Privacy Policy

Last updated and effective as of August 16, 2024

This website is operated by Discipleship Ministries The United Methodist Church (referred to in this Privacy Policy as “we,” “us” or “our”). This Privacy Policy (“Policy”) explains how we collect, use and protect information that we learn about you as a result of your interaction with us through the websites on which this Policy is posted, including the websites that you may access using your mobile electronic device (collectively, “Sites”) and, through the services provided through the Sites (“Services”). By accessing any portion of the Sites or using any of the Services, you agree to the practices described in this Policy and you consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as set out in this Policy. If you do not wish to provide your consent and/or do not agree with any part of this Policy, you must discontinue all use of the Sites and the Services immediately.

When does this policy apply?

This Policy applies solely to our online information collection, use and disclosure practices in connection with the Sites, and does not apply to any of our practices conducted offline.

This Policy is only applicable to the Sites and not to any other website or service that you may be able to access from any of the Sites, or use in connection with the Sites or the Services. When you click on an advertisement or a logo displayed on any of the Sites that links you to a different website, including, without limitation, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Google+ or YouTube, or when you use any third-party app, tool, widget, plug-in or extension on the Sites or as part of any of the Services, information about you may be collected through automated means. We do not control, and are not responsible for, any third party’s collection and use of your personal information. You should refer to the privacy policies of such third parties to learn about their information collection, use and disclosure practices.

The Services may also have message boards, forums or chat areas, where users can exchange ideas and communicate with one another. When you post to a message board, forum or chat area, please be aware that the information you post is made publicly available on-line.

What is the effective date of this Policy?

This Policy is effective as of the “last updated and effective” date set out at the top of this page. We reserve the right to modify this Policy at any time, and such revisions will become effective upon the earlier of (1) posting of the revisions to the Sites, or (2) distribution of the revisions by electronic mail. Your continued use of any of the Sites or the Services after the effective date of any modifications means that you accept and agree to all such revisions. Please visit this page on a regular basis and check the “last updated and effective” date at the top of this page to ensure that you are familiar with the most recent version of this Policy.

What is our policy on children’s privacy and privacy rights of California minors?

The Sites and the Services are not for children under 13 years of age, and we do not knowingly collect or store personal information from users of the Sites or the Services who are under 13 years of age. No personal information should be submitted to or posted at the Sites by visitors who are under 13 years of age. If you become aware that your child under 13 years of age has provided his or her personal information to us, please contact us at info@UMCdiscipleship.org. If we determine that we are storing personal information about a child who is or who was, at the time of providing information, under 13 years of age, we will delete such information from our files immediately.

If you are a resident of the State of California, under 18 years of age, and a registered user of a service available on the Sites, and you have posted content or information on the Sites, you may request and obtain removal of the content or information posted by you, by contacting us at info@UMCdiscipleship.org. Please note that our removal of such content or information does not ensure complete or comprehensive removal of this content or information from the Sites.

Cookies: What information about you do we collect and how do we use it?

By accessing the Sites or using the Services, you may provide to us two types of information: (1) personally-identifiable information that you voluntarily choose to disclose to us, such as your name, address, telephone number, e-mail address and credit card information; and (2) non-personally-identifiable information, which we collect through the use of technologies such as “cookies,” “web beacons” or “web logs.” We use the information we collect to monitor and analyze how the Sites and the Services are used, to provide customer service, and to maintain and improve the Sites and the Services. We may also collect technical information to help us identify your mobile device.

You may be asked to submit personally-identifiable information to access or use certain aspects of the Services offered on the Sites – for example, when you create an account, subscribe to our mailing list, make a donation, contact us, receive customer or technical support, participate in chat rooms, forums, polls, questionnaires, surveys or promotions. The personally-identifiable information that you provide to us allows us to fulfill your service request or product order, respond to your questions, contact you about your account or your order, alert you of new products or services and new product and service features, and inform you of promotions, special events and other offers that we think may be of interest to you.

We use cookies for a variety of purposes. We may use cookies for system administration, to assess the performance of the Sites and the Services, to enhance your online experience, and to personalize your use of the Sites. You may choose to disable cookies, block all cookies, or receive a warning before a cookie is stored on your computer or your mobile device; please consult instructions for your web browser to disable or block cookies, or to receive a warning before a cookie is stored on your computer or your mobile device. However, if you disable or block cookies, it is possible that some parts of the Sites or the Services will not be accessible or available to you.

We use web beacons and web logs to monitor and analyze how the Sites and the Services are used, to provide customer service, and to maintain and improve the Services. Web beacons and web logs allow our servers to automatically record information that your browser sends whenever you visit the Sites. This information includes the time and date of your visit, your Internet Protocol address, your geographic location (your zip code, your area code and/or your time zone), your browser type and version, the Sites and the Services you use, and when and how long you use them. We use this information to monitor and analyze how the Sites and the Services are used, to provide customer service, and to maintain and improve the Sites and the Services. We may also use this information to deliver content, including ads, relevant to your interests, on the Sites and on third-party websites. We may also collect technical information to help us identify your mobile device. Mobile devices typically provide users with the ability to disable location services. If you have questions about how to disable the location services on your mobile device, you should contact your mobile service provider or your device manufacturer.

Discipleship Ministries Store
If you create an account on the Discipleship Ministries Store (https://store.umcdiscipleship.org), when you visit our login page, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.

When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks. If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed.

If you request a password reset, your IP address will be included in the reset email.

We collect information about you during the checkout process on our store.

While you visit the Discipleship Ministries Store, we’ll track:

Products you’ve viewed: we’ll use this to, for example, show you products you’ve recently viewed
Location, IP address and browser type: we’ll use this for purposes like estimating taxes and shipping
Shipping address: we’ll ask you to enter this so we can, for instance, estimate shipping before you place an order, and send you the order!

We’ll also use cookies to keep track of cart contents while you’re browsing our site.

When you purchase from us, we’ll ask you to provide information including your name, billing address, shipping address, email address, phone number, credit card/payment details and optional account information like username and password. We’ll use this information for purposes, such as, to:

Send you information about your account and order
Respond to your requests, including refunds and complaints
Process payments and prevent fraud
Set up your account for our store
Comply with any legal obligations we have, such as calculating taxes
Improve our store offerings
Send you marketing messages, if you choose to receive them

If you create an account, we will store your name, address, email and phone number, which will be used to populate the checkout for future orders.

We generally store information about you for as long as we need the information for the purposes for which we collect and use it, and we are not legally required to continue to keep it. This includes your name, email address and billing and shipping addresses.

Store Administrators have access to the information you provide us. Administrators can access:

Order information like what was purchased, when it was purchased and where it should be sent, and
Customer information like your name, email address, and billing and shipping information.

Our team members have access to this information to help fulfill orders, process refunds and support you.

By using this extension, you may be storing personal data or sharing data with an external service. We share your shipping name and address with our fulfillment provider, Dynamark Graphics Group. Your shipping information is transmitted to our fulfillment provider via the ShipStation application. Your shipping information will be shared with our shipping providers, UPS and USPS.

We do not store or transmit your payment information. Your payment information (billing name, billing address, credit card information) is collected by our payment provider, Stripe. Stripe will set cookies on your computer in order to complete your transaction.

Will we share your information with other parties, and what are your California Privacy Rights?

We may use your personally-identifiable information and your non-personally-identifiable information to provide analysis of the users of the Sites and the Services, in the aggregate, to prospective partners, advertisers and other third parties.

We may also share your non-personally-identifiable information with our business partners for the purpose of their delivering content, including ads, on the Sites and on third-party websites.

We will not exchange, sell or rent your name, mailing address, e-mail address, telephone number or any other personally-identifiable information with third parties that offer marketing information or products.

We may disclose your personally-identifiable information to our employees, agents, contractors and sub-contractors, and to our related and affiliated entities, and their respective employees, agents, contractors, sub-contractors, for the limited purpose of enabling them to communicate with you directly about events and promotions that may be of interest to you.

We will share your personally-identifiable information with other parties under the following circumstances:

Protection of Rights. We will share your personally-identifiable information if we have a good faith belief that: (i) access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process, such as a court order or subpoena, or a request by law enforcement or governmental authorities; (ii) such action is appropriate to enforce the Terms of Use for the Sites, including any investigation of potential violations thereof; (iii) such action is necessary to detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues associated with the Sites or the Services; or (iv) such action is appropriate to protect our rights, property or safety or the rights, property or safety of our employees, users of the Sites or the Services, or others.
Asset Transfers. If we become involved in a merger, acquisition, or other transaction involving the sale or transfer of some or all of our assets, or in the event of an insolvency or bankruptcy, the information, including personally-identifiable information, collected from you through your use of the Sites may be included in the transferred assets. Should such an event occur, we will use reasonable measures to notify you, either through e-mail or a prominent notice on the Sites.
Service Providers. We may share your personally-identifiable information with the service providers that we engage in connection with the Sites or the Services. For example, we have partnered with Donor Perfect (www.donorperfect.com) to manage donations, with International Scholarship & Tuition Services (www.applyists.com) and Fluid Review (www.fluidreview.com) to manage grants and scholarship applications, with Smart Sheet (www.smartsheet.com) to manage submissions, with MailChimp (www.mailchimp.com) to manage our e-newsletters, with Salesforce (salesforce.com) for contact management, with LeadPages (leadpages.com) for lead generation, with Teachable (teachable.com) for e-learning, with Zoom (zoom.us) for webinars and online meetings, with Zapier (zapier.com) for transaction data transmittal; and with WPEngine (WPEngine.com) and PayPal (www.paypal.com) to facilitate and process our e-commerce transactions. We also use Google Sheets (www.google.com/sheets/about), and Facebook (www.facebook.com/business) in the operation of the Sites. These companies and other service providers may access your personally-identifiable information that they need in order to perform services on our behalf.
Sweepstakes and Contests. If we offer and you choose to participate in any of our on-line promotions such as a sweepstakes or a contest, your personally-identifiable information collected in connection with a promotion may be shared with the third-party sponsor of the promotion, or as otherwise provided in the Official Rules. You should carefully review the Official Rules of each promotion in which you choose to participate through the Sites, as the Official Rules may contain additional important information about a third party’s collection and use of your information. To the extent that the Official Rules of any promotion conflict with this Policy, the Official Rules will govern collection and use of your personally-identifiable information in conjunction with that particular promotion.

If you are a resident of the State of California and you have provided any personally-identifiable information to us, you have the right to request a list of all third parties to whom we have disclosed your personally-identifiable information during the preceding year for direct marketing purposes. If you are a California resident and wish to make such a request, please send an e-mail to info@UMCdiscipleship.org or contact us at the address or the telephone number below.

What choices do you have about the collection and use of your information?

For any of the Services that include an account access, you may review, update or delete your personally-identifiable information, and modify your account preferences for the Services by contacting us at info@UMCdiscipleship.org. To update or delete personally-identifiable information that you had provided in connection with any other Services, you may contact us at info@UMCdiscipleship.org. Please note that when you delete your account or request that we delete your personally-identifiable information, we may retain your information for a reasonable period of time, for the purpose of internal account management and fraud prevention.

If you no longer wish to receive announcements by e-mail, you may unsubscribe from receiving them at any time by clicking on the link “to manage your communication preferences,” appearing at the bottom of our e-mails, and by following subsequent instructions, or by contacting us at info@UMCdiscipleship.org. If you send an e-mail to us to change your contact preferences, we will implement your requested changes within a reasonable amount of time. Please note that your requested changes will not be effective until we implement such changes. Please also note that you cannot unsubscribe from certain correspondence from us, including messages relating to your account transactions.

If you choose to join one of our mobile marketing lists, please be aware that there are usually costs associated with receiving SMS or MMS messages, which are determined by your carrier. You should contact your carrier to determine the charges that may apply, before you sign up to receive our updates via SMS or MMS. If you wish to stop receiving such messages from us, at any time, simply write “STOP” in a reply to any message from us.

You agree that, in the event that any dispute or claim arises out of or relating to this Policy or our privacy practices, you will attempt to negotiate, in good faith, a written resolution of your dispute or claim directly with us and/or our affiliates or subsidiaries, depending on your concern. You agree that if your dispute or claim remains unresolved for forty-five (45) days after notification (via Certified Mail or personal delivery) that a dispute or claim exists, the parties shall join in mediation services in Nashville, Davidson County, Tennessee, with a mutually chosen mediator, in an attempt to resolve the dispute or claim. Should you file any arbitration claims, any administrative actions, or any court actions without first having attempted to resolve your dispute or claim by mediation, then you agree that you will not be entitled to recover any costs of the proceeding, including, without limitation, your attorneys’ fees or other costs, even if you would otherwise be entitled to them.

What is our policy on tracking?

We do not participate in tracking networks and do not intentionally or knowingly allow other parties to collect personal information about your online activities over time and across different websites, when you visit the Sites or use any of the Services.

You may be able to adjust your browser’s setting to turn on a “do not track” feature. We support “do not track” and will honor a relevant “do not track” signal. However, because there is no uniform standard for “do not track” signal recognition, the Sites may not respond to all types of “do not track” signals.

What security measures do we take?

The personally-identifiable information that you provide to us is stored on servers that are located in secured facilities with restricted access, and protected by protocols and procedures designed to ensure the security of such information. In addition, we restrict access to personally-identifiable information to our employees, independent contractors and agents who need to know this information in order to develop, operate and maintain the Sites and the Services. However, no data transmission over the Internet or through mobile telecommunications can be guaranteed to be completely secure, and, for this reason, we cannot ensure or warrant the security of any information that you transmit to us or that is transmitted to us as a result of your use of the Sites or any of the Services. You can help protect your personally-identifiable information by using strong passwords, changing your password often, using a secure web browser, and signing off and closing your web browser when you are finished with the use of the Sites.

Requesting your data

You may request a copy of all data we have collected about you, or request that your data be removed. To make such a request, please contact us at info@umcdiscipleship.org.

Does this policy apply outside of the United States?

We comply with United States privacy laws and regulations. We do not represent that the Sites are governed by or operated in accordance with the laws of other nations, or that the Sites or the Services are appropriate or available for use in any particular location. If you choose to access the Sites or the Services, you do so at your own risk, and you are responsible for complying with all local laws, rules and regulations. By using any part of the Sites or the Services, visitors to the Sites from outside the United States acknowledge and agree that the Sites are subject to the United States laws and regulations, and waive any claims that may arise under their own national laws.

How can you contact us with questions about this Policy or our privacy practices?

If you have questions about this Policy or any of our privacy practices, please contact us. Please include your name and your contact information in your mail or e-mail correspondence.

Discipleship Ministries The United Methodist Church
Attn: Office of Communications
P.O. Box 340003
Nashville, TN 37203-0003

E-mail: info@UMCdiscipleship.org

Telephone: toll-free (877) 899-2780

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