Privacy Policy

Why Do We Collect, Hold, Use, and Disclose Personal Information?

We collect, hold, use and disclose personal information so that we can provide you with products and services including:

• Arranging and administering insurance
• Risk analysis and underwriting
• Management of claims, including investigation and settlement
• Accounting and auditing
• Complaints and disputes management
• Legal, regulatory and compliance purposes
• Direct marketing

Without your personal information, we may not be able to issue insurance coverage, administer your insurance, answer your questions or concerns, or process your claim.

Our websites are not intended for children. We do not knowingly collect any personal information from children under 16-years old.

What Types of Personal Information Do We Collect and Hold?

We collect and hold a range of personal information from and about individuals who are insured, or have submitted a claim, under our insurance policies. Depending on the products or services we are providing to you, we may collect and hold the following information about you:

• General identification and contact information, which may include some or all of the following information:
  • Name
  • Address
  • E-mail address
  • Telephone number(s)
  • Gender
  • Nationality
  • Marital status
  • Number of dependents
  • Date of birth
  • Place of birth
• Financial information and account details to enable us to underwrite insurance for you and process payments to or from you or your agent
• Employment, health, and/or motor vehicle records of commercial insureds’ employees for underwriting and claims purposes
• Medical information regarding injuries and treatment
• Recordings of telephone calls to our representatives and to call centers operated on our behalf
• We may also collect personal information from employees, prospective employees, service providers and third-party contractors. This information may include name, address, employment history, education history, photo, financial account information, and family or beneficiary information to provide employee benefits. You provide this information to us through employment applications, resumes, cover letters, and benefits applications. We may share this information with benefits providers or third parties that provide administrative support for our operations, which may be located in the United States or in other countries.

We will only collect information for the purposes outlined above.

How Do We Collect and Hold Personal Information?

Where it is reasonable and practicable to do so, we collect personal information directly from you or from your insurance broker. This information may be collected using various means including in writing, in person, by telephone, by email or through other electronic messages.

We may also collect your personal information from:

• Your agents or brokers
• Third-parties you have asked to provide your personal info to us
• Publicly available services
• Service providers
• Other insurers
• Credit check bodies
• Law enforcement or dispute resolution bodies
• Marketing organizations

We will only collect and use your personal information in accordance with applicable privacy laws. Some laws require your consent to collect certain personal information from you and we will first obtain your consent where required by law to do so.

Our websites also utilize technology such as tracking pixels and cookies, which may collect data such as your IP address, referring websites, and unique or returning visitors. This data may be linked with personal information we have collected, such as your name or contact information.

We hold your personal information in various internal systems and databases including shared drives, email, document management systems and in hard copy. We maintain physical, electronic, and procedural safeguards to protect the security of personal information from misuse and loss, as well as unauthorized access, modification or disclosure. After it is no longer needed or required for applicable legal or regulatory purposes, we dispose of or de-identify personal information.

To What Other Organizations or Third-Parties Do We Disclose Personal Information?

We may make your personal information available to third-parties as permitted by applicable law to administer our insurance policies or when required by law to do so. We may provide your personal information to:

• Contractors or third-parties providing services to us related to the administration of insurance policies such as distributors, agents, claims & loss assessors, claims managers, insurance reference bureaus.
• Our related bodies and corporate companies in the Berkshire Hathaway insurance group that provide administrative services, including processing insurance policies and completing regulatory reporting.
• Banks and financial institutions for the purpose of processing your application and payments to/from you or your agent.
• Third-party administrators, emergency providers, repairers and suppliers, and investigators for the purpose of processing and administering your claims.
• Governmental authorities, law enforcement agencies and dispute resolution bodies and agencies.
• Third-party companies that provide certain services for us, which may include name and address verification, email distribution, market research and other business-related services.
• Third-party companies for analytics, such as Google Analytics, to evaluate use of our webpages by online visitors.

We do not sell any personal information to marketing companies.

International Disclosure of Personal Information

We are an international insurance company, with offices in several countries. In some circumstances and for the purposes set out above, we may disclose personal information to parties, including our own offices, located in other countries. The laws governing personal data protection vary and the country where your personal information is transferred may have different laws than those in the country in which you reside.

We make all reasonable efforts to ensure that the arrangements we have in place with overseas parties impose appropriate privacy and confidentiality obligations on those parties to ensure that the personal information shared is kept secure and used only for the purposes noted above.

How Do You Access and Correct Your Personal Information?

We take reasonable steps to ensure that your personal information is accurate, complete and up-to-date.

If you wish to access the personal information we may hold about you or if you believe that the personal information we hold about you is not accurate, complete or up-to-date, you can request access to or correction of the information by contacting us (contact details below).

In order to process any request for access or correction of personal information, we may need to obtain a minimum level of information, including:

• Full name
• Date of birth
• Details of the request, including supporting information, evidencing the individual’s right to access the data

If you are seeking access to, or correction of, information on another person’s behalf, we will also require written authorization from that individual.

We reserve the right to refuse access to personal information under grounds permitted by applicable privacy laws. There is no fee to access or correct your information but there may be a cost charged, if permitted by applicable law, for providing access to personal information, which reflects the cost of locating and providing the information to you.

Who Do You Contact If You Have a Question or Complaint About How We Handle Your Personal Information?

If you have any questions or concerns about how we handle your personal information, please contact us (contact details below).

If you have contacted us with a complaint and you are not satisfied with our response, you may refer your complaint to your state privacy regulatory authority. If you reside in the United States, complaints can be made with the state insurance regulator.

Policyholder Reviews

We may reach out to you by email or use third-party vendors to allow policyholders to submit original ratings and reviews of our insurance products and services (“Submissions”). Submissions to us or to such third-party vendors’ review submission forms and via email may be published on our websites, marketing, advertising, or any other lawful purpose. We may publish your review Submissions with limited information to possibly include your first name, first letter of last name, and your state of residency. We are not responsible for the privacy policies and/or practices of third-parties. By submitting a review or rating of our products and services, you agree to the following: (1) We reserve the right to publish partial versions of the Submissions in any manner, for marketing, advertising, trade, or any other lawful purpose; (2) You explicitly waive rights of publicity, privacy, and all right to compensation as it relates to the Submissions; (3) You grant us an irrevocable, unrestricted, and royalty-free license to use, reproduce, publish, exhibit, and distribute any part of the Submissions in any format and media; and (4) We have no obligation to use or publish your Submissions.

When Is This Notice Updated?

This Notice may change from time to time and where this occurs, the updated Notice will be posted on our web site.

How Do You Contact Us?

Berkshire Hathaway Specialty Insurance
Attention: Deputy Compliance Officer
100 Federal Street, 7th Floor
Boston, MA 02110

By Phone: 617-902-7150

By Email: northamerica.privacy.compliance@bhspecialty.com

California Residents Only:

Per Cal. Civ. Code § 1798.100-§ 1798.198 (“The California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018”), you have the following rights, subject to our legal and records retention obligations:

• To request information from us about the categories of or specific personal information we maintain about you and the categories of the sources of such information.
• To request we delete personal information we have collected from you.
• To contact us with questions or concerns about our privacy policy or practices.

You will not receive any discriminatory treatment by exercising these privacy rights.

We will respond to all reasonable, verified requests within the amount of time required by applicable law. If you want to exercise any of these rights, please contact:

Phone: (855) 928-1228

Email: northamerica.privacy.compliance@bhspecialty.com

You may authorize an agent to make a request on your behalf, if proof of authorization is provided. We will return your call or email the following business day and will ask for information to help verify your identity (or verify your agent is authorized to make the request on your behalf). We will confirm whether we are able to verify, and if so will respond to your request within 45 days.

Effective Date: December 2019