood is committed to protecting the privacy of our donors, supporters, and others with whom we interact.

The Redwood makes every effort to maintain a pre-emptive approach to protecting donor privacy. We recognize, however, that while we work to do good, operating in today’s technology-driven environment provides opportunities for others to do harm. Despite our vigilance and best efforts at data protection, the risk of cybercrime, data breaches and fraud remain real. The Redwood remains steadfast in our commitment to risk reduction, transparency and accountability.

i. The personal information of our donors and supporters is always held in confidence and any use or disclosure of this information is subject to consent.

ii. All those who are privy to the personal information of donors and prospective donors sign a confidentiality agreement.

iii. The Redwood values the trust of our donors and supporters and recognizes that maintaining this trust requires that we be accountable and transparent in how we treat shared information.

iv. The Redwood collects and uses donor information as needed to fulfil its obligations to donors and maintain compliance with regulatory requirements. Specifically, we collect:

• name and address to be able to issue a charitable tax receipt, as required by Canada Revenue Agency;
• other contact information such as phone number and email address to communicate with donors as part of our stewardship commitment, based on the donor’s preferred mode of communication;
• banking and credit card details for the sole purpose of processing recurring and one-time donations;
• donor comments, voluntarily provided along with donations, which sometimes contain instructions regarding communication preferences or clarification about the gift itself.

v. The Redwood considers additional information that is given to us by a donor voluntarily, as being important to the donor for us to know and remember. We may record this information on a donor’s record to enhance our engagement with them.

vi. The Redwood uses a leading proprietary customer relationship management database to record and retain donor information. Our vendor partner that owns the software maintains strict protocols and safeguards and robust, ongoing monitoring, testing, infrastructure upgrade and other risk mitigation measures to keep donor data protected and secure. Sensitive information such as credit card details are encoded using point-to-point encryption.

vii.  The Redwood utilizes the payment platform of our banking partner to facilitate processing of donations made by direct debit, e-transfer and direct deposit.

viii. The Redwood regularly shares updates about our work, fundraising initiatives, special events and volunteer opportunities that may be of interest to donors via a prominent online marketing platform.  Donors who provide an email address are included automatically in our contact list, unless they ask not to be. Donors are always given the option to unsubscribe via a direct link as well as by emailing or calling the fundraising office.

ix. From time to time The Redwood engages the services of other external vendors to provide certain fundraising services. This may involve sharing donor information that is in The Redwood’s possession or receiving information on behalf of The Redwood. Careful and reasonable steps are taken to ensure that appropriate safeguards and systems are in place to protect donor information exchanged during such interactions.

x. The Redwood does not sell or share donor lists without the donors’ permission.

xi. The Redwood obtains explicit permission from donors before publicly acknowledging them (i.e., in the Impact Report, on the website).

xii. Donors are entitled to request a copy of the information The Redwood has on record about their giving.