Privacy policy

• We collect little. Mostly your name, your email address and whatever you write to us.
• We never sell it. Not to insurance companies, contractors, lawyers, public adjusters or anyone else.
• Marketing emails are your choice. You only get them if you tick a box agreeing to them, and every one has an unsubscribe link.
• Analytics cookies wait for your yes. We do not store analytics or advertising cookies on your device unless you agree.
• We never see your full card number. When the course goes on sale, payments will be handled by Stripe.
• You stay in control. You can ask to see, correct or delete your information at any time.

Claims Answer Man is the homeowner education program of Homeowners Insurance Exposed. We teach homeowners how insurance claims work through free guides, a free claim checklist and an online course. In this policy, “we”, “us” and “our” mean Claims Answer Man and the business that operates it.

This policy covers this website, the forms on it, the emails we send and the online course once it opens. It does not cover other websites we link to, including the separate Homeowners Insurance Exposed website and podcast, which have their own policies.

We only collect what you choose to type into one of our forms.

Please do not send us your policy number, claim number, Social Security number, bank details or copies of claim documents through the contact form. We are an education program and cannot review individual claims, so we do not need them.

When you send one of our forms, the website records your IP address (the number your internet connection uses), your browser type, the page you sent it from and the date and time. We use these details to block spam, to limit repeated submissions from the same connection, and to see which pages people contact us from.

Like almost every website, our hosting company keeps standard server logs for security and troubleshooting. These logs include IP addresses, dates and times, and the pages requested.

When the course opens, the course platform will record sign-in times, the devices you use and your progress through each lesson. This lets you continue where you left off. It also helps us spot a login being shared or a sign-in that looks unusual. To protect the lessons from copying, course videos may show a light watermark with your name or email address while you watch.

A cookie is a small file a website saves in your browser. Today you can read our pages and send our forms without any cookies: our forms block spam in other ways. Two kinds of cookies may be used here.

• Necessary cookies will keep you signed in once the course opens, and our hosting or security providers may use them to protect the website. The parts of the site that rely on them do not work properly without them.
• Analytics cookies help us count visits and learn which free guides are most useful. If we turn on an analytics tool such as Google Analytics, its cookies are set only after you agree. Before you agree, the tool does not set or read analytics cookies on your device. It may still send Google a basic signal without cookies, such as the time, your browser type and the page you came from, which helps estimate total visits.

We do not use advertising cookies or ad tracking pixels today. If we ever add them, we will ask for your consent first and update this policy before we do.

Analytics is not turned on today, so there is no cookie choice to make yet. If we turn it on, we will first add a cookie banner where you can agree or say no, and a way to change that choice at any time. Your browser settings also let you block or delete cookies. Blocking necessary cookies may stop some parts of the site from working.

Do Not Track: some browsers can send a “Do Not Track” signal. We do not track visitors across other websites, and we do not let advertising networks do so through our site, so the site works the same way whether or not your browser sends one.

Global Privacy Control: if your browser sends a Global Privacy Control (GPC) signal, we treat it as a request to opt out of any sale or sharing of your personal information. Since we do not sell or share it, nothing else is needed from you.

• To answer your questions about the course, your account or billing.
• To send you the printable PDF of the free claim checklist when it is ready, or other resources you asked for.
• To send claim tips and course news, only if you agreed to receive them.
• To run your course account once it opens: access, progress and support.
• To protect the website, our forms and the course from spam, fraud and login sharing.
• To understand, in total and not person by person, how the site is used so we can improve it. Where cookies are involved, only with your consent.
• To meet our legal, tax and accounting duties.

We do not use your information to make decisions about you that have legal or similar effects, and we do not build profiles to predict things about you.

There are two kinds of email.

• Emails you asked for or need: the printable checklist PDF you asked for, once it is ready, replies to your messages, and, once the course opens, receipts, password resets and account notices.
• Marketing emails: claim tips, new free guides and course news. You only receive these if you tick the box agreeing to them, and we never tick it for you.

On our sign-up forms and the contact form, the words next to the consent box say exactly which emails it covers. If you would rather not get email from us at all, the full checklist is free to read on its web page.

Every marketing email we send will:

• clearly say it comes from Claims Answer Man;
• have a subject line that matches what is inside;
• include our postal mailing address; and
• include an unsubscribe link that keeps working for at least 30 days after the email is sent.

When you unsubscribe, we stop marketing emails promptly, and always within the 10 business days that the federal CAN-SPAM Act allows. We keep your email address on a short “do not email” list so you are not added back by mistake, and we never sell or pass on the addresses of people who unsubscribe. You may still receive emails about a purchase or your account.

We keep a record of your consent (the date, the form you used and the page it was on) so we can show that you asked to hear from us.

We do not sell your personal information for money or for anything else of value. We also do not “share” it in the legal sense, which means giving it out for targeted advertising based on what you do across different websites.

Homeowners after a disaster often get calls from people they never contacted. That will not start because of us. We do not give or rent our email list to insurance companies, contractors, public adjusters, attorneys or marketers. If we ever want to share your information with our parent organization, Homeowners Insurance Exposed, for its own use, we will ask you first.

Like most small organizations, we use outside companies (service providers) for some jobs. They receive only the information they need for that job. We choose providers that commit to protecting it and to using it only for the work we ask of them. A few, such as Stripe, also use some information for their own fraud prevention and legal duties, as their own privacy policies explain.

• Website hosting and security providers.
• An email service provider that sends our replies, the checklist PDF once it is ready, and the marketing emails you agreed to.
• An analytics provider, only if you consent to analytics cookies.
• A video hosting provider that streams course lessons, once the course opens.
• Stripe, our payment processor, once the course goes on sale.

We may also disclose information if the law requires it, to respond to valid legal process, to protect the safety of our users or others, or to prevent fraud. If Claims Answer Man is ever merged, sold or transferred, your information would move with it and stay protected by this policy.

The course is not on sale yet. When it is, card payments will be processed by Stripe, Inc. You will type your card number into Stripe’s secure payment form, so it goes straight to Stripe and is never stored on our servers. We receive only limited details, such as your name, email address, card brand, the last four digits of the card and your billing ZIP code. Stripe’s own privacy policy explains how Stripe handles your information.

We keep purchase records, such as receipts and refund records, because tax and accounting laws require them.

• The whole website uses an encrypted connection (HTTPS).
• Only people who need your information to do their job can see it.
• Administrator accounts use strong passwords and two-step sign-in.
• Course passwords are stored in scrambled (hashed) form, so no one can read them.
• We never store card numbers.
• The site is backed up, monitored and kept up to date.

No website can promise perfect security. If a breach ever affects your personal information, we will tell you as the law requires.

Any visitor in the United States can ask us to:

• stop sending marketing emails (or simply use the unsubscribe link);
• tell you what personal information we hold about you and give you a copy;
• correct information that is wrong;
• delete your information, except records we must keep by law, such as purchase records; and
• change your cookie choice, once analytics cookies are offered.

We will not treat you differently or charge you more for using any of these choices.

Some states give residents specific privacy rights by law. If you live in California, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), as amended by the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), gives you the right to:

• know what personal information we collect, use and disclose, and get a copy;
• delete it, with some exceptions;
• correct it if it is inaccurate;
• opt out of its sale or sharing (we do neither);
• limit the use of sensitive personal information (we use it only to provide the service, such as signing you in); and
• not be treated differently for using these rights.

The categories of personal information we collect are: identifiers (such as name, email address and IP address), internet activity on our website (only with consent where cookies are involved), and the contents of messages you sent us. Once the course opens, we will also collect purchase records and account sign-in details. We collect them from you and your browser, for the purposes listed above.

Residents of a growing number of other states, including Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut, Texas and Oregon, have similar rights under their own laws. Many of those laws also give you the right to appeal if we turn down your request.

California’s “Shine the Light” law also lets residents ask whether a business gave their personal information to other companies for those companies’ own marketing. We do not do that.

1. Send us a message through our contact form and choose Privacy request as the topic. For now, the contact form is the only way to send us a privacy request.
2. Tell us what you would like: a copy, a correction or deletion.
3. Use the email address you used with us, so we can match your records. We may ask a simple question to confirm it is you.

We will confirm that we received your request within 10 business days. We will answer within 45 calendar days. If we need more time, we will tell you why and may take up to 45 more days, as California law allows. Another person (an authorized agent) can make a request for you if they show your signed permission.

If we decline your request, we will explain why. You can appeal by replying to our answer and asking us to look again. If you are still not satisfied, you can contact your state attorney general. California residents can also contact the California Privacy Protection Agency.

Claims Answer Man is for adults dealing with a home insurance claim. The website is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from them, in line with the federal Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). You must be 18 or older to create a course account or buy the course. If you think a child has sent us information, contact us and we will delete it.

Our guides link to other websites, such as FEMA, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners and the state insurance departments listed on our help by state page. When you leave our site, that website’s own privacy policy applies, so it is worth a quick read.

We will update this policy as Claims Answer Man grows, for example when the course and checkout open. The date at the top of this page shows the latest version. For an important change, we will post a notice on the website or email people on our list. We will not use information we already have in a very different way without asking you first.

If anything here is unclear, ask us through our contact page, choosing the topic Privacy request, and we will reply by email. For the rules that apply when you use the site and course, see our Terms of Use.