Keeping your personal information confidential is part of the responsibility of every employee at the FC GROUP and we are accountable for all personal information in our custody including personal information that we disclose to third parties for processing, storage, or other administrative functions. Employees and our suppliers are informed about, and must comply with, the policies and procedures that we have established regarding the collection, use and storage of your information. We have a designated Privacy Officer who is responsible for monitoring and supervision of the FC GROUP’s compliance with this policy and PIPEDA.

The FC GROUP will identify and document the purposes for which it collects the personal information, before or at the time of collection. In most situations where you are asked to provide personal information, it will be readily obvious to you why we are collecting such information and how we will use it.

For example if you have decided to invest with us, we will collect via the subscription process, your name, address, telephone number, e-mail address, banking information and social insurance number primarily for the purposes of being able to communicate with you, to be able to remit distributions to you, and to prepare income tax and other reporting required by law.

If you have come to us for financing, we will collect via the loan approval process, your name, address, telephone number, and at times your personal financial information to be able to communicate with you and for the purposes of determining your creditworthiness and to assist in future enforcement and collection of the loan.

If you have come to us to rent a property that is managed or controlled by us we will collect via the rental application process, your name, address, telephone number and your personal financial information for the purpose of being able to communicate with you and for the purposes of determining your creditworthiness and to enable us to enforce the lease and collect rents.

We may collect from, and use and disclose personal information to, any person or organization for the following purposes:

• To verify your identity and protect you and us from error and fraud;
• To understand your financing requirements;
• To determine your creditworthiness, ability to pay, and security available and thus your eligibility for a loan;
• To set up and manage automatic payments;
• To comply with legal, regulatory and contractual requirements;

We may use third party service providers to assist us with various services such as legal services, accounting and audit, title insurance, mortgage default insurance, mortgage administration, printing, collection of accounts, mail distribution and marketing and we may release information about you to them. When your personal information is provided to our service providers we will, where they do not have their own privacy policy in effect, or are not governed by a professional code with respect to privacy and confidentiality, require them to protect the information in a manner consistent with our privacy policy.

We may collect, use and disclose your Social Insurance Number (“SIN”) for income tax reporting purposes but also to verify and report credit information to credit reporting agencies and to verify your identity. Your SIN may be used keep your personal information separate from that of other clients with similar names. You may refuse to consent to its use and disclosure for purposes other than required by law.

If we sell or assign your mortgage or loan, or securitize it, sell parts of our business, or merge or amalgamate with other entities we may release the information we hold about you to the prospective purchaser or assignee as part of due diligence and on completion of the transaction.

When you apply, as a borrower or guarantor, for a loan we may exchange information about you with credit bureaus for the purpose of establishing your creditworthiness and maintaining the reliability of the credit reporting system. If you use a mortgage broker or other third party to assist you in your credit application we may obtain and exchange information with them in order to determine your eligibility for credit.

We may verify relevant information you give us with your employer or your references and you authorize any person whom we contact in this regard to provide such information to us.

We may monitor or record any telephone call we have with you. We will retain the content of the call. This is to maintain an accurate record of the information you provide and to ensure that our service levels are maintained.

With certain exceptions as outlined below, we will obtain your consent to collect, use or disclose personal information. This consent will allow us to check your employment, obtain a credit report and exchange information with credit reporting agencies, offer you other products and service, and share your information with our affiliates including Firm Capital Corporation. Your consent may be given in writing, verbally or by electronic means. We may rely upon implied consent where permitted by law including where the following situations occur:

• Where a customer relationship already exists;
• Where express consent has been previously been given for the same or similar use of the personal information;
• Where the intended use is reasonably obvious from the context in which it is obtained and you provide the information voluntarily;

The following are exceptions where we may collect, use or disclose information without consent and for which you may not withdraw consent:

• If we use an outside supplier to do work for us as outlined above;
• If we are required or permitted by law. We may be compelled to release information by a court or other legal or regulatory authority.
• To protect our interests, such as collecting overdue payments, realizing on security pledged for a loan, or to detect or prevent fraud,
• To periodically update your information with credit reporting agencies as long as you have a loan with us and for a period of time following payment, in order to maintain the integrity of the credit reporting system;
• Where we need to exchange or disclose customer information to sell or securitize your mortgage or loan, or as part of the sale or merger of our business;

Where you are permitted to withdraw your consent, and you do withdraw your consent, for example you choose not to receive direct marketing, we will do our best to make sure that our files are updated as quickly as possible. You must give us reasonable notice of your withdrawal of consent in writing.

The FC GROUP limits the amount and type of personal information to what is necessary for the purposes we have identified. We will obtain personal information only by fair and lawful means and not by misleading or deceiving you about the purposes for which information consent to collection is sought.

We will use or disclose your personal information only for the reasons it was collected, as described in this code. Disclosure means providing specific information about you from our records to a third party. When you apply for credit from the FC GROUP, such application forms expressed consent for use, and disclosure pursuant to the terms outlined both on the application and in this code. If a new purpose is developed in the future we will notify you and request your consent for use of your information for this new purpose.

We will keep personal information as long as necessary for the purposes identified in this code, which will be at least as long as any balance remains outstanding on any credit provided to you, and thereafter during any period after settlement of all balances during which any readjustment or claim is not statute barred.

We will make every effort to ensure the information in our records is correct and up to date. We also rely on you to tell us when your personal information changes.

The security of your personal information involves both physical, organizational and electronic methods. We only contract with key suppliers that have a proven track record of securely handling personal information and share our policies.

We restrict physical access to areas where information is collected, stored or processed to authorized employees and agents only.

We maintain electronic security measures such as password protection to prevent unauthorized access to our electronic records of personal information.

When information is no longer required and is to be destroyed we shred paper documents that contain personal information and erase or make anonymous any personal information on any electronic media.

We attempt to make information about our privacy policies and procedures available to customers. We will use our best efforts to use simple language that is easy to understand and to provide specific information regarding how we are attempting to comply with the Model Code.

Through this policy and other documentation you will be able to find out:

• The title, office address, and e-mail of the person at the FC GROUP who is responsible for responding to your requests about the privacy of your personal information;
• How to access your personal information held by the FC GROUP;
• A description of the type of personal information held by us and a general account of its use;

When you request it we will tell you what personal information we have, what it is being, or may be used for, from whom it was collected and to whom it has been disclosed. Depending on the nature of the information you are requesting and the complexity of your request we may ask you to put your request in writing. Some of the information you request may not be immediately available. If this is the case we may require that your request be submitted in writing or by e-mail and will provide such information as soon as reasonably available and generally within thirty days.

Generally there will be no charge for verifying or correcting your information. Depending on the circumstances there may be a charge if you want a copy of records that we have already given you or your request is relatively complex. We will let you know in advance if there is a charge.

If we have obtained information about you from other people, you can ask us for the source of that information. If we obtained a credit report on you, we will advise you of the agency that provided such report and you may contact them directly for a current credit report.

We may not be able to provide you with a copy of appraisals or other materials obtained by us from third parties subject to copyright, without the authorization of the author. We will provide you with a summary of the findings of such third party reports.

On request, and except where legally prohibited, we will provide you with the names of outside companies or organizations to whom we’ve given your personal information. This will not include outside suppliers we used to do work for us or companies that process information for us. This also won’t include reports to the Canada Revenue Agency, regular updating of credit information to credit bureaus, indicating to third parties when cheques are returned NSF, or information provided to legal counsel for the purpose of collection or enforcement of security or information that has been provided for legal or regulatory reasons.

We will not provide personal information if it:

• The information is not readily retrievable and the cost of retrieving cannot be justified;
• That includes personal information about other customers;
• That contains our own proprietary information, such as a credit scoring formula, assessment of risk, or collection recommendations;
• Cannot be disclosed for legal reasons;
• Is subject to solicitor-client or other privilege;
• Is used for the detection and prevention of criminal activity, including fraud, and dealings in proceeds of crime;

We will give you brief reasons for any refusal to allow access to your personal information. You may then challenge our decision.

If we discover that we have information about you that is obsolete or incorrect we will update our records accordingly. We reserve the right to decline a requested correction but will append a notation to the records of your requested alternative information. Whenever possible we will correct any information which we may have given to an outside organization.

If a third party such as a credit bureau or reporting agency has given us information that you tell us is wrong, we will give you the name and address of that party so that you can contact them to correct the information they maintain.

The FC GROUP is committed to treating your personal information in accordance with our privacy policy. If you have any questions or complaints about our Privacy Policy or how we are living up to the Policy, let us know right away. Your first step should be to talk to the loans officer or employee with whom you are doing business. If your complaint or question remains unresolved you should then bring them to the attention of our Privacy Officer as follows:

Privacy Officer – The FC GROUP
163 Cartwright Avenue
Toronto, ON M6A 1V5
Tel: (416) 635-0221
Fax: (416) 635-1713
E-mail: privacy@firmcapital.com

Should you not accept the conclusion of the FC GROUP’s Privacy Officer you may contact:

Privacy Commissioner of Canada
Place de Ville
112 Kent St., 34d Floor Ottawa, ON K1A 1H3
Toll free at 1 800 282-1376
Website: www.privcom.gc.ca