Version 2.0 (November 2020)
1. What is the purpose of this Privacy Policy?
2. Who are we?
3. What does "personal data" and "processing" mean?
4. For whom and for what is this Privacy Policy intended for?
5. Which personal data do we process and for what purposes?
6. Whom do we share your personal data with?
7. Do we disclose your personal data to countries abroad?
8. Do we perform profiling or make automated individual decisions?
9. How do we protect your personal data?
10. How long do we retain your personal data??
11. How do we process personal data of children?
12. What rights do you have in relation to the processing of your personal data?
13. What else needs to be considered?
14. Changes to this Privacy Policy
1. What is the purpose of this Privacy Policy?
This Privacy Policy sets out which personal data we process in which way and for what purposes.
With this Privacy Policy we inform you how and why we collect, process and use your personal data. It is important to us that you understand:
- which personal data we collect about you;
- the purpose for which we use your personal data;
- how long we retain your personal data;
- who has access to your personal data; and
- what rights you have with regard to your personal data.
You will find corresponding notes and explanations below. Please find further details in the table at the end of this Privacy Policy. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us. You can find our contact details under section 2.
2. Who are we?
For each data processing activity a certain undertaking (the so called "controller") is responsible to ensure data protection. It is this entity that determines the purposes and means of the processing activity. In principle, the following entity ("we" or "us") is the controller with regard to the data processing in accordance with this Privacy Policy:
AMC Middle East
Center 522, Hrawi Avenue
Tehwita
Furn El Chebback
Beirut, Lebanon
In certain cases the controller of your personal data is not us, but another group entity:
- If you are in contact with another AMC group entity, then such entity is in principle the controller with regard to the respective data processing.
- In certain cases, we may also transfer your personal data to another AMC group entity or to third parties, such as independent sales agents, who offer and sell AMC products and services on our behalf. In this case, the respective recipient is the controller.
3. What does "personal data" and "processing" mean?
“Personal data” is all information pertaining to a particular natural person, i.e. a human being. This for example includes the following information, provided that it can be related to a specific natural person:
- contact information, e.g. name, address, e-mail address, telephone number;
- further personal information, e.g. gender, birthday and age, marital status, nationality;
- transaction data, e.g. information on orders, shopping history, preferences and affinity to certain product categories;
- personal preferences, e.g. nutritional habits or cooking skills;
- financial information, e.g. credit card number, account details, creditworthiness;
- job-related information, e.g. profession, title, function, education, former employers, skills and experience, permits and admissions as well as memberships;
- logs showing your visits on our websites.
We do not necessarily process all personal data mentioned in this paragraph. You will find specific information on the personal data we process in section 5 and in the table at the end of this Privacy Notice.
"Processing" means any operation or set of operations which is performed on personal data. This includes, for example, the following actions:
- the collection, storage and retention;
- the organisation, the arrangement and the administration;
- adaptation and alteration;
- retrieval and consultation;
- the use and application;
- the disclosure;
- the alignment and the combination;
- the restriction;
- the erasure and destruction; and
- the transfer and dissemination.
4. For whom and for what is this Privacy Policy intended for?
This Privacy Policy applies to any processing of personal data in connection with all our business activities in all our business areas. For certain services additional Privacy Policies may apply. We will inform you of these provisions in an appropriate manner where such is the case.
This Privacy Policy applies to the processing of personal data of all “data subjects”. The following persons are examples of data subjects:
- Persons who write to us or contact us in any other manner;
- customers or prospects who are visited by our sales staff or sales agents;
- participants in sales parties, cooking classes and other customer events;
- visitors of our premises;
- visitors of our websites;
- users of our applications;
- recipients of our information and marketing communications;
- participants in competitions, contests and surveys;
- contact persons of our business partners and our sales agents; and
- job applicants.
5. Which personal data do we process and for what purposes?
Depending on the occasion and purpose, we process very different personal data. You will find more details in this section and in the table at the end of this Privacy Policy:
- Communication: We process personal data when you contact us or when we contact you, e.g. when you contact our customer service as well as when you write or call us. Normally, we only require information such as name and contact data and the content and time of the relevant messages. We use this data in order to provide you with information, process your request and to communicate with you. We can also forward messages within the AMC Group to the responsible entity offices, e.g. if your request concerns another entity.
- Purchase of goods and services: We also receive and process personal data if you make use of our services, e.g. if you purchase goods or services from us. We need e.g. your name and contact data, information on the ordered goods or services as well as means of payment. In case you wish to pay in arrears, we may also need to verify your creditworthiness, for which we are retaining the services of credit agencies. We process your personal data, for example, for the processing of orders and contracts, including the dispatch of order and shipping confirmations, delivery confirmations, delivery and invoicing, as well as warranty services. From this, we may also derive information about your preferences and affinities to certain products or services. Such information helps us to provide you with specific information about offers and to generally tailor our offer more precisely to the demands of our customers.
- Sales parties and customer events: When we hold sales parties and customer events (such as product demonstrations, cooking classes and promotional events), we also process personal data. Such data include the name and address of the participants or interested parties and, other data depending on the event, e.g. your date of birth. We process this information for the purpose of carrying out customer events, but also to get in direct contact with you and attract your interest for our products and services.
- Information and direct marketing: We process personal data in many ways, including for information and marketing purposes. If you, for example, register for a newsletter, we will, for example, process your contact details, details about your nutritional habits, cooking skills and preferences, and information about your use of the newsletter and products previously purchased by you, in order to get to know you better and to attract your interest for our products.
- Visiting websites; using apps: When you visit our websites, we process personal data. The processing depends on the offer and functionality of the website. This data includes, for example, log data, information about the time our website was accessed, the duration of the visit and the pages accessed. We use this data for reasons of IT security, but also to improve the user-friendliness of the website and its functions. We also use "cookies", which are small text files that are temporarily or permanently stored on your device when you visit our website. Cookies are often required for the functionality of the website. Others are used to personalize the offer. We also use analytic tools such as Google Analytics. These tools allow the evaluation of the users’ behaviour on the respective websites. Finally, we may use functionalities from providers such as Facebook, which may result in the provider concerned processing data about you. Please refer to the table at the end of this Privacy Policy for further details. There you will also learn how you can prevent these processing activities.
- Competitions, contests and surveys: From time to time we also organise competitions, contests and surveys. In this case, we process your contact data and information about your participation for the purpose of carrying out the competitions, contests and surveys, as well as the contributions provided by you. Further details can be found in the respective conditions of participation.
- Business partners: We work together with various companies and business partners, e.g. with independent sales agents, suppliers, commercial customers of goods and services, with cooperation partners and with service providers (e.g. IT service providers). We also process personal data about the contact persons in these companies, e.g. name, function and title, as well as information regarding deliverables and payments.
- Job applications: We also process personal data when you apply to us. As a general rule, we require the usual information and documents as well as the ones mentioned in a job advertisement.
- Protection of rights: We process personal data in various situations in order to protect our rights, e.g. to assert claims in and out of court and before local and foreign authorities or to defend ourselves against claims. For example, we can have process prospects clarified or submit documents to an authority. Authorities may also require us to disclose documents containing personal data.
The table at the end of this Privacy Policy describes in more detail what types of personal data we collect about you, how and for what purposes it is used, on what legal basis and whether you are obliged to provide us with personal data.
6. Whom do we share your personal data with?
Our employees and sales agents have access to your personal data as far as it is necessary for the described purposes and the work of the employees or sales agents concerned. They act in accordance with our instructions and are bound to confidentiality and secrecy when handling your personal data.
Our employees and sales agents have access to your personal data as far as it is necessary for the described purposes and the work of the employees or sales agents concerned. They act in accordance with our instructions and are bound to confidentiality and secrecy when handling your personal data.
We may also transfer your personal data to other entities within the AMC Group for the purpose of internal group administration and for the various processing purposes described in this Privacy Policy. This means that your personal data can also be processed and combined with personal data originating from another AMC Group entity for the respective purposes.
We may also disclose your personal data to third party service providers who perform certain business operations on our behalf, in particular:
- IT services, e.g. services in the areas of data storage (hosting), cloud services, dispatch of e-mail newsletters, data analytics etc.;
- Consulting services, e.g. services of tax consultants, lawyers, management consultants, consultants in the field of personnel recruitment and placement;
- transport and logistics services, e.g. for the dispatch of ordered goods;
- administration services, e.g. real estate management;
- business information and debt collection, e.g. if you want to make a purchase on account or if due receivables are not paid;
There are also other cases where we may disclose your personal data. For instance, we may disclose your personal data to third parties (e.g. authorities) if this is required by law. We also reserve the right to process your personal data in order to comply with a court order or to assert or defend legal claims or if we deem it necessary for other legal reasons.
7. Do we disclose your personal data to countries abroad?
The recipients of your personal data (section 6) may be located abroad - even outside of the EU or the EEA. The AMC-Group is represented globally. A list of countries is available at the top right corner of this website. The countries concerned may not have laws that protect your personal data to the same extent as the laws in Switzerland, the EU or the EEA do. We refer to such countries that do not provide for adequate protection "third countries". If we disclose your personal data a third country recipient, we will take appropriate measures to ensure the protection of your personal data. For this purpose, we conclude data transfer agreements based on the EU standard contractual clauses. You may access a copy here.
8. Do we perform profiling or make automated individual decisions?
“Profiling” means any form of automated processing in order to analyse or predict certain personal aspects. We may perform such profiling for the purposes set out in section 5. For example, we analyse shopping behaviour, the use of our websites, portals and apps and, based on this, make assumptions about your personal interests, preferences, affinities and habits. This profiling helps us to better tailor our offerings to your individual needs. It also supports our IT security. In order to improve the quality of our analyses, we can also link personal data that originates from different sources, for example data collected offline and online as well as data collected through our different services or data that we receive from other companies in the AMC Group.
“Automated individual case decisions" are decisions which are made fully automatically, i.e. without any relevant human influence, and which have negative legal effects or other similar negative effects on you. As a matter of principle, we do not make automated individual decisions. We will inform you separately should we use automated individual decisions in individual cases.
9. How do we protect your personal data?
We apply appropriate technical and organisational security processes to safeguard the security of your personal data and to protect it against unauthorised or unlawful processing and to prevent the risk of loss, unintentional alteration, unintentional disclosure or unauthorised access. However, the electronic transfer of information in particular entails security risks that cannot be completely ruled out. If you transfer information in this way, you do so at your own risk.
10. How long do we retain your personal data?
We retain your personal data for no longer than this is necessary for the purposes for which the information is collected. We moreover retain personal data as long as we have a legitimate interest in the storage, e.g. if we need personal data for the performance of contractual duties (e.g. honouring of warranty claims) for the enforcement of or the defence against claims, for archiving purposes and for guaranteeing IT security or in the case of running statutes of limitations. We also retain your personal data as long as it is subject to a legal retention obligation. Other documents must only be retained for a short period, which is the case, for example, for video surveillance recordings or for recordings of certain Internet processes (log data).
11. How do we process personal data of children?
We do not process any personal data of children. Should this nevertheless be necessary, we take special care to protect children, and if we process personal data of children based on consent, we ask the parents or the legal representatives for their consent. If consent for a child has been given by its parents or legal representative, the adult person is free to revoke this consent at a later date.
12. What rights do you have in relation to the processing of your personal data?
You can at any time object to the processing of your personal data or freely withdraw your consent to the processing of your personal data. A right of objection exists in particular against data processing in the context of direct advertising. If you revoke your consent or effectively object to further processing for a specific purpose, we may no longer process your personal data for the corresponding purposes.
In addition, you have the following rights: