AWS Terms of Use and Privacy Policy
About the American Welding Society (AWS)
The American Welding Society (AWS) was founded in 1919 as a multifaceted, nonprofit organization with a mission to advance the science, technology and application of welding and allied joining and cutting processes worldwide, including brazing, soldering, and thermal spraying. Headquartered in Miami, Florida, and led by a volunteer organization of officers and directors, AWS serves more than 65,000 members worldwide and is composed of 22 Districts with 250 Sections and student chapters. The Society is dedicated to supporting industry professionals, including: welders, business leaders, sales and service teams, manufacturers, vendors, associations, educational institutions, committee volunteers, and students. We connect welding communities around the world into a collaborative force, built on a foundation of higher standards, advanced learning, and rewarding growth.
References in this policy to “the Society”, “we,” “us,” or “our,” are to AWS Certification Services. We refer to aws.org, and any other microsites or mobile websites we operate or use as our “Website.” “Social Media Pages” are the official social media pages we operate on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube, or other social media platforms. This privacy policy is an integrated part of the AWS Services Terms of Use.
Our registered address is: 8669 NW 36th Street, #130, Doral, FL 33166
What Information Do We Collect?
We collect different types of information about our members and Website visitors, including:
Device Information: When you visit our Website or interact with our Social Media Pages or online ads, or open our emails, we learn technical information about your device.
Contact Information: We collect contact information, which includes personal information like name, email address, phone number, and physical address.
Employment Information: We collect information about your employment, including your job title, your employer, or your organization affiliation.
Payment Details: Your payment details may be collected in connection with your membership or in connection with any purchases you make from the Website.
Call and email records: If you call or email our customer support agents, we may keep records of those conversations.
Website Interactions: We collect information about your interactions with our Website, including what pages you visit. This information could include personal information, depending on what information you provide.
Submitted Content: We collect any content you submit to our Website, Social Media Pages, or to us in person including photos, videos, or other similar content.
Demographic Information: We collect information about your demographic data, including industry sector(s), professional function, education level, and academic institution.
Profile Information: We have access to profile details about our members as part of your membership with us.
How Do We Collect Your Information?
We may collect the information described above directly from you, from third parties we partner with, or through cookies or other automated means. Such sources include:
From You: We collect information directly from you, whenever you: register for a certification, create an AWS account; become a member; use our products and/or services; attend one of our events; attend one of our educational seminars; contact AWS customer service by phone or email; express an interest in AWS; purchase products from our Website; or fill out any forms on our Website or Social Media Pages.
From Your Device or Browser: Certain information is automatically collected from your device or browser and analyzed when you visit our Website or open our emails.
Communications with Others: We may offer features where members can send information to others. We will use the contact information provided to send the information requested.
Third Parties: We work with third parties who provide services to us such as payment processors or analytics. Your information may be collected and processed independently in accordance with the third party’s own privacy notices. These third parties share information they have collected with us.
Cookies: We use cookies, pixel tags, and other similar technologies to automatically collect information when you visit our Website or interact with our email. Please see the section on Cookies, below, which describes how we use cookies.
How Do We Use the Information We Collect?
We may use your information for the following business purposes:
Fulfillment: We process your information to provide the contracted services you have requested; to register you as a member and provide ongoing membership services and benefits to you, as part of your membership contract with us; to process your membership application and provide you with your membership information and benefits; to carry out contracts in place between us; or to fulfill other orders and requests, including processing payments.
Advertising: We process your information for marketing purposes if you have opted into receiving marketing communications from us or have previously expressed an interest in the Society and have not opted out. We also use your information to measure and understand the effectiveness of our advertising; this includes general aggregated anonymous information about you through third party advertising networks, analytics providers, hosting providers, and search information providers.
Personalization: We process your information to provide you with a more effective user experience, such as by displaying articles and links in which we think you will be interested. Our use of your personal information in this way means that your experience of our Website will be more tailored to you.
Communications: We use your information in communicating with you, including responding to your requests, questions, and other messages.
Events: We provide a delegate list of names only to the organizations and other individuals who attend our events available through the event’s app. We do this because our events provide a useful networking opportunity, and we have a legitimate interest in wanting to help build and develop the AWS community.
Customer Experience: We may share your aggregated, anonymous data with third party analytics and search engine providers that assist us in the improvement and optimization of our Website.
Research: We may use your information for research, testing, statistical analysis, website troubleshooting, and enhancement of user experience.
Security: We will use your information to protect our members from fraud, security threats, and other illegal or harmful activity.
Legal Obligations: In some circumstances we may also need to share your personal information if we are under a duty to disclose or share it to comply with a legal obligation.
Who Do We Share Your Information With?
Service Providers: We partner with third parties to assist with many aspects of our business, including advertising, analyzing your interests and activity on our Website, and helping us communicate with you. These third parties may provide services related to any of the purposes described in How Do We Use the Information We Collect?, and we may share with them any types of information described in What Information Do We Collect?. We may also receive information collected by these third parties and combine it with the information we have collected. Some of these third parties may be located outside the United States. Your information may also be collected and processed by third parties, such as the payment providers you select, who will process your information independently in accordance with their own privacy policies.
Other Third Parties: We will disclose information about you, including to government bodies or law enforcement agencies, when we believe it to be necessary for compliance with the law or to protect the users of our Website, our Website, or the public. When we have co-branded or sponsored services or when we join with other parties to provide specific services, we may share your personal information with the third parties involved.
What Are My Privacy Choices?
Location and tracking: You can prevent us from using your personal information by using the ‘do not track’ functionality in your internet browser. If you enable the ‘do not track’ functionality, our Website may be less tailored to your needs and preferences.
Marketing: You can tell us that you do not want your personal information to be processed at any time by contacting us at 800.443.9353, where relevant, by following the unsubscribe link shown in marketing communications you receive from us.
Event Attendee List: You can object to us including your information in an event app by contacting us using the information provided at the time of registration.
Online Account: You can keep your contact information and payment methods accurate and up to date by logging into your account on the Website. If you wish to cancel your account, email us at customercare@aws.org.
Social Media: This policy does not cover the privacy and security practices of social media platforms on which AWS Services has Social Media Pages. Please review the terms, policies, and settings of those social media platforms if you have questions about how they collect and use your data.
Emails: Every email we send to you for marketing purposes will also contain instructions on how to unsubscribe from receiving them.
Children’s Guidelines
AWS, our Website, and our Social Media Pages are not fully or partially targeted towards children under the age of 13. COPPA guidelines are observed and this privacy policy will be updated accordingly if content and marketing changes to fall under these requirements. If you are under 13, please do not attempt to register for services or send any personal information about yourself to us. If we learn that we have collected personal information from a child under age 13, we will delete that information as quickly as possible. To request deletion of personal information relating to a child under 13, please email privacy@aws.org.
Cookies
Our Website may store some information on your device or device hard drive as a cookie, web beacon, pixel, clear gif, tag or other similar technology to collect data related to the use of our Website and for the purpose of facilitating and enhancing your communication and interaction with our Website. Cookies are small text files with information stored on your computer or other device used for visits to our Website. Cookies are used to make websites work more efficiently, for example, by simplifying login processes, but also for providing information to a website owner about how their website is used.
The data collected by cookies on our Website may include: the address of the websites you visited before and after you visited the Website, the type of browser you are using, IP address, what pages in the Website you visit and what links you clicked on. We use this information to help us maintain and enhance the efficiency and usefulness of our Website and may use it and other information for the purposes described in this privacy policy. For a more thorough explanation of what cookies are and how they operate, please visit aboutcookies.org or allaboutcookies.org. On their own, cookies do not personally identify you; they recognize your Web browser. Unless you choose to identify yourself to us by opening an account or becoming a member, you remain anonymous to us. You can manage the use of cookies on your computer using controls in your browser.
We use cookies that are session-based. Session cookies exist only during one session, i.e., only while you are reading or navigating the Website. These cookies are used to retain your login session or to analyze the performance of our Website, and disappear from your computer when you close your browser software or turn off your computer. We also use essential cookies, which are essential to the Website’s functionality. You can block cookies by activating the setting on your browser that allows you to refuse the setting of all or some cookies. However, if you use your browser settings to block all cookies (including essential cookies) you may not be able to access all or parts of our Website. Except for essential cookies, all cookies will expire after 2 years.
Please note that third parties (including, for example, advertising networks and providers of external services like web traffic analysis services) may also use cookies, over which we do not have any control. These cookies are likely to be analytical/performance cookies or targeting cookies.
Where Is My Data Stored and How Is My Data Kept Secure?
We (and many of our external third parties) are based in the United States (US) so the processing of your personal information may involve a transfer of data outside of your country and economic region if you are affecting transactions outside of the US.
Whenever we transfer your personal information, we ensure it is protected by making sure the following safeguards are in place:
### access to physical and digital information is reasonably limited to essential AWS Certification and Membership Services staff and third parties to perform required services and transactions; payment information is secured in transit using Secure Socket Layers (SSL) technology; managerial procedures are in place to advise, train, and identify appropriate data storage. You can contact the PR Manager Customer Service by mail at 8669 NW 36th Street, #130, Doral, FL 33166, by email at customercare@aws.org or telephone at 800.443.9353 for the details as to how we protect the transfer of your data.
All information you provide to us is stored on our secure servers or those of our third-party data storage providers. Where we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password which enables you to access certain parts of our Website, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. You must not share your password with anyone.
How Long Do We Retain Your Data?
AWS will only retain your personal information for as long as necessary to fulfill the purposes we collected it for, including for the purposes of satisfying any legal, accounting, or reporting requirements.
To determine the appropriate retention period for personal information, we consider the amount, nature, and sensitivity of the personal information, the potential risk of harm from unauthorized use or disclosure of your personal information, the purposes for which we process your personal information and whether we can achieve those purposes through other means, and the applicable legal requirements.
In some circumstances we may anonymize your personal information (so that it can no longer be associated with you) for research, product development or improvement, or statistical purposes, in which case we may use this information indefinitely without further notice to you.
What Are My Rights Under Data Protection Laws?
The United States does not recognize a uniform data protection law. If you wish to access your information, learn how your information is stored, correct inaccuracies, limit marketing use, and/or completely erase your information from AWS Services' systems (to the extent permitted by law), you can contact our PR Manager, by mail at 8669 NW 36th Street, Doral, FL 33166, by email at customercare@aws.org, or telephone at 800.443.9353.
Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), European Union consumers have the following rights:
Right of access: You are entitled to receive confirmation as to whether your personal information is being processed by us, as well as various other information relating to our use of your personal information. You also have the right to access your personal information which we are handling.
Right to rectification You have the right to require that we rectify any inaccurate personal information we hold about you. You also have the right to have incomplete personal information we hold about you completed, by providing a supplementary statement to us.
Right to restriction: You can restrict our processing of your personal information where:
you think we hold inaccurate personal information about you; our handling of your personal information breaks the law, but you do not want us to delete it; we no longer need to process your personal information, but you want us to keep it for legal reasons; or where we are handling your personal information because we have a legitimate interest (as described in the How Do We Use the Information We Collect? section above) and are in the process of objecting to this use of your personal information. Where you exercise your right to restrict us from using your personal information, we will then only process your personal information when you agree, except for storage purposes and to handle legal claims.
Right to data portability: You have the right to receive your personal information in a structured, standard readable format and to send it to another organization controlling your personal information.
This right only applies to your personal information we are handling because you consented to us using it or because there is a contract in place between us.
Right to erasure: You have the right to require us to erase your personal information which we are handling in the following circumstances:
where we no longer need to use your personal information for the reasons we told you we collected it; where we needed your consent to use your personal information, you have withdrawn your consent, and there is no other lawful way we can continue to use your personal information; when you object to our use of your personal information and we have no compelling reason to carry on handling it; if our handling of your personal information has broken the law; and when we must erase your personal information to comply with a law we are subject to.
Right to complain: You have the right to lodge a complaint with the relevant supervisory authority within the EU for data protection issues in your territory. As we conduct business globally, we have not set out the specific supervisory authorities for each country in this policy, but please contact us if you would like us to identify who the relevant supervisory authority is in your country or territory.
If the basis on which we rely for processing your personal information is your consent to the processing, you also have the right to withdraw your consent for future processing of that personal information. You can exercise any of your GDPR rights by contacting us using the information in How Do I Contact You With Feedback?, below. Please be aware that we may need to use your personal information if it is relevant to a legal claim that is being pursued.
What Are the Terms and Conditions for Automatic Recurring Billing?
By opting into our Automatic Recurring Billing service, you agree to the following terms and conditions:
- Authorization: You authorize American Welding Society, Inc. to charge your designated payment method on file for recurring membership fees or subscription charges as applicable.
- Billing Cycle: Your membership or subscription will be automatically renewed at the end of each billing cycle unless you choose to cancel. The billing cycle duration and corresponding fees will be clearly communicated to you.
- Payment Method: You are responsible for providing accurate and up-to-date payment information. If your payment method fails or is declined, we may attempt to process the payment again or contact you to update the payment details.
- Fee Changes: We reserve the right to modify the membership or subscription fees upon providing reasonable notice. Such notice will be sent to the email address associated with your account or communicated through our website.
- Cancellation: You may cancel your membership or subscription at any time. To initiate the cancellation process, please follow the instructions provided on our website or contact our support team. Please note that cancellation requests received after the billing cycle has commenced may be applicable for the subsequent period.
- Refunds: Unless otherwise specified, membership fees or subscription charges are non-refundable. Upon cancellation, you will retain access to the benefits until the end of the current billing cycle, and no further charges will be applied.
- Account Information: You are responsible for maintaining the accuracy and security of your account information, including contact details and payment information. Please promptly update any changes to ensure uninterrupted service.
- Termination: We reserve the right to suspend or terminate your membership or subscription in the event of a violation of these terms and conditions or any misuse of our services.
- Liability: American Welding Society, Inc. will not be liable for any damages or losses resulting from the use or inability to use the Automatic Recurring Billing service, except where prohibited by law.
- Modifications: We reserve the right to modify or update these terms and conditions at any time. Changes will be effective upon posting the updated terms on our website. It is your responsibility to review the terms periodically.
By opting into Automatic Recurring Billing, you acknowledge that you have read, understood, and agreed to these terms and conditions. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact our support team for assistance.
These Terms and Conditions do not in any way terminate, modify, or otherwise amend any other terms, agreements, or policies that apply to your account with American Welding Society, Inc. or any other services you receive from American Welding Society, Inc.
What About Websites to Which We Link?
Our Website may, from time to time, contain links to and from third-party websites. If you follow a link to any of these websites or use services that connect you to other websites, please note that you have left our Website and that these websites have their own privacy policies. We do not accept any responsibility or liability for these policies or websites. Please check their policies before you submit any personal information to these websites.
When Will You Change Your Privacy Policy?
Any changes we make to our privacy policy in the future will be posted on this page, and where appropriate, we will notify you by email or post. Please review this policy from time to time to see any updates or changes to our privacy policy. If we make any material changes to our privacy practices, we will update this policy and change the effective date at the top of this page.
How Do I Contact You With Feedback?
Questions, comments, and requests regarding this privacy policy are welcomed and should be addressed to our Customer Service by mail at 8669 NW 36th Street, #130, Doral, FL 33166, by email at customercare@aws.org, or telephone at 800.443.9353.