Privacy policy

  1. Introduction

For purposes of the policy, references to “we,” “our,” and “us” mean Black Tomato Limited.

Black Tomato owns and operates the website at www.epictomato.com. Our site provides a wide range of information to our Site’s visitors. Like many web sites, we also collect information from our visitors, including personally identifiable information, such as your full name, e-mail address, contact address, phone number, details of any group members you are travelling with that you tell us about, and other information that you may provide to us, and non-personally identifiable information (e.g., aggregate statistics about what parts of our Site are most popular).

We also deal with customers by email, over the phone, face to face, via social media, and via travel agents which may contact us on your behalf. We will collect personally identifiable information from you such as your full name, email address, contact address, details of any group members you are travelling with that you tell us about, and other information that you may provide to us. We will also collect information about your travel arrangements such as booking numbers, flight and accommodation details, and any special requirements you may request.

This privacy policy is designed to tell you about our information collection practices – that is, the ways we collect information; what kinds of information we collect; why we collect information; how we use information we collect; with whom we share information we collect; how you can access, amend, and delete information we collect from you; and what kinds of security we use to protect information you provide.

Before using this site or communicating with us – and particularly before providing personally identifiable information to us – you should read this entire policy. Use of this site or communicating with us constitutes your agreement to the terms of this policy. If the terms of this policy are not acceptable to you, do not provide any personally identifiable information to us. You can also contact us here.

  1. Scope of policy

Please be aware that this policy applies to information which we process about you. It does not apply to information which you provide via any other web sites.

Within our site you may see links or references to other web sites which are not covered by this policy and are likely to have different information practices. We therefore encourage you to read the privacy policy of each web site you visit. We provide these references and links for your convenience; they should not be construed as an endorsement of such sites, their content, or their information practices. You are solely responsible for any interactions you may have with such web sites.

If you make an enquiry or a booking with Black Tomato, we will share your information with third parties who will fulfil your travel requirements. We try to ensure that your information remains secure and is processed in accordance with relevant data protection requirements, but those third parties may have different information practices, which will be governed by their privacy policies which we recommend you read.

If you have been referred to us from another site or by any other third party, your information that you provide to them will also be governed by their privacy policy, which we recommend you read.

  1. How we collect your information

(a) How we collect your information via our site

Active information collection

This site collects information from its visitors in two ways: actively and passively. Active information collection refers to instances in which we gather information from you when you fill it in and send it to us, such as by completing a registration form, signing up for an electronic newsletter, entering a competition, or sending us a message via an e-mail reply mechanism provided by this site. Active information collection can include both personally identifiable information (e.g., your full name or information that is unique to you) and non-personally identifiable information (e.g., if we were to ask for a list of the top three things you like about our site). Passive information collection refers to instances in which we collect information from you that you have not actively provided (please see the next section of this policy for a summary of our passive information collection practices).

(a) Registration Information

If you are interested in receiving electronic updates, alerts, and other information from us regarding this site and our products and services, you must provide us with an e-mail address. In completing your registration, we may also ask for optional information, such as how you found us, to help us better serve you in the future.

(b) Feedback Information

We welcome your comments and feedback regarding this Site and our products, services and programs. This Site provides an e-mail address that permits you to send us your own e-mail address, comments, and any other information you choose to include. E-mail is not secure. As a result, you should carefully consider what information you wish to send to us via e-mail.

Passive information collection

We may use special technologies to passively collect information while you are visiting www.blacktomato.com (that is, you do not actively provide this information). These technologies allow us to collect certain kinds of non-personally identifiable information, including your Internet domain name, the type of web browser you use, the operating system you use, the date and time of your visit www.blacktomato.com, the specific pages you visit, and the address of the web site you visited prior to entering www.blacktomato.com. We may link this passively collected non-personally identifiable information with personally identifiable information you have actively provided elsewhere on this site.

Below we have summarized the primary means of passive information collection at our Site.

(i) Cookies

This site uses cookies, which are small text files that store non-personally identifiable information about you, either temporarily in connection with your Internet Protocol (IP) address (known as a temporary or session cookie, and deleted once you close your browser window) or more permanently on the hard drive of your computer (known as a permanent or persistent cookie). This Site uses session cookies so that you do not have to fill in the same information from page to page within www.blacktomato.com. If you elect not to receive cookies, you may be able to view some, but not all, of the content on this Site.

(ii) Internet Protocol (IP) Addresses

This site uses Internet protocol (IP) addresses. IP addresses are unique identifiers automatically assigned to each computer when logging onto the Internet. IP addresses allow us to collect much of the same information we collect through cookies, including browser type, what pages you visit, and how long you stay on the site. In general, IP addresses allow us to identify problems with our servers, prepare aggregate demographic information and other information regarding this use of this site, and improve the functions of this site.

(b) How we collect information through other channels

We collect information from you when you call us, when you send emails or other messages to us, when we meet with you in person, when you communicate with us via social media, and if you have asked another travel agent to make an enquiry on your behalf.

(c) Information about other people.

If you provide information to us about any person other than yourself, such as people you are enquiring or making a booking on behalf of, people you are travelling with, you must ensure that they understand how their information will be used and that they have given their permission for you to disclose it to us and for you to allow us, and our service providers, to use it.

(d) Sensitive personal data

Unless we make it clear otherwise, our policy is not to ask for any sensitive personal data from you (that is information about you, or anyone you are enquiring or booking on behalf of) about, for example, racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious beliefs, physical or mental health, or sexual life. We, our service providers, and third parties which are providing a quote or fulfilling your travel arrangements may, however, require certain sensitive personal data to provide services which you have requested, or to deal with your enquiries. For example, if you ask us to book an easy access room due to a disability, or one of your party has special health requirements).

If you choose to provide this sensitive personal data to us as part of a particular service (where such information has been requested and the reasons for that discussed with you) or for any other reason, this will mean that you have given (and we accept) your explicit consent for us, our outsourced service providers, and third parties which are providing a quote or fulfilling your travel arrangements to use that information for the reasons described in this policy, or as explained at the time you provide that information to us.

  1. What do we do with your information

The personally identifiable information we process about you, and anyone that you are enquiring or booking on behalf of, will only be used and disclosed in accordance with this policy or as specifically disclosed to you at the time you provide the information.

The personally identifiable information that we process may be used in the following ways:

(a) To respond to your requests, it will be accessed by our staff, service providers which act on our behalf, and carefully selected third parties in the course of providing quotes that you request for our products and services, and fulfilling your travel bookings (e.g. for quotes, customer travel documents, airlines, accommodation providers, and destination management companies for operational purposes.)

(b) It will be used to send you our newsletter and offers. We will send you these if you have opted in to receive them, or if you have previously asked us for a quote or made a booking with us. You can unsubscribe any time – see #7 Unsubscribing for more information.

(c) It may also be used to personalise and tailor your experience by using your previous requests for quotes, previous purchases, communications with Black Tomato staff and providers which have fulfilled part of your Black Tomato travel bookings, your browsing activity, and other publicly available information (such as demographic data provided by an external provider), to make recommendations and special offers to you about products and services we think may be of interest to you. If you do not want us to process your information in this way, please see #12 Contact Information for further information.

(d) We and/or our authorised service providers (such as our marketing agencies, and data analytics providers) may also use your personally identifiable information to review your dealings with us including your purchasing and preferences; to review, develop and improve our products and services, to improve our customers’ experience, and for internal market research, strategic development, and statistical analysis.

We reserve the right to sell, lease, transfer, or otherwise share without restriction aggregated, anonymised and other non-personally identifiable information regarding site usage, sales patterns, traffic patterns, demographics, and other statistics about our site and our products and services.

We reserve the right to use or disclose personal information which we process about you and other people which you provide information about, as necessary to comply with applicable laws, regulations, legal processes, and law enforcement inquiries, as required by litigation, to take precautions against liability, and protect the security and integrity of the site and the safety of our customers and site users.

  1. Subscribers to our newsletters and emails

Should you subscribe to the Black Tomato newsletter and offers, either directly through the Black Tomato website or by filling in the Black Tomato enquiry form, you will receive our newsletter from hello@blacktomatonews.comas well as promotional emails about new products, special offers or other information which we think you may find interesting using the email address which you have provided.

If you make an enquiry or a booking, we will also send you our newsletter and offers to the email address you provide to us.

  1. Unsubscribing

We do not seek to collect personally identifiable information from you that you do not want collected. Toward that end, we indicate at all active information collection points whether requested information is required or optional. We also attempt to tell you at the point of collection and in this policy what the consequences will be (e.g., inability to access important functions of the site, less tailoring of information to match your interests, etc.) if you do not provide the required or optional information. When you submit personally identifiable information to us, whether such information is required or optional, that information will be subject to this privacy policy.

Should you wish to unsubscribe from marketing communications via email, you may opt out by clicking on the clearly marked ‘unsubscribe’ button at the bottom of any Black Tomato newsletter or marketing email. Should you wish to unsubscribe from marketing communications via mail, you can contact us by e-mail at info@blacktomato.com (please write “unsubscribe” in the subject line and provide each email address you would like us to remove), by post at Black Tomato, 40-42 Scrutton Street, London EC2A 4PP.

  1. Information access

We take reasonable steps to ensure that personally identifiable information that you send us is accurate, current, and complete. Toward that end, we provide you with reasonable access to your personal information to correct errors or delete the information you have provided. If you wish to correct or delete your personally identifiable information, please contact us by e-mail at info@blacktomato.com or by post at Black Tomato, 40-42 Scrutton Street, London EC2A 4PP.

To respond to your request or inquiry, we may require follow-up or contact information to allow us to verify that you are the person authorized to view the information you are requesting. We may, at our discretion, refuse to allow you access to certain information if, in our view, to provide such access would jeopardize another person’s privacy; would violate any applicable federal, state, or foreign law, regulation, or directive; or would unreasonably burden this site.

  1. Data security

Although we take reasonable steps to protect the personally identifiable information that you provide via this site, no system is 100% secure or error-free. Therefore, we do not, and cannot, guarantee the security or accuracy of the information we gather.

One way we protect your personally identifiable information is through usernames and passwords. This safety measure is only effective if you protect the secrecy of both your username and password. If you ever suspect your username or password may have been compromised or subject to unauthorized use, contact us immediately at contacting us by e-mail at info@blacktomato.com.

  1. This site is not intended for use by children

This site is not directed to, and does not seek to collect personally identifiable information from, children under the age of 13. Nevertheless, if we are informed that we have collected information from someone in this age category, we will take reasonable steps to delete that information.

  1. Changes to this policy

We reserve the right to change this Policy at any time and in our sole discretion, for example to take account of new data protection legislation, and to reflect our current business practices. If we do change the Policy, the new Policy will be posted here, along with its revision date. We encourage you to check this Policy periodically and – at a minimum – before each instance in which you provide personally identifiable information to us.

  1. Contact Information

Black Tomato Limited are at 40-42 Scrutton Street, London EC2A 4PP. Please contact us by email at info@blacktomato.com or by telephone on 0207 426 9888 from UK or 1 646 558 3644 from US. Opening hours (UK GMT & US EST) are Monday – Friday 0900 – 1900.

  1. Use of and with Google
  • We use Remarketing with Google Analytics to advertise online.
  • Third-party vendors, including Google, may show you ads on sites across the Internet.
  • We and third-party vendors, including Google, use first-party cookies (such as the Google Analytics cookie) and third-party cookies together to inform, optimise and serve ads based on your past visits to this website.
  • We and third-party vendors, including Google, use first-party cookies (such as the Google Analytics cookie) and third-party cookies together to report how your ad impressions, other uses of ad services and interactions with these ad impressions and ad services are related to visits to our site.
  • We will use data from Google’s Interest-based advertising or 3rd-party audience data (such as age, gender and interests) with Google Analytics to optimise how we show you ads across the internet.
  • If you would like to opt out of receiving google analytics cookies: see currently available opt outs for the web.
  • Using the Ads Settings, you can opt out of Google Analytics for Display Advertising and customise Google Display Network ads.

This policy was last revised on 10 November 2017