Privacy Policy

This Privacy Policy and its Addendum(s) (“Policy”) describe how Ascent (collectively “Ascent”, “we”, “us” or “our”) collects, uses, processes and discloses your Personal Data through the use of Ascent’s websites (respectively “Websites”), as well as products, features and other services, operated by Ascent (collectively, “Services”).

This Policy applies to our agents, users and third party providers (collectively “you”, “your” or “yours”).

“Personal Data” is any information which can be used to identify you or from which you are identifiable. This includes but is not limited to your name, telephone number, bank and credit card details, personal interests, email address, your image, government-issued identification numbers, biometric data, race, date of birth, marital status, religion, health information, employment information and financial information.

I.    COLLECTION OF PERSONAL DATA

We collect Personal Data about you in the ways listed below. We may also combine the collected Personal Data with other Personal Data in our possession.

You provide your Personal Data to us

We collect your Personal Data when you voluntarily provide it to us. For example, you may provide your Personal Data to us when you:

• complete a user profile or registration forms (such as your name, contact information and other identification information where needed);
• provide information to assess your eligibility to provide services as a peer tutor;
• interact with our social media pages (such as your social media account ID, profile photo and any other publicly available data);
• participate in contests or events organised by us (such as the pictures, audio files, or videos you may submit, which may include images of yourself);
• fill up demographic information in surveys (such as your age, gender, and other information you may volunteer such as your school, interests and income information); and

In certain circumstances, you may need to provide your Personal Data in order to comply with legal requirements.

When our services are used

Personal Data may be collected through the normal operation of our Websites and Services. Some examples are:

• information about how you interacted with our Website or Services (such as features used and content viewed);
• device information (such as hardware model and serial number, IP address, file names and versions and advertising identifiers or any information that may provide indication of device modification);
• information that you voluntarily provide in our registration forms   

II.    USE OF PERSONAL DATA

Ascent may use, combine and process your Personal Data for the following purposes (“Purposes”):    

Providing services and features

Your Personal Data will be used to provide, personalise, maintain and improve our Websites and Services. This includes using your Personal Data to:

• feed our proprietary algorithm in ensuring the best match between our tutors and tutees, enabling optimal experience using our platform and service. 
• keep track of the tutors and tutees currently involved in our platforms.
• as feedback to track how well our platforms are doing, as well as ensure quality control.
• engage you to provide Services;
• conduct due diligence checks;
• verify your identity;  
• perform internal operations necessary to provide our Services, including troubleshooting software bugs and operational problems, conducting data analysis, testing and research, monitoring and analysing usage and activity trends;
• protect the security or integrity of the Services and any facilities or equipment used to make the Services available;
• enable communications between our users;   

Customer support

We use Personal Data to resolve tutor/tutees support issues. For example, we may:

• investigate and address concerns;
• monitor and improve our support responses;
• respond to questions, comments and feedback; and
• inform you about steps taken to resolve support issues.

Research and development and security

We may use the Personal Data we collect for testing, research, analysis and platform development. This allows us to understand and analyse your needs and preferences, protect your Personal Data, improve and enhance the safety and security of our Services and develop new features, products and services

Legal purposes

We may use the Personal Data we collect to investigate and resolve claims or disputes, or as allowed or required by applicable law.

We may also use your Personal Data when we are required, advised, recommended, expected or requested to do so by any local legal, regulatory, governmental or other authority.

For example, we may use your Personal Data to:

• comply with court orders or other legal, governmental or regulatory requirements;
• enforce our Terms of Service or other agreements; and
• protect our rights in the event of a claim or dispute.

Marketing and promotions

We may use your Personal Data to market Team Ascent and Team Ascent’s partners’, sponsors’ and advertisers’ products, services, events or promotions. For example, we may:

• send you alerts, newsletters, updates, mailers, promotional materials, special privileges, festive greetings; and
• notify, invite and manage your participation in our events or activities.

We may communicate such marketing to you by online messaging services or by email.

III.    DISCLOSURE OF PERSONAL DATA

We need to share Personal Data with various parties for the Purposes. These parties include:

With third party providers

For example, we share your contact information, grades and other relevant information with our third party providers for the purposes of allowing them to provide targeted tutoring help.

IV.    RETENTION OF PERSONAL DATA

We retain your Personal Data for the period necessary to fulfill the Purposes outlined in this Policy unless a longer retention period is required or allowed by law. Once your Personal Data is no longer necessary for the Services or Purposes, or we no longer have a legal or business purpose for retaining your Personal Data, we take steps to erase, destroy, anonymise or prevent access or use of such Personal Data for any purpose other than compliance with this Policy, or for purposes of safety, security, fraud prevention and detection, in accordance with the requirements of applicable laws.

V.    COOKIES AND ADVERTISING ON THIRD PARTY PLATFORMS

Ascent, and third parties with whom we may partner, may use cookies, web beacons, tags, scripts, local shared objects such as HTML5 and Flash (sometimes called “flash cookies”), advertising identifiers (including mobile identifiers such as Apple’s IDFA or Google’s Advertising ID) and similar technology (“Cookies”) in connection with your use of the Websites. Cookies may have unique identifiers, and reside, among other places, on your computer or mobile device, in emails we send to you, and on our web pages. Cookies may transmit Personal Data about you and your use of the Service, such as your browser type, search preferences, IP address, data relating to advertisements that have been displayed to you or that you have clicked on, and the date and time of your use. Cookies may be persistent or stored only during an individual session.

Ascent may allow third parties to use Cookies on the Websites to collect the same type of Personal Data for the same purposes Ascent does for itself. Third parties may be able to associate the Personal Data they collect with other Personal Data they have about you from other sources. We do not necessarily have access to or control over the Cookies they use.

Additionally, we may share non-personally identifiable Personal Data with third parties, such as location data, advertising identifiers, or a cryptographic hash of a common account identifier (such as an email address), to facilitate the display of targeted advertising on third party platforms.

If you do not wish for your Personal Data to be collected via Cookies on the Websites, you may deactivate cookies by adjusting your internet browser settings to disable, block or deactivate cookies, by deleting your browsing history and clearing the cache from your internet browser. 

VI.    PROTECTION OF PERSONAL DATA

We will take reasonable legal, organisational and technical measures to ensure that your Personal Data is protected. This includes measures to prevent Personal Data from getting lost, or used or accessed in an unauthorised way. We limit access to your Personal Data to our members on a need to know basis. Those processing your Personal Data will only do so in an authorised manner and are required to treat your information with confidentiality.

Nevertheless, please understand that the transmission of information via the internet is not completely secure. Although we will do our best to protect your Personal Data, we cannot guarantee the security of your Personal Data transmitted through any online means, therefore, any transmission remains at your own risk.

VII.   YOUR RIGHTS WITH RESPECT TO YOUR PERSONAL DATA    

In accordance with applicable laws and regulations, you may be entitled to:

• ask us about the processing of your Personal Data, including to be provided with a copy of your Personal Data;    
• request the correction and/or (in some cases) deletion of your Personal Data;
• in some cases, request the restriction of the processing of your Personal Data, or object to that processing;
• withdraw your consent to the processing of your Personal Data (where we are processing your Personal Data based on your consent);
• complain to the relevant data privacy authority if your data privacy rights are violated, or if you have suffered as a result of unlawful processing of your Personal Data.

Where you are given the option to share your Personal Data with us, you can always choose not to do so. If we have requested your consent to processing and you later choose to withdraw it, we will respect that choice in accordance with our legal obligations.

However, choosing not to share your Personal Data with us or withdrawing your consent to our use of it could mean that we are unable to perform the actions necessary to achieve the purposes of processing described in Section II (Use of Personal Data) or that you are unable to make use of the Services. After you have chosen to withdraw your consent, we may be able to continue to process your Personal Data to the extent required or otherwise permitted by applicable laws and regulations.

We will screen and verify all requests beforehand. In order to verify your authority to make the request, we may require you to provide supporting information or documentation to corroborate the request.

Once verified, we will give effect to your request within the timelines prescribed by applicable laws.

VIII.    AMENDMENTS AND UPDATES

Ascent shall have the right to modify, update or amend the terms of this Policy at any time by placing the updated Policy on the Websites. By continuing to use the Websites or Services, purchase products from Ascent or continuing to communicate or engage with Ascent following the modifications, updates or amendments to this Policy, you signify your acceptance of such modifications, updates or amendments.