Privacy Policy

If you have any complaints regarding this Privacy Policy or the way that we use your personal information, you may also contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada or the European National Data Protection Authorities.

1. Who we are

  1. 1.1 At Discover Holidays we are committed to protecting and respecting your privacy, whilst striving to provide the very best user experience. We work very hard to keep your information safe and we want our services to be safe and enjoyable for everyone. We follow strict security procedures on how personal information is stored and used and who sees it to help stop any unauthorized person getting hold of it. We also recognize that it is important for you to understand how we use your personal information.
  2. 1.2 This Privacy Policy (and any other documents referred to in it) describes the way we will process and use any personal information about our customers, potential customers, visitors to our website and any other individuals whose data we process in the course of our business. Please read this Privacy Policy carefully to understand our practices regarding your personal information and how we will treat it.
  3. 1.3 We have a legal obligation to protect personal information that we collect under the British Columbia Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) and the Canadian federal Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) that came into effect on January 1st, 2004. This Act governs information collected as part of commercial activity by any private sector organization.
  4. 1.4 We also have a legal duty to protect personal information that we collect under the Data Protection Act 1998 (and any law which replaces it, including the new UK Data Protection Bill) (DPA) and the General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679, (GDPR).
  5. 1.5 For the purpose of the DPA and GDPR, we (Discover Holidays Inc.) are the data controller (in other words, the organization that determines how your personal information is used)
  6. 1.6 We are located at 1200 - 675 West Hastings St, Vancouver, British Columbia, V6B 1N2, Canada. Our contact details are set out in part 10 below

2. Personal information we collect, how we use it and our basis for processing

  1. 2.1 We may collect and use various types of personal information about you. Details of this information, together with an overview of the way that we use it and our lawful bases for the processing in each case are set out below:
  2. 2.2 Inquiries and bookings
  3. 2.2.1 We will collect personal information from you when you make an inquiry or request a brochure from us. This includes your name and contact information, details about the materials or brochures that you request and any additional details of your travel plans which you voluntarily give to us. We may also collect details about the best time to contact you and any in-person appointments that you request as well as what prompted you to contact us and any other requests or comments that you may make.
    • We have a legitimate interest to use your information in this way to make sure that we are able to help you find the right destinations and start to plan the best trip for you. Where we rely on our legitimate interests, we'll always ensure that your rights are protected.
  4. 2.2.2 If you book trips with us, we will ask you to provide certain details about your travel arrangements. This is likely to include details of your passports, emergency contacts, travel insurance arrangements, preferences and special requirements, visa requirements, flights (if you arrange your own flights). This will also include details of any other friends or family who are accompanying you as part of your booking.We will use this information to help us organize your trip, make bookings on your behalf and ensure that you (and any other friends or family accompanying you) receive the products and services set out in your itinerary.
    • We collect this information so we can fulfil our contract with you and provide you with the quality of service we strive to provide.
  5. 2.2.3 Where you are a regular customer we may retain some of this personal information so that we can use it when you next book with us as we have a legitimate interest to improve our customer journey and ensure we look after our regular customers.If you have made an inquiry with us, or booked a trip with us, we might send you our marketing e-mails.
    • We send you these on the basis of our legitimate interests, but you always have a right to object to our e-mails (see further below) and if you do not want to receive them, please let us know using the links provided in each e-mail messages or by contacting us using the details in section 10.
  6. 2.3 Websites, marketing and advertising
    We will collect certain technical information about you when you visit our website. This is likely to include: the internet domain you use, your IP address or other device identifier, your browser type and version (e.g. Chrome or Internet Explorer), the operating system and platform that you are using (e.g. Windows or Mac), the screen resolution of your device, the dates and times when you access our website, the full URLs of the pages you visit and the websites or links that you use to access our website, login information, details of products or services that are viewed and the length of visits to certain pages of the website.
  7. 2.3.1 We use cookies to collect this information; for more information about what cookies are and how we use them, please refer to our Cookie Policy.
    • We collect this information so we can fulfil our legitimate interests as a business to ensure that our website is fit for purpose and promotes our services appropriately for our customers, including by displaying information that our customers are interested in. We also rely on our legitimate interest in measuring customer satisfaction and troubleshooting any website issues. Where required by law, we may also seek and rely on your consent.
  8. 2.3.2 We may collect and use information from various sources in connection with the marketing and advertising of our services. This may include your contact details (and your marketing preferences) to contact you with certain marketing messages (e.g. marketing e-mails). We may also use data we collect from you (either directly or via our website or advertising) to help us measure the effectiveness of our advertising and to establish what interests you and what doesn't.
    • We rely on your consent to contact you directly about our offering. In other scenarios in carrying out efficient and appropriate marketing and advertising for our services, we will rely on our legitimate interests, whilst always ensuring that your rights are protected. You can withdraw your consent or opt out of our direct marketing at any time through our marketing preference center or through the unsubscribe option in any marketing email.
  9. 2.3.3 We may collect your contact details when you enter into competitions or promotions, or complete surveys. We will rely on your consent or on our legitimate interests (depending on whether we are marketing or carrying out market research), whilst always ensuring that your rights are protected.
  10. 2.3.4 We may collect details about you, such as your user name, when you engage with us on social media (by mentioning or tagging us in a post or contacting us directly) this is so that we can respond to any comments and queries you have. We rely on our legitimate interests to do this as we want to ensure our customers have the best possible experience, whilst always ensuring your rights are protected.
  11. 2.3.4 i) Administrative or other business purposes
    We may collect and use certain other personal information when we correspond with you (whether by telephone, e-mail or otherwise). For example, we may record both in-bound and out-bound telephone calls or collect information when you use our LiveChat feature to speak with our Travel Designers to ensure quality of service and for training purposes.
    • We collect this information so we can fulfil our legitimate interests as a business to ensure that our Travel Designers are trained to the highest level so that our customers receive the very best travel advice.
  12. 2.3.5 We may collect certain other information that you give us, for example, when you contact us for a particular reason other than those set out above such as to report problems with our website.
    • It is in our legitimate interests as a business to use your data in this way, for example, we have a clear interest in ensuring that our website works properly and in ensuring that we operate our business efficiently. We will always ensure that your rights are protected.
  13. 2.4 As well as collecting personal information directly from you, we also collect some from third parties such as Google Analytics.
  14. 2.5 We may also collect and use certain especially sensitive personal information about you, namely specific details of any relevant health conditions, disabilities, access requirements and special dietary requirements that you may have. We collect this information directly from you to try to ensure that your trip is appropriate for your needs and to try and keep you safe during any trip that you plan through us. We may need to ask for your explicit consent in order to process this information.
  15. 2.6 To the extent you provide us with information about third parties (such as other travellers or guests on your trips) we ask you to confirm that you have obtained consent from the relevant third parties to do this. Please also tell them about this privacy policy and give them our contact details if they have any queries. Please make sure you let us know if any of these third parties would like to speak to us directly, either about the trip or about our use of their data.

3 How we share personal information

  1. 3.1 In order to make sure that we run our business efficiently, and to make sure that you get the service that you expect, we will need to share your personal information, from time to time, as necessary, with the following third parties:
  2. 3.1.1 Third parties if necessary to comply with legal obligations or enforce agreements, for example, we are required to provide airlines with a passenger mobile phone number and email contact details under IATA Resolution 830d for the airline to inform the passenger of any operational difficulties.
  3. 3.1.2 Any other third parties if this is necessary to protect our or your rights, property, or safety and/or those of others.
  4. 3.1.3 Subsidiaries and affiliates, and with service providers who perform services for us, these services include but are not limited to the provision of online advertising which may involve anonymous profiling in order to find similar prospects to you or showing you relevant ads based on your interest in our products and services.
  5. 3.2 We do not share your personal information with third parties for them to use for the purposes of sending you marketing information or for those third parties to use your information for their own purposes.

4 Automated decisions and profiling

  1. 4.1 We may on occasion use automated decision making or profiling on customer data that has been provided through consented channels to ensure delivery of relevant marketing content.

5 Where we transfer and store personal information

  1. 5.1 From time to time we may process (or ask, or permit a third party to process) your personal information outside of the European Economic Area (EEA) where local laws may not provide legal protection for your information in the same way as is applicable in the EEA.For example, when you book a trip, we will need to provide your information to local accommodation or service providers. In other cases, we may need to share your information with an overseas service provider such as our local partners who host you during your safari experience, the provider of a cruise or experience train journey.
  2. 5.2 Whenever we send (or permit a third party to send) your personal data outside of the EEA, we will make sure that we take steps necessary to protect your data as required by applicable laws. For example, we may require the overseas recipient to enter into particular contract terms, or we will make sure that the information that we give to them will be limited to what is needed to perform our contract with you.
  3. 5.3 If you wish to learn more about the safeguards in place to protect your personal information when we transfer it outside of the EEA, please contact us using the details in section 10 below.
  4. 5.4 The personal data that we collect from you will also be processed by staff operating outside the EEA who work for us or for one of our suppliers. This includes staff involved in, among other things, providing support services.

6 Security of your personal information

  1. 6.1 We take the security of your information very seriously and have put physical, technical, operational and administrative strategies, controls and measures in place to help protect your personal information from unauthorized access, use or disclosure as required by law and in accordance with accepted good industry practice. We will always keep these under review to make sure that the measures we have implemented remain appropriate.

7 Retention of personal information

  1. 7.1 We will keep your personal information for limited and appropriate periods of time only and the applicable retention periods will always be linked to our purposes for processing your personal information. This means that the retention periods will vary according to the type of personal information. For example, some transaction information will be kept for a number of years in order to comply with various finance and tax related obligations.

8 Your rights in your personal information

  1. 8.1 You have certain rights in respect of the personal information that we hold about you. Details of these rights are set out below. To exercise any of these rights, please contact us (see the "Contact and Complaints" section of this Privacy Policy below).
  2. 8.2 Your rights:
  3. 8.2.1 Access: We will confirm to you whether or not we are processing and using personal information about you, at your request and, if so, provide you with access to and a copy of such personal information and the other details to which you are entitled.
  4. 8.2.2 Rectification: We will correct any inaccurate personal data and complete any incomplete personal data (including by providing a supplementary statement) that we hold about you.
  5. 8.2.3 Prevention of processing likely to cause damage or distress: We will respect your rights to require us to cease or not to begin processing your personal information for a specific purpose, or in a specific way, that is likely to cause you or any third parties unwarranted damage or distress.
  6. 8.2.4 Erasure: We will erase your personal information at your request without undue delay where there is no good reason for us to continue to use it.
  7. 8.2.5 Restriction: We will restrict the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances, if you ask us to do so.
  8. 8.2.6 Data portability: We will provide you or third parties on your behalf with a copy of any personal information that we hold about you which you have provided to us in a structured, commonly used and machine readable format.
  9. 8.2.7 Objection (including objection to direct or e-mail marketing): We will respect your general rights to object to the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances, including for direct and e-mail marketing purposes.
  10. 8.2.8 Automated decisions and profiling: We do not make automated decisions or profile you based on your data.

9 Changes to our privacy policy

  1. 9.1 We reserve the right to modify this Privacy Policy from time to time. For example, if we need to reflect changes to the way that we use your personal information. Any changes we make in the future will be posted on the following website: www.discoverholidays.com and, where appropriate, notified to you by e-mail. You should check back frequently to see any updates or changes to our Privacy Policy.

10 Contacts and complaints

  1. 10.1 We are very keen to hear from you, including if you have any questions, concerns, comments, requests or complaints regarding this Privacy Policy, our website and/or our use of your personal information. Please contact:
    Privacy Officer
    Discover Holidays Inc.
    1200 – 675 W Hastings St
    Vancouver, BC, V6B 1N2
    Canada
  2. 10.2 If you have any complaints regarding this Privacy Policy or the way that we use your personal information, you may also contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada or the European National Data Protection Authorities.