Your information, handled with care.

Who we are

Alpine Ridge Group is an operations consulting business based in Burlington, Ontario. It is operated by Chris Kirkland, carrying on business as Alpine Ridge Group. In this policy, "we", "us" and "our" mean Alpine Ridge Group. Chris Kirkland is responsible for how we handle personal information and acts as our privacy officer.

What we collect

When you use our contact form, we collect what you choose to send us:

• your first and last name, email address and phone number
• your company name and your role
• what you'd like help with, and anything you write in your message
• if you provide them, your company's number of employees, your industry, what's prompting you to reach out, and the days and times that suit you

When you email or call us, we keep a record of the conversation and the contact details you use.

When we work together, you may share business documents, financial information and details about your team. That information is your confidential information. We use it only to carry out the work you've engaged us for. It is protected by the Terms and Conditions that come with every quote and, where we have signed one with you, by a mutual Non-Disclosure Agreement. Where those agreements are more specific or more protective than this policy, they apply.

About your employees. Some work involves personal information about a client's employees, such as interview notes and survey responses. We use it only for the engagement and report it in summary form. We do not attribute individual comments to a named employee unless that person agrees.

When you visit the site, our hosting and security provider (Cloudflare) automatically processes technical information such as your IP address, browser type and the pages you request. This is used to deliver the site, protect it from spam and attacks, and run the spam check on our contact form. Cloudflare may set strictly necessary security cookies for this. We also use Cloudflare Web Analytics to count visits and see which pages are read most. It does not use cookies or identify individual visitors, and we only see totals, such as page views, referring sites and visitor countries. The site's fonts load from Google Fonts, which receives your IP address when a page loads. We do not use advertising or tracking cookies, and we do not sell visitor data.

How we use it

We use your information only to:

• reply to your message and arrange a time to talk
• understand your business well enough to scope work and prepare a quote
• deliver the work you've engaged us for, and invoice for it
• keep accurate business, tax and accounting records
• keep our website and inbox secure, and understand how the website is used so we can improve it

We do not add you to a mailing list or send you marketing unless you ask us to.

Your consent

By sending us a message, you consent to us using your information for the purposes above. You can withdraw your consent at any time by emailing us, subject to any legal or contractual reason we must keep a record (for example, tax records for completed work). If you withdraw consent, we may not be able to continue a conversation or engagement with you.

Who we share it with

We never sell, rent or trade your personal information. We share it only:

• with service providers who help us run the business, such as Google (email, document storage and our client records) and Cloudflare (website hosting, spam protection and visitor statistics). They may only use your information to provide their services to us.
• with our professional advisors, such as our accountant or lawyer, where needed and under a duty of confidentiality.
• with a subcontractor, only with your written consent. We do the work ourselves. If you agree to a subcontractor, they must be bound to keep your information confidential, and we remain responsible for their work.
• with anyone else, only with your written consent.
• where required by law, for example in response to a valid court order. Where the law allows, we will tell you first so you can respond.

Where it's stored

Our service providers may store and process information on servers outside Canada, including in the United States. While it is there, it may be accessible to courts, law enforcement and national security authorities in that country under its laws. We choose providers with strong security and privacy commitments.

How long we keep it

Enquiries. If you contact us and we don't go on to work together, we keep your enquiry for up to two years so we have the context if you get in touch again, and then delete it.

Client records. We keep engagement records for 12 months after an engagement ends, unless you ask us to return or destroy them sooner or the law requires us to keep them longer, and then securely destroy them. We keep one copy of the final report and our invoices for our business records. Where we have signed a Non-Disclosure Agreement with you, its return and destruction terms apply instead.

Confidentiality. Anything we keep stays confidential. Our confidentiality obligations continue for three years after the engagement ends, and indefinitely for personal information and trade secrets.

Billing records. We keep quotes, invoices and payment records for as long as Canada Revenue Agency record-keeping rules require (generally six years).

How we protect it

We protect your information with safeguards suited to its sensitivity, including password-protected accounts with two-step sign-in, encrypted connections to our website, spam and bot protection on our contact form, and limiting access to the people who need it. No method of transmission or storage is perfectly secure, but we take reasonable care. If a breach creates a real risk of significant harm to you, we will notify you and the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada as soon as feasible, as PIPEDA requires, and we keep a record of every breach. Where we have signed a Non-Disclosure Agreement with you, we will notify you immediately if any of your confidential information is lost or disclosed without authorization, and take all reasonable steps to recover it.

Your rights

You can ask us to:

• tell you what personal information we hold about you and how it has been used
• correct information that is inaccurate or incomplete
• delete information we no longer need to keep

Email us at the address below and we'll respond within 30 days. We may need to confirm your identity first. If you're not satisfied with how we've handled a concern, you can contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy as our business or the law changes, for example if we change how we measure website visits. The date at the top shows when it was last updated, and significant changes will be noted on this page.

Contact us

For any question or request about your personal information, contact our privacy officer: