Our organization is made up of:
(collectively, “EQB”, “we”, “us”, or “our”).
EQ Bank is a trade name of Equitable Bank,
We are accountable for the Personal Information under our control. We have appointed a Chief Privacy Officer (CPO) to oversee our privacy program and ensure our compliance with applicable privacy laws and regulations.
If you have any questions or complaints about how we handle your Personal Information, please contact the Chief Privacy Officer at:
EQ Bank / Equitable Bank / Equitable Trust / Concentra Bank / Concentra Trust/ President's Choice Bank/ PC Insurance — Privacy Office
EQ Bank Tower, 2200-25 Ontario Street, Toronto, Ontario M5A 0Y9
Tel: (416) 515-7000 | Toll Free: 1-866-407-0004
Email: privacyoffice@eqbank.ca
This Privacy Notice (“Notice”) applies to Personal Information collected from customers, prospective customers, applicants, guarantors, joint accountholders, powers of attorney, estate representatives, and other individuals who interact with our products and services—including our websites, mobile applications, and online banking. This Notice does not apply to information about employees, contractors, or applicants for employment.
“Personal Information” means information about an identifiable individual, including information that identifies you or could reasonably be associated with you.
“you” and “your” means each customer, prospective customer, guarantor, power of attorney, or other individual whose Personal Information is governed by this Notice.
We collect Personal Information throughout the prospective customer, applicant and customer lifecycle, including:
We limit the personal information we collect about you to what is reasonably necessary to fulfill the purpose for which it is collected. Depending on the products and services from us you use, some examples of Personal Information we collect include, but are not limited to:
The information we collect may include your Personal Information, as well as the Personal Information of other individuals, such as those who may also be covered by insurance (for example, your spouse or dependents). If you provide us with Personal Information about another individual, please ensure that you have their knowledge and consent to do so. By submitting this information, you confirm that you are authorized to provide it and that the individual has consented to its collection, use, and disclosure for the purposes described in this Notice.
We collect, use, and disclose your SIN when required by law (for example, for income tax reporting on interest-bearing products). If we request your SIN for other products or services, providing it is optional. When provided, we may use your SIN to match, verify, and report information to credit reporting agencies and to help distinguish you from other customers, which supports the accuracy and integrity of your information. We may also use your SIN to retrieve anonymized credit reporting information to develop and improve our financial and credit risk models, including after you are no longer a customer. When we request your SIN for optional purposes you may choose not to provide it; however, you may not refuse or withdraw consent for uses required by law.
We may collect biometric information (e.g., facial geometry, voiceprints, or fingerprints) to verify your identity, prevent fraud, or enhance account security.
We may collect personal information about minors (ages 12 to the age of majority) only when reasonable, necessary, and proportionate to provide a requested product or service, support account operation, meet legal or regulatory obligations, or otherwise comply with applicable law. We may obtain express (explicit) consent from a parent or legal guardian where required or appropriate, or from a minor who has the capacity to reasonably understand the nature, purpose, and consequences of the processing. We may not use certain minors’ personal information for unrelated purposes, for profiling, or for automated decision‑making that may significantly impact a minor without clear justification and explicit consent. Parents/guardians (and, where appropriate, the minor) may request access, correction, withdrawal of consent (subject to legal or contractual limits), and deletion where information is no longer required.
We use Personal Information to:
When we use your Personal Information for analytical, modelling or research purposes, wherever possible, we use aggregated, anonymized or de-identified information and minimize the risk of re-identification.
We may use cookies, pixels, software development kits, and similar technologies to understand your interactions with our websites and apps and to present advertisements that may be more relevant to you.
We use automated tools and processes to help provide our products and services, manage our operations, and protect against fraud and security risks. In some cases, decisions may be fully automated (for example, certain aspects of processing credit applications, assessing credit risk, or fraud monitoring). When we make a decision about you that is based solely on automated processing and that produces legal or similarly significant effects, we may notify you of the automated nature of the decision and provide you with a way to contact us learn more about the automated decision where required by law.
We share Personal Information as permitted or required by law. We do not sell your Personal Information, except if we sell or transfer a part of our business.
If you use a product or service that involves another person (e.g. a joint bank account, or a credit card with an authorized user), we may share your personal information with that person as necessary and in connection with that product or service. We will identify the information shared with or available to those other persons at the time you apply for or request that product or service.
We may share Personal Information within our corporate group for operational purposes described in this Notice and in accordance with applicable law. We will share detailed financial information within the group only where necessary to provide services, with your consent, or as required or permitted by law.
We use service providers to support our business operations, technology systems, internal procedures, infrastructure, marketing, risk management, and analytics, as well as to help us meet our legal and regulatory obligations. These providers assist with services such as card and statement production and delivery, communications, customer service, fraud prevention, analytics, advertising and media, payment processing, identity verification, data storage, audit, legal, collections, payments, and other services. We require service providers to limit their access and use of Personal Information to what is required to provide their services, and to maintain appropriate administrative, technical, and physical safeguards that are proportionate to the sensitivity of the information.
We disclose Personal Information to third parties:
These third parties often have their own privacy policies and terms and conditions, which govern their collect and use of your Personal Information. You will be informed upon signing up for the relevant product or service of the third-party arrangement, so that you can review the relevant privacy policies that apply.
We may share information with regulators, law enforcement, courts, and other parties as required or permitted by law. We may also share information where we believe you may be a victim of fraud, financial abuse, or other illegal activity, or where we reasonably believe your interests can best be served by taking action. We may share information with appropriate authorities, your next of kin, or other appropriate parties to protect your interests.
We may transfer Personal Information as part of a sale, assignment, or other transfer of all or part of our business or assets (including sales of mortgages). Our successors and assigns may use the information for similar purposes as those described in this Notice.
In some cases, Canadian law permits the sharing or disclosure of Personal Information without consent. These include where sharing or disclosure is necessary to protect our employees, customers, or others (such as investigating and preventing suspected or actual illegal activities, including fraud, or assisting government and law enforcement agencies). If this happens, we will not share more Personal Information than is reasonably required to fulfill that particular purpose.
Other than the purposes listed above, we may, with your implied or express consent, share or disclose your personal information outside of our group of companies, in accordance with applicable law.
Your consent can be withdrawn at any time, except in limited circumstances, including where withdrawal of consent is restricted by legal or regulatory requirements or as a result of your contractual obligations with us.
If you choose not to provide us with certain personal information or if you withdraw your consent, where such withdrawal is available, we may not be able to provide you with the products, services, offers, promotions, or information that you requested or that could otherwise be provided to you.
There are several options available for you to manage your privacy preferences:
If you have opted out of receiving marketing communications from us, we may still contact you for transactional purposes, in compliance with applicable laws (e.g., for customer service, product information, service or reminder notices).
We use cookies and similar technologies to enhance site functionality and security, support login sessions, measure performance, and show relevant advertisements. You can manage or delete many of these technologies at any time through your browser or device settings. You can also adjust your advertising preferences with certain third parties, such as Google, through their own opt-out tools.
We take the security of your Personal Information seriously and are committed to protecting your privacy using a variety of methods.
We apply administrative, technical, and physical safeguards designed to protect Personal Information against loss, theft, misuse, unauthorized access, disclosure, alteration, and destruction. Safeguards we use are commensurate with the sensitivity of the information and are periodically reviewed and enhanced in line with industry practices and regulatory requirements. These safeguards also apply when we dispose of or destroy your Personal Information.
Examples of safeguards we may use, where appropriate, include but are not limited to:
We maintain policies and practices which ensure the protection of your personal information. Depending on the volume and sensitivity of the information, the purposes for which it is used and the format in which it is stored, we implement a combination of measures to protect your personal information, including:
Your Personal Information may be stored, processed or accessed in jurisdictions outside Canada. Such jurisdictions currently include, but are not limited to, the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, India, South Africa and the Philippines. Such information may be accessible to law enforcement and national security authorities under local laws. When we engage a service provider that operates outside of your province, territory or Canada, Personal Information may be subject to the law of the jurisdiction in which it is used or stored, including any law permitting or requiring disclosure of the information to the government, government agencies, courts, and law enforcement in that jurisdiction.
We retain Personal Information only for as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes for which it was collected, or as required or permitted by law. When information is no longer required, we securely delete it, anonymize it, or de-identify it in accordance with our retention and records management schedules. Please note that if your Personal Information is collected by a third party, it will be retained in accordance with the privacy policies and records retention requirements of that third party.
Under Canadian law, and subject to legal and contractual restrictions, you may request:
To exercise your rights, contact our Chief Privacy Officer using the contact details above.
If we are unable to resolve your concern, you may have the right to contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (OPC) or your applicable provincial privacy regulator.
We may update this Notice to reflect changes in our practices, legal or regulatory requirements, or technological developments. Updated versions will be posted on our website. Where changes are material, we will provide additional notice or seek consent where required. If you do not agree to the changes in our policy, it is your responsibility to stop using our products and services.
For Québec residents only: You acknowledge and agree that you have first been presented with and have examined the French version of this Notice, and that you then have expressly requested that this Notice, and all related documents including notices, be drawn up in the English language and that you wish to and agree to be bound by the English version of this Notice. Vous reconnaissez et convenez que la version française de la présente politique vous a d’abord été présentée et que vous l’avez examinée, et que vous avez ensuite expressément demandé que la présente politique et tous les documents connexes, y compris les avis, soient rédigés en anglais et que vous souhaitez être lié par la version anglaise des présentes et que vous acceptez de l’être.