Privacy Policy

Last Modified: June 23, 2023

Britsou America Corp. (hereinafter referred to as “MAC” or “we” or “us”) is committed to protecting the privacy of all visitors to and users of our websites and mobile applications, and as part of our commitment to privacy, we make this privacy statement. Please read the following Privacy Policy to understand how we use and protect the information our visitors and users (or “you”) provide us. By accessing and/or using web pages of MAC, including at the URLs/domain names www.midea.com/us/, and MAC’s mobile applications, including SmartHome (collectively, the "Services"), you, as a user of this Services, hereby accept and agree to abide by our Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, please discontinue your use of our Services.

This Privacy Policy applies to information that we collect on the Services and in email, text, and other electronic messages between you and MAC. It does not apply to information collected by any third party (including our affiliates and subsidiaries), including through any application or content that may link to or be accessible from (or on) the Services.

CHILDREN UNDER THE AGE OF 18

Our Services are not intended for children under 18 years of age. No one under age 18 may provide any information to or on the Services. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 18. If you are under 18, do not use or provide any information on our Services or on or through any of its features, including your name, address, telephone number, email address, or any screen name or username you may use. If we learn we have collected or received personal information from a child under 18 without verification of parental consent, we will delete that information. If you believe we have inadvertently collected information from a child under the age of 18, please use the contact details provided in Article 10 of our policy to reach out to us. This Privacy Policy describes the following:

1. Personal Information that we collect;
2. Our use of your personal information;
3. Who we may share your personal information with;
4. Choices about how we use and disclose your information
5. Accessing and correcting your information
6. Your privacy rights under the laws of your jurisdiction, including California;
7. Do Not Track signals;
8. Security and retention of your information;
9. Privacy Policy updates; and
10. Contact Information.

 

1. PERSONAL INFORMATION THAT WE COLLECT

(a)  We collect personal information directly from you. For example, we may collect personal information about you when you sign up to receive newsletters, register to become a user, download and use our mobile applications, purchase our products, communicate with us over the telephone (which conversations may be recorded for customer service purposes), send us product registration cards or correspondence (whether by letter, fax or e-mail), visit our Services, participate in our promotions or competitions or when you have contact with us in person, in which case you may be asked to provide certain information about yourself including your name, email address, phone number, physical address and other contact details. We may also collect information about you from emails and/or letters you send to us. MAC may also request that you complete surveys that we use for research purposes, although you are not obliged to respond. To register as a user, we will ask for your email address and a username and password. If you purchase our products, we will ask for your payment card information and billing address. You have the option to leave reviews for our products on our Services, in which case your chosen display name and comments will be shared publicly. When you utilize our SmartHome  mobile application, you are providing to us information about your home and living spaces.

We utilize third party service providers to host our Services and our shop for the sale of our products and process payments. To the extent you are re-directed to those providers’ user interfaces, information may be provided directly to such providers, and accordingly we may receive information about you from those providers in connection with your transactions.

(b)  We may also collect information about you automatically as you navigate through the Services, which may include usage details, IP addresses, and information collected through cookies, web beacons, and other tracking technologies. We may also collect personal information about you from third parties, such as our business partners.

The technologies we use for this automatic information collection may include:

• Cookies (or browser cookies).A cookie is a small file placed on the hard drive of your computer. Unless you have adjusted your browser setting so that it will refuse cookies or chosen to decline cookies through our cookie banner, our system will issue cookies when you direct your browser to our Services. You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when cookies are being sent. However, if you do not consent to our use of cookies or select this setting you may be unable to access certain parts of our Services. You can find more information about cookies at http://www
  allaboutcookies.org and http://youronlinechoices.eu.
• Web Beacons.Pages of the Services and our e-mails may contain small electronic files known as web beacons (also referred to as clear gifs, pixel tags, and single-pixel gifs) that permit MAC, for example, to count users who have visited those pages or opened an email and for other related statistics (for example, recording the popularity of certain content of our Services and verifying system and server integrity).

We use Google Analytics, which uses Cookies to identify the frequency of use of certain areas of our Services and to identify preferences. For more information regarding how Google collects, uses, and shares your information please visit http://www.google.com/policies/privacy/partners/. You can deactivate Google Analytics using a browser add-on if you do not wish the analysis to take place. You can download the add-on here:  https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout?hl=en.

Advertising identifiers are similar to cookies and are found on many mobile devices and tablets (for example, the "Identifier for Advertisers" (or IDFA) on Apple iOS devices and the "Google Advertising ID" on Android devices), and certain streaming media devices. Like cookies, advertising identifiers are used to make online advertising more relevant.

We operate social media pages on third party networks and have social media icons on our Services. When you visit or link to our social media pages, information is processed both by us and the applicable social media provider. Social media providers are unaffiliated with us, and we are not responsible for the content or privacy practices of social media providers.  Social media providers have their own terms of use and privacy policies, and we encourage you to review those policies whenever you visit their websites or interact with their platforms.

2. OUR USE OF YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

MAC may use and analyze the information that we collect for the following purposes:

• To fulfill or meet the reason you provided the information. For example, if you share your name and contact information to ask a question about our products or services, we will use that personal information to respond to your inquiry. If you provide your personal information to purchase a Product, we will use that information to process your payment and facilitate delivery. We may also save your information to facilitate new Product orders or process returns.
• To register your Products.
• To provide, support, personalize, and develop our Services, products, and services.
• To create, maintain, customize, and secure your account with us.
• To authenticate you as a user, including by the use of text messaging for multi-factor authentication.
• To process your requests, purchases, transactions, and payments and prevent transactional fraud.
• To provide you with support and to respond to your inquiries, including to investigate and address your concerns and monitor and improve our responses.
• To personalize your experience with our Services and to deliver content and Product and Service offerings relevant to your interests, including targeted offers and ads through our Services, third-party sites, and via email or text message (with your consent, where required by law).
• To help maintain the safety, security, and integrity of our Services, databases and other technology assets, and business.
• For internal testing, research, analysis, and product development, including to develop and improve our Services, and to develop, improve, or demonstrate our products and services.
• To respond to law enforcement requests and as required by applicable law, court order, or governmental regulations.
• To evaluate or conduct a merger, divestiture, restructuring, reorganization, dissolution, or other sale or transfer of some or all of our assets, whether as a going concern or as part of bankruptcy, liquidation, or similar proceeding, in which personal information held by us about our users is among the assets transferred.
• Undertaking internal research for technological development and demonstration.
• Undertaking activities to verify or maintain the quality or safety of a service or Product that is owned, manufactured, manufactured for, or controlled by MAC or one of its affiliates or subsidiaries, and to improve, upgrade, or enhance the Service or Product that is owned, manufactured, manufactured for, or controlled by MAC.
• Detecting security incidents, protecting against malicious, deceptive, fraudulent, or illegal activity, and prosecuting those responsible for that activity.
• Debugging to identify and repair errors that impair existing intended functionality in our Products or Services.

We may contact you by post, telephone, fax or e-mail. If you change your mind about being contacted in the future, please let us know.

3. WHOM WE SHARE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATON WITH

We may disclose personal information that we collect or that you provide as described in this privacy notice:

• To our subsidiaries and affiliates.
• To contractors, service providers, and other third parties we use to support our business.
• To a potential or actual buyer or other successor in the event of a planned or actual merger, divestiture, restructuring, reorganization, dissolution, or other sale or transfer of some or all of MAC’s assets, whether as a going concern or as part of bankruptcy, liquidation, or similar proceeding, in which personal information held by MAC about our customers is among the assets transferred.
• To carefully selected third parties, including other subsidiaries and affiliated companies, to contact you occasionally about products and services which may be of interest to you. They may contact you by post, telephone, fax or e-mail. If you change your mind about being contacted by these companies in the future, please let us know.
• Tothird parties for marketing purposes, with your consent.

We may disclose your personal information to comply with a court order, subpoena, search warrant, or other legal process, including to respond to any government or regulatory request. This is to ensure that we adhere to our legal obligations and protect our rights in the context of legal proceedings.

 We may share information to enforce or apply the terms and conditions of any agreements we have with you, including for billing and collection purposes. This is necessary to maintain the integrity of our business relationships and to pursue any owed payments.

If we believe that sharing your personal information is necessary or appropriate to protect the rights, property, or safety of MAC, our customers, or others, we may disclose the information. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organizations for the purposes of fraud protection and credit risk reduction. We take the security of our users seriously and may need to act on our own initiative or in cooperation with third parties to protect against threats to safety or fraud.

 

4. CHOICES ABOUT HOW WE USE AND DISCLOSE YOUR INFORMATION

We do not control the collection and use of your information collected by the third parties described herein. Where possible, these organizations are under contractual obligations to use this personal information only for providing the services to us and to maintain this information confidential. These parties may, however, aggregate the personal information they collect with information from their other consumers for their own purposes.

In addition, we strive to provide you with choices regarding the personal information you provide to us. We have created mechanisms to provide you with control over your personal information:

• Tracking Technologies and Advertising.You can set your browser to refuse all or some browser cookies, or to alert you when cookies are being sent. If you disable or refuse cookies, please note that some parts of our Services may then be inaccessible or not function properly.
• Disclosure of Your Information for Third-Party Advertising.If you do not want us to share your personal information with unaffiliated or non-agent third parties for promotional purposes, You can opt-out by contacting us directly.. If you wish to change your choice, you may do so at any time by contacting us as set forth below.
• Promotional Offers from MAC.If you do not wish to have your contact information used by MAC to promote our own or third parties’ products or services, you can opt-out by checking the relevant box located on the form on which we collect your personal information or otherwise seek such consent  or by contacting us as set forth below. If we have sent you a promotional email, you can unsubscribe from future email distributions by clicking the unsubscribe link in the email. This opt out does not apply to information provided to MAC as a result of a product purchase, warranty registration, product service experience or other transactions.

5. ACCESSING AND CORRECTING YOUR INFORMATION

You may send us an email at the email address listed below to request access to, correct or delete any personal information that you have provided to us. We may not accommodate a request to change information if we believe the change would violate any law or legal requirement or cause the information to be incorrect.

6. YOUR PRIVACY RIGHTS UNDER THE LAWS OF YOUR JURISDICTION

(a)  General. This section is subject to specific disclosures on privacy rights set forth below. We are committed to facilitate the exercise of your rights granted by the laws of your jurisdiction, which may include, without limitation, the right to request the correction, modification or deletion of your personal information, data portability, and the right to opt out of the sale or sharing of your personal information (as applicable). We will do our best to honor your requests subject to any legal and contractual obligations.  If you would like to make a request, cancel your account or request we delete or no longer use your account information to provide you products and services, contact us via Info@britsou.com or make changes to any user profile information connected to your account. Subject to local law, you may have additional rights under the laws of your jurisdiction regarding your personal information, such as the right to complain to your local data protection authority and to appeal our decision about a data subject request.

This Privacy Policy applies to the United States website. If you are a resident of a jurisdiction outside the United States, please click the down arrow next to “United States” at the top right corner of the home page to navigate to your country-specific website.

(b)  California Disclosures

California “Shine the Light” Information-Sharing Disclosure: California Civil Code Section 1798.83 (California’s “Shine the Light” law) permits users of our Website that are California residents and who provide personal information in obtaining products and services for personal, family, or household use to request certain information regarding our disclosure of personal information to third parties for their own direct marketing purposes. If applicable, this information would include the categories of personal information and the names and addresses of those businesses with which we shared your personal information with for the immediately prior calendar year (e.g. requests made this year will receive information regarding such activities for last year). You may request this information once per calendar year. To make such a request, please write us at the contact information listed below with “California Shine The Light Rights” in the subject line. 

California Consumer Privacy Act Disclosures. Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act effective January 1, 2023 (“CCPA”), California residents have the right to request:

• The categories of personal information (including sensitive personal information if applicable) we have collected about you;
• The categories of sources from which the personal information is collected;
• The business or commercial purpose of collecting, selling or sharing personal information;
• The categories of third parties with whom we share or sell personal information;
• The categories of personal information about you that we have disclosed; and
• The specific pieces of personal information we have collected about you.

Additionally, you have the right:

• to know the length of time we retain your personal information;
• to request deletion of your personal information;
• to request the correction of any inaccurate information;
• to opt out of the sale or sharing of your information;
• to limit the use of sensitive personal information (if applicable); and
• to not be discriminated against for exercising any of your CCPA rights.

We share (as defined under CCPA) consumers’ personal information in the context of cross-context behavioral advertising. Please see Section 7 below for more information. Although we do not currently offer the option to opt out of the sharing of your personal information for cross-context behavioral advertising via a 'Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information' link on our homepage, you have the right to request that we do not sell or share your personal information. To exercise this right, please contact us directly by Email provided in Article 10 of our policy to reach out to us, and we will assist you with your request in accordance with applicable laws and our privacy practices.Please see the chart below regarding the categories of information we may have (or have not) collected or received in the 12 months preceding the effective date of this Privacy Policy from users in connection with providing our Services, products and services and to whom we may have disclosed the information for business purposes. 

Personal Information Category	Source of Personal Information	Purpose for Collecting the Personal Information	To whom we disclose the Personal Information
Identifiers such as a name, address, unique personal identifier, email, phone number	Information you provide to us; Information we collect automatically; Information collected from third party providers.	See Sections 1(a) and 2 above	See Section 3 above
Information described in 1798.80(c) (and not otherwise addressed in this table), including bank account number, credit card number, debit card number, or any other financial information, medical information, or health insurance information	Information you provide to us; Information collected from third party providers.	See Sections 1(a) and 2 above	See Section 3 above
Protected Classifications under California and federal law, including gender, age and citizenship.	We do not collect this Information.
Commercial information such as records of products or services purchased, obtained, or considered, purchase histories and tendencies	Information you provide to us; Information we collect automatically; Information collected from third party providers.	See Sections 1(a) and 2 above	See Section 3 above
Biometric information	We do not collect this information
Internet or other electronic network activity information, including browsing history and search history and interactions with an advertisement.	Information you provide to us; Information we collect automatically, information collected from third party providers	See Sections 1(b) and 2 above	See Section 3 above
Geolocation data that is sufficient to identify a precise physical location.	We do not collect this information.
Sensory data, such as audio, electronic, visual, or other similar information.	We may collect this information from you in connection with recorded phone calls for customer service purposes.	See Sections 1(a) and 2 above.	See Section 3 above
Professional or employment-related information	We do not collect this information
Education Information	We do not collect this information
Inferences about preferences, characteristics, psychological trends, predispositions, behavior, attitudes, intelligence, abilities, and aptitudes.	We do not collect this information

 

We do not collect any “sensitive information” for the purposes of inferring characteristics of a consumer. Accordingly, all information collected is “personal information” (and not “sensitive information”) pursuant to CCPA.

Personal information may be provided to our service providers, contractors and, pursuant to Sections 1798.140(ad)(2)(A) and 1798.140(ah)(2)(A) of the CCPA, to third parties.

Our contact information is listed at the bottom of this policy.  You may also submit a request on our Website form located at https://www.britsou.com/us/support and enter your request in the message blank. If you submit a data subject request, we will ask for your name and email address, and we will endeavor to authenticate your account. We may also require that you submit your request via the Services’s standard authentication procedures (i.e., log on with username and password to submit a request) and/or provide information about any historical transactions to ensure you are the person you say you are. If this information or these processes are insufficient to verify your identity and assess your privacy request, we may need to ask for additional information.  You may also designate an authorized agent to make a CCPA privacy request.

7. DO NOT TRACK SIGNALS

We may use automated information collection technologies to collect information about your online activities over time and across third-party websites or other online services (behavioral tracking). Some web browsers permit you to broadcast a signal to websites and online services indicating a preference that they “do not track” your online activities. We utilize an automated tool designed to recognize Do Not Track settings and Global Privacy Controls in end-user browsers.

8. SECURITY, DATA RETENTION

We retain the personal information we collect for so long as reasonably necessary to fulfill the purposes for which the information was collected and to perform our contractual and legal obligations. Notwithstanding the generality of the foregoing, we store email addresses until the user requests to be unsubscribed or removes themselves through any self-service tools offered to the user. 

We do not store payment card information; rather we utilize the Shopify platform and payment processors and store only an electronic receipt that sets forth confirming payment details, such as purchase date, the expiration date of the payment card and the payment ID, but not complete payment card information.

We employ reasonable security measures to protect your information from access by unauthorized persons and against unlawful processing, accidental loss, destruction and damage.

The transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure, however.   We therefore cannot guarantee the security of your data transmitted to us; any transmission is at your own risk, and we are not responsible for processes and networks that we do not control. Please be careful in deciding what information you send to us via email or over the Internet.

9. CHANGES TO OUR PRIVACY POLICY

We may change this Privacy Policy at any time. It is our practice to post any changes we make to our Privacy Policy on this page with a notice that the privacy policy has been updated on the Website’s home page (and for our mobile applications, with an in-app message). If we make material changes to how we treat our users’ personal information, we will notify you by email to the email address specified in your account and/or through a notice on the Website’s home page (and for our mobile applications, with an in-app message). The date this Privacy Policy was last revised is identified at the top of the page. You are responsible for ensuring we have an up-to-date active and deliverable email address for you, and for periodically visiting this Privacy Policy to check for any changes. Your continued use of our Services following the posting of changes constitutes your acceptance of such changes.

10.  CONTACT

All comments, queries and requests relating to our use of your information are welcomed and should be addressed to our Support Representative at 1-866-646-4332 or email us through our Customer Service & Support web page. The Services are operated by britsou America Corp., a company incorporated in the 1920 Longhu Junhui, No. 4741 Longhua Avenue, Qinghua Community, Longhua Street, Longhua District, Shenzhen, China 518110