The Themed Entertainment Association (TEA) is the international non-profit association representing the world’s leading creators, developers, designers and producers of compelling places and experiences - worldwide. We take your privacy seriously. This Privacy Policy (“Policy”) describes our practices regarding the collection and use of your personal data when you visit the websites or mobile applications linking to this privacy policy (including www.TEA.org, our “Site”) or otherwise use our services or interact with us, or that we receive from third parties. This Policy sets out our data processing practices and your rights and options regarding the ways in which your person information is collected and used. The term “personal data” as used in this Policy shall mean any information that enables us to identify you, directly or indirectly, by reference to an identifier such as your name, identification number, location data, online identifier, or one or more factors specific to you.
This Policy contains important information about your personal rights to privacy. Please read it carefully to understand how we use your personal information.
The provision of your personal information to us is voluntary. However, without providing us with your personal information, your use of our services or your interaction with us may be impaired.
Contents Who We Are. 2 How we Collect Your Personal Data. 2 Personal Data We Use. 3 How and Why We Use Your Personal Data. 4 Lawful Bases. 6 Use of Our Online Services. 6 Communications for Marketing/Promotional Purposes. 7 How Long We Keep Your Personal Information. 7 How We Store and Secure Your Personal Data. 8 When and How We Share Personal Data with Others. 8 Links to Third-Party Websites. 9 International Data Transfers. 10 Exercising your Rights. 10 Changes to this Privacy Policy. 12 Children and Privacy. 12 How to Contact Us. 12
Who We Are The Themed Entertainment Association (“TEA”, “we”, “us” or “our”) is based in Burbank, CA with offices at 303 N. Glenoaks Blvd, Suite 200, Burbank, CA 91502, United States of America.
We may collect and use personal information of individuals in other jurisdictions, such as the UK or Member States of the EU. Please note that there are certain aspects of this Policy that only apply when we are required to comply with some jurisdiction-specific laws, for example the General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”).
How we Collect Your Personal Data TEA collects personal data about our members and other customers. With a few exceptions, this information is limited to the kind of information found on business cards or company websites: first name, last name, job title, employer, phone number, professional address, professional e-mail, and area of expertise.
We collect personal data when you give it to us directly. For example, personal data that you submit through our website by registering as a TEA member, signing up to attend one of our events, subscribing to emails, downloading a document, or when you communicate with us by email, phone, fax, or letter.
We collect personal data from third parties. For example, your personal data may be shared with us by individuals who have nominated you for an award or recognition.
We may collect personal data from you indirectly. For example, your personal data may be shared with us by third parties, including, for example, current TEA members, event managers and planners who assist us to run our events and conferences, your employer, parties assisting us with our certifications, and subcontractors in technical, payment, and delivery services. To the extent we have not done so already, we will notify you when we receive personal data about you from them and tell you how and why we intend to use that personal data.
We may collect your personal data from external publicly available sources. For example, depending on your privacy settings for social media services, we may access information from those accounts or services, such as when you choose to interact with us through platforms such as LinkedIn.
We also collect certain types of information about you automatically every time you interact with us online. While the information obtained may not be personal data under the laws of the country you are based in, we recognize that there are certain laws (for example, the GDPR) that consider this type of information to be personal data.
Those types of information include: (a) technical information, including the internet protocol (IP) address used to connect your device to the internet, browser type and version, time zone setting, browser plug-in types and versions and operating systems and platforms; and (b) information about your visit to our website, including the uniform resource locator (URL) clickstream to, through and from the website (including date and time), services you viewed or searched for, page response times, download errors, length of visits to certain pages, referral sources, page interaction information (such as scrolling and clicks), methods used to browse away from the page and your interaction with advertisements for TEA placed on third party websites, including advertisements you viewed and what action you took in response.
We also collect and use your personal data by using cookies on our website. Please see our Cookie Notice.
In general, we may combine your personal data from these different sources for the purposes set out in this Policy.
Personal Data We Use We may collect, store and otherwise use the following kinds of data (which may be considered personal data according to the laws of the country where you are located when you interact with us):
your name and contact details (including emergency contacts), including postal address, telephone number, fax number and email address;
your date of birth and gender;
any other information contained in your TEA membership profile (for example, your username and the duration of your membership);
details about why you are interested in TEA;
your financial information, such as bank details, credit/debit card details, account holder name, and account number (for example so that we can process your payment for membership);
information about your computer/mobile device and your visits to and use of our website, including, for example, your IP address and geographical location;
personal descriptions and photographs (for example, so that we can identify you at our events);
details of your qualifications and experience;
details of your event attendance history;
photographs and video footage (for example, for publicity purposes in relation to past or forthcoming events – where required, we will not do so without your consent);
details of products and services in which you have expressed an interest or purchased;
your posts / posts about you made on our website;
your resume and other personal data when you submit information through our Career Center;
information about our services which you use/ which we consider may be of interest to you;
any other personal information which we obtain as described above.
Certain countries have laws (for example, the GDPR in the EU Member States, the UK GDPR) that recognize particular types of personal data as more sensitive and therefore requiring greater protection, for example information about your health, ethnicity, political opinions or religious beliefs. This is known as special category data under the GDPR.
In certain situations, TEA may collect and/or use these types of personal information (for example, we may need to know information about your health to make reasonable allowances when you attend an event, or about your religious beliefs to ensure that your dietary requirements are observed at one of our events). We will only process these types of personal information if there is a valid reason for doing so and where applicable law allows us to do so.
How and Why We Use Your Personal Data Your personal data, however provided to us, will be used for the purposes specified in this Policy. In particular, we may use your personal data:
To administer your TEA membership;
To post your resume or your job listing;
to allow you to attend/participate in our events (whether in person or online);
to otherwise assist with your career development (for example, through our Career Center Resources);
to allow you to register as a TEA member and modify your membership details;
to recognize individuals for awards and recognition;
to provide you with TEA publications, whitepapers and industry data and analysis (where required by applicable law, only where you have provided your consent for us to do so);
to provide you with other services, products or information you have requested;
to provide further information about our work, services, activities or products, either where you have expressed an interest or where we think the information may interest you (where required by applicable law, only where you have provided your consent to receive such information);
to allow your organization to sponsor our events, programs or services;
to provide you with customer service or technical assistance;
to provide our advocacy services to ensure that your views are adequately and appropriately represented;
for PR/ publicity purposes (where required by applicable law, only where you have given us your consent to do so);
to process your payments (for events and other TEA initiatives/ services);
to answer your questions/ requests and communicate with you in general;
to connect you with other TEA members;
to manage relationships with our sponsors and partners;
to analyze and improve our work, customize your experiences, analytics, services, activities, products or information (including our website), tailor content according to your interests and preferences, or for our internal records;
where appropriate, to ascertain whether you would be interested in serving in a governance capacity; volunteering for TEA services, events or activities; or contribute to one of our publications;
to report on the impact and effectiveness of our work;
to run/ administer our website, keep it safe and secure and ensure that content is presented in the most effective manner for you and for your device;
to process your application for a job with us or through our Career Resource Center;
to post your job opening through our Career Resource Center;
to provide you with services through our Career Resource Center;
to audit and/ or administer our accounts;
to satisfy legal obligations which are binding on us, for example in relation to regulatory, government and/ or law enforcement bodies with whom we may work (for example requirements relating to the payment of tax or anti-money laundering);
for the prevention of fraud or misuse of services; and/or
for the establishment, defense, and/ or enforcement of legal claims.
Lawful Bases Under certain laws, we are required to rely on one or more lawful grounds to collect and use the types of personal data that we have outlined above.
Where this requirement applies to us, we consider the grounds listed below to be relevant:
Where you have provided your consent for us to use your personal information in a certain way (for example, we may ask for your consent to use your personal information to send you publications).
Where necessary so that we can comply with a legal obligation to which we are subject (for example, where we are obliged to share your personal information with regulatory bodies which govern our work and services).
Where necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are a party or to take steps at your request prior to entering a contract (for example, to provide you with career development services which you have requested).
Where it is in your/ someone else’s vital interests (for example, in case of medical emergency suffered by an attendee at one of our events).
Where there is a legitimate interest in us doing so.
The GDPR allows us to collect and process your personal information if it is reasonably necessary to achieve our or others’ legitimate interests (as long as that processing is fair, balanced and does not unduly impact your rights). In broad terms, our “legitimate interests” means the interests of running TEA as a trade association committed to advancing the success of its members, representing the themed entertainment industry, and facilitating meaningful connections for its global membership.
When we process your personal data to achieve such legitimate interests, we consider and balance any potential impact on you (both positive and negative), and your rights under data protection laws. We will not use your personal information for activities where our interests are overridden by the impact on you, for example where use would be excessively intrusive (unless, for instance, we are otherwise required or permitted to by law).
Use of Our Online Services We may make available certain interactive services through our website, such as our membership directory and community forums. You will be able to post personal information to the directory and such forums.
Please be aware that any information, including personal information, which you post to the directory and forums becomes public information and may be available to other TEA members or to the general public. In addition, your name may be available in association with any posting you make, and information regarding your forum activities may be available for other members to view.
Please exercise caution and discretion when posting information, including personal information, in the directory or a forum. In particular, please do not post personal information about other individuals unless you are confident that they would not object to their personal information being used in this way. TEA is not responsible for the use by others of the personal information that you disclose in the directory or forums.
Communications for Marketing/Promotional Purposes We may use your contact details to provide you with information about our work, events, services, initiatives and/ or products which we consider may be of interest to you (for example, about courses or events you previously attended, actions TEA has taken on behalf of its members or about career development services which we consider may be of interest to you).
Certain laws which apply to TEA (for example, the GDPR) may require us to obtain your consent to provide you with this information via certain channels (for example email, SMS or telephone). Where such requirements apply to us, we will not send you such information without your prior consent.
Where you have provided us with your consent previously but do not wish to be contacted by us about our products and/or services in the future, please let us know by email at [email protected]. You can opt out of receiving marketing/promotional emails from TEA at any time by clicking the “unsubscribe” link at the bottom of our emails.
How Long We Keep Your Personal Information Personal data may be retained by TEA for so long as necessary or useful to pursue the legitimate interests of TEA. Other factors may include: the duration of the business or contractual relationship between TEA and an individual; archiving of historical information; and legal requirements, including limitations periods during which a legal claim might be brought.
In some jurisdictions, there are limits on how long we may retain your personal data. Where these limits apply, in general, unless still required in connection with the purpose(s) for which it was collected and/or processed, we remove your personal information from our records six (6) years after the date it was collected. However, if before that date (i) your personal data is no longer required in connection with such purpose(s), (ii) we are no longer lawfully entitled to process it or (iii) you validly exercise your right of erasure, we will remove it from our records at the relevant time.
If you request to receive no further contact from us, we will keep some basic information about you on our suppression list in order to comply with your request and avoid sending you unwanted communications in the future.
How We Store and Secure Your Personal Data TEA is committed to keeping your personal information safe and secure and we have appropriate and proportionate security policies as well as organizational and technical measures in place to help protect your personal information. Your personal information is only accessible by appropriately trained staff, volunteers and contractors, and stored on secure servers with features enacted to prevent unauthorized access.
When and How We Share Personal Data with Others Except as described in this Policy, we do not sell or rent your personal data to third parties for marketing purposes. However, we may disclose your personal data to selected third parties in order to achieve the purposes set out in this Policy.
Non-exhaustively, those parties may include:
suppliers and sub-contractors for the performance of any contract we enter into with them, for example IT service providers such as software developers, website hosts or cloud storage providers;
insurers and banks;
third parties who help us organize and administer our events;
sponsors who sponsor our events;
other members and the general public via our membership directory;
financial companies that process payments on our behalf;
professional service providers such as accountants and attorneys;
parties assisting us with research to monitor the impact/effectiveness of our work and services, including third party tools we deploy such as Google Analytics and AdWords;
our Divisions and international Global Partners who share our vision and help us expand our global reach;
regulatory authorities, such as tax authorities;
third party vendors that provide a more customized experience for you. To do so, we disclose personal data about your (specifically your name and email address) to those vendors, though we do not allow them to re-sell or use that information for their own purposes; and/or
news media outlets (we will always discuss this with you in advance and will not share your personal data with such outlets without your agreement).
In addition, we reserve the right to disclose your personal information to third parties:
in the event that we sell or buy any business or assets, in which case we will disclose your personal information to the (prospective) seller or buyer of such business or assets;
if substantially all of our assets are acquired by a third party, personal information held by us may be one of the transferred assets;to prevent or investigate possible wrongdoing;to protect against legal liability;
if we are under any legal or regulatory duty to do so; and/or
to protect the rights, property or safety of TEA, its personnel, members, users, visitors, or others.
We may provide paid products and/or services within the Service. In that case, we may use third-party services for payment processing (e.g., payment processors).
TEA will not store or collect Your payment card details. That information is provided directly to Our third-party payment processors whose use of Your personal information is governed by their Privacy Policy.
When You access TEA’s website to pay for a product and/or service via bank transfer, we may ask You to provide information to facilitate this transaction and to verify Your identity.
Links to Third-Party Websites The Site contains links to and from the websites of our partners, sponsors, advertisers, affiliates, and other third parties. This Policy does not cover external websites and we are not responsible for the privacy practices or content of those sites. If you follow a link to any of these websites, please note that these websites have their own privacy policies and that we do not accept any responsibility or liability for these policies. Please check these policies before you submit any personal data to these websites.
International Data Transfers Our headquarters are located in Burbank, California and our staff serve our global membership remotely. Information we collect may be processed in this office or from remote locations in the United States but hosted on our service providers’ cloud servers on our behalf in the United States.
Certain countries have rules relating to the transfer of personal information across borders and require us to ensure that personal information remains protected according to appropriate standards (for example, EU Member States under the GDPR).
As an international organization that encourages worldwide membership but which is headquartered and administered in the US, we will occasionally need to transfer your personal information overseas. This may also happen because we use agencies and/ or suppliers to process your personal information on our behalf.
Where required to do so, we will ensure that your personal information is given appropriate protection. For example, for individuals based in the EU or the UK, personal information we collect from you will likely be transferred to and stored in a location outside the European Union or the United Kingdom, for example the US.
If you are an individual based in the EU or the UK, please note that some countries outside of the EU or the UK have a lower standard of protection for personal information, including lower security requirements and fewer rights for individuals. Where your personal information is transferred, stored and/or otherwise processed outside the EU or the UK in a country that does not offer an equivalent standard of protection to the EU or the UK, we will take all reasonable steps necessary to ensure that the recipient implements appropriate safeguards (such as by entering into standard contractual clauses) designed to protect your personal information and to ensure that your personal information is treated securely and in accordance with this Notice. If you have any questions about the transfer of your personal information, please contact us using the details below.
Unfortunately, no transmission of your personal information over the internet can be guaranteed to be 100% secure – however, once we have received your personal information, we will use strict procedures and security features to try and prevent unauthorized access.
Exercising your Rights In general, please note that we will honor your requests to exercise your rights to the extent possible and required under applicable law. Certain of these rights may only be available to you if you are located within the EU or the UK when you access our website or you otherwise engage with us. Where we rely on your consent to use your personal information, you have the right to withdraw that consent at any time. This includes the right to ask us to stop using your personal information for marketing purposes or to unsubscribe from our email list at any time. You also have the following rights:
Right of access – you can write to us to ask for confirmation of what personal information we hold on you and to request a copy of that personal information. Provided we are satisfied that you are entitled to see the personal information requested and we have successfully confirmed your identity, we will provide you with your personal information subject to any exemptions that apply.
Right of erasure – at your request we will delete your personal information from our records as far as we are required to do so. In many cases we shall use limited personal information to suppress further communications with you, rather than delete it entirely.
Right of rectification – if you believe our records of your personal information are inaccurate, you have the right to ask for those records to be updated. You can also ask us to check the personal information we hold about you if you are unsure whether it is accurate/ up to date.
Right to restrict processing – you have the right to ask for processing of your personal information to be restricted if there is disagreement about its accuracy or legitimate use.
Right to object – you have the right to object to processing where we are (i) processing your personal information on the basis of the legitimate interests ground, (ii) using your personal information for direct marketing or (iii) using your information for statistical purposes.
Right to data portability – to the extent required by the GDPR or the UK GDPR, where we are processing your personal information (that you have provided to us) either (i) by relying on your consent or (ii) because such processing is necessary for the performance of a contract to which you are a party or to take steps at your request prior to entering into a contact, and in either case we are processing using automated means (i.e. with no human involvement), you may ask us to provide the personal information to you – or another service provider – in a machine-readable format.
Rights related to automated decision-making – you have the right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing of your personal information which produces legal effects on you or similarly significantly affects you, unless such a decision (i) is necessary to enter into/ perform a contract between you and us/ another organization; (ii) is authorized by EU or Member State law to which TEA is subject (as long as that law offers you sufficient protection); or (iii) is based on your explicit consent.
We may ask you for additional information to confirm your identity and for security purposes, before disclosing personal information requested to you.
Please note that some of these rights only apply in limited circumstances. For more information, we suggest that you contact us using the details below.
For individuals based in the EU, please note that you may also have the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority about how we use your personal information – a list of the data protection authorities in each Member State, including their contact details, can be found here: http://ec.europa.eu/justice/article-29/structure/data-protection-authorities/index_en.htm. For further information, please contact us using the details below.
Changes to this Privacy Policy We may update Our Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify You of any significant changes by contacting you directly where reasonably possible for us to do so and by placing an update notice on our website. This Policy was last updated on December 13, 2022
You are advised to review this Privacy Policy periodically for any changes. Changes to this Privacy Policy are effective when they are posted on this page.
Children and Privacy Our Site, products and services are not directed to children under the age of 18; therefore, we do not intend to process children’s personal data. If you are not 18 years or older, do not use our Site. If you believe we are processing children’s personal information (those under 18 years old), please contact us so that we can take the appropriate steps to delete this information.
How to Contact Us If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, or about the way in which TEA processes your personal data, you may contact us:
By email: [email protected] with the subject line: TEA Privacy Policy. Telephone: +1 (818) 843-8497 Mail: 303 N Glenoaks Blvd. Suite 200 Burbank, CA 91502
