Privacy Policy

Operated by Honest Reviews Tech LLC (HonestReviews) (honest-reviews.org) · Website: honestfarewell.org

Honest Reviews Tech LLC, a Delaware limited liability company ("HonestReviews," "we," "us," or "our), the operator of HonestFarewell ("HonestFarewell," the "Site," or the "Platform"), respects your privacy.

HonestFarewell is a U.S. death-care price-transparency, comparison, and review platform. Our purpose is to help consumers research funeral homes, cremation providers, cemeteries, memorial providers, and related end-of-life services by making publicly available information, pricing information, reviews, and educational resources easier to understand and compare.

This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect, how we use it, when we share it, and the choices available to you when you use the Site or related services.

By using the Site, you acknowledge that you have read and understood this Privacy Policy.

1. Scope

This Privacy Policy applies to information collected through:

• https://honestfarewell.org;
• pages, forms, directories, comparison tools, review features, and other services made available through the Site;
• communications you send to us;
• interactions with our advertisements, emails, or other digital communications; and
• other services or pages that expressly link to this Privacy Policy.

This Policy does not necessarily apply to websites, applications, products, or services operated by third parties, including funeral homes, crematories, cemeteries, insurance companies, attorneys, affiliates, advertising partners, analytics providers, or other service providers.

2. Information We Collect

We aim to collect information reasonably necessary to operate HonestFarewell and provide useful comparison and review services.

2.1 Information You Provide

Depending on how you use the Site, we may collect:

• name or display name;
• email address;
• telephone number;
• ZIP code, city, state, or other location information;
• information you provide when submitting a review;
• information you provide when contacting us;
• information you provide when requesting information or asking to be connected with a third-party provider;
• account credentials, where accounts are offered;
• preferences and communication choices; and
• other information you voluntarily submit.

Please do not submit sensitive information unless it is necessary for the specific feature you are using. In particular, do not submit Social Security numbers, financial account numbers, medical records, passwords, or other highly sensitive information through a review, contact form, or public-facing field.

2.2 Information About a Deceased Person

HonestFarewell may display or process information relating to deceased persons where that information is relevant to reviews, obituaries, provider information, public records, user submissions, or other death-care resources.

Information relating to a deceased person may be subject to different legal protections than information relating to a living individual. However, users should not submit confidential or legally protected information about a deceased person unless they have the legal authority and a legitimate reason to do so.

2.3 Information Collected Automatically

When you visit the Site, we and our service providers may automatically collect information such as:

• IP address;
• browser and device type;
• operating system;
• pages viewed;
• referring and exit pages;
• approximate geographic information derived from IP address;
• date and time of visits;
• clicks and interactions;
• search queries entered on the Site;
• general usage and performance information; and
• identifiers associated with cookies or similar technologies.

We use this information for analytics, security, fraud prevention, troubleshooting, performance, personalization, and improving the Site.

2.4 Cookies and Similar Technologies

We may use cookies, pixels, local storage, tags, SDKs, and similar technologies to:

• keep the Site functioning;
• remember preferences;
• understand Site usage;
• measure advertising and referral activity;
• prevent fraud and abuse;
• improve Site performance; and
• provide relevant content or advertising where permitted.

Depending on your browser, device, and jurisdiction, you may be able to control certain cookies through browser settings or through a cookie-preference mechanism made available on the Site.

Blocking certain cookies may affect Site functionality.

Planning email sign-up cookies (hf_pa and hf_pa_pick). When you sign up for our planning emails, we set a cookie named hf_pa on honestfarewell.org so that browser shows that you've signed up instead of the form. It holds no identifier and never your email address, only the value "sent" after you send the form or "confirmed" after you click the confirm link. It lasts one year. Clearing your cookies brings the form back. If you also answer the optional questions under "Personalise your first email", a second cookie, hf_pa_pick, keeps your answers (why you came, and whether you'd like partner offers) so the next page can show them filled in: the confirm page, or, if you've already confirmed, the "Choose what we send you" page linked from our emails. It never holds your email address. It is deleted as soon as your choices are saved, and otherwise after 30 days.

Compare list (hf_cmp). When you add businesses to compare, the list is kept in your browser's local storage under hf_cmp, so it's there when you come back. It holds only which businesses you picked, never reaches our server, and clearing your browser's site data removes it. When you use the callback form, your browser also keeps the email and phone you typed for 24 hours, so the form is filled in if you come back, and then clears them. They stay in this browser only, and "Not your details? Clear them" removes them sooner.

Finding a funeral home. When you look for a funeral home, we ask when you need to speak with one. If you answer "As soon as possible", the page address shows that answer (urgency=asap), and our own site measurement counts it. Neither holds your name or contact details, and we don't send it to Google Analytics. If you then ask a home to call you, your request says you need help as soon as possible. Your answer is also kept in that browser tab's session storage, so the last step of the search can suggest what to read next. Unless it's "As soon as possible", it never reaches our server, and closing the tab normally clears it.

Which site sent you, when you sign up. When you sign up on our site (for our emails, the estate checklist, a callback or a business account), we note which site or link brought you here on that visit: another website's name, a tag in the link such as ref= or utm_source=, or that you came directly. We note only that, never which pages you viewed. To find it, your sign-up briefly carries the code our site measurement gives that visit. If you go from our site to sign up a business, the link passes that code to our partner site, premium.honestfarewell.org, which keeps it in your browser until your sign-up completes. It is never used after 24 hours. We remove that code once we've noted the site, and within 90 days at most. We use the site only to count sign-ups per site, and never report it next to your name. If you turn statistics off, or your browser sends a Global Privacy Control signal, we note nothing.

Google Analytics. We use Google Analytics, a Google service, to see how the Site is used: the pages you view, how you arrived, your device and browser type, and your approximate location. It loads when you open a page and sets cookies named _ga and _ga_ followed by an ID. If you turn off statistics cookies in our cookie banner, we tell Google Analytics not to use cookies and delete its cookies, on that page and again on every later page. Google may still receive a signal that a page was viewed. Visits recorded before you turned statistics off stay in Google Analytics. Our own site measurement stops completely when you turn statistics off, or when your browser sends a Global Privacy Control signal.

3. How We Use Information

We may use information we collect to:

• operate, maintain, and improve HonestFarewell;
• provide price comparisons, provider information, reviews, directories, and educational content;
• respond to questions, requests, and support inquiries;
• facilitate a consumer-requested connection with a third-party provider;
• authenticate accounts and protect the Site;
• detect, prevent, and investigate fraud, abuse, security incidents, and violations of our Terms;
• moderate and administer reviews and user-generated content;
• measure traffic, engagement, conversions, and advertising performance;
• understand how consumers use the Site;
• develop new features and services;
• communicate with you about requested services, account activity, or Site updates;
• send marketing communications where permitted by law and consistent with your choices;
• comply with legal obligations and respond to lawful requests;
• enforce our agreements and protect our rights, users, and business; and
• perform other purposes disclosed at the time information is collected or otherwise permitted by law.

4. How HonestFarewell Makes Money

HonestFarewell is designed so that consumers can access core comparison and informational content without paying a fee merely to view the information.

We may generate revenue through:

• advertising;
• affiliate relationships;
• referral or click-out arrangements;
• consumer-requested lead or connection programs;
• partnerships with service providers;
• insurance or financial-service referrals;
• legal-service referrals where permitted by applicable law;
• sponsorships and promotional placements; and
• other lawful commercial arrangements.

A provider, product, service, advertisement, or referral opportunity may generate compensation for HonestReviews.

Compensation does not necessarily mean that a provider is the cheapest, highest quality, or best provider for a particular consumer.

Where required or appropriate, sponsored, advertising, affiliate, or paid placements may be identified as such.

5. Information Sharing

We may share information with the following categories of recipients, depending on how you use the Site:

5.1 Service Providers

We may share information with vendors that help us operate the Site, including hosting providers, analytics providers, email providers, customer-support providers, security vendors, database providers, and technology providers.

Error monitoring (Sentry). When a page or one of our scheduled jobs fails, a technical error report goes to Sentry, a US company that helps us find and fix the problem. The report holds the address of the page without anything after a question mark, your browser type, the error and its technical trace, and which version of the Site was running. We set it to send no names, email addresses, IP addresses, cookies, form contents or screen recordings.

These companies are generally permitted to use information only as necessary to provide services to us or as otherwise permitted by their agreements with us and applicable law.

5.2 Providers You Ask Us to Contact

If you voluntarily request that we connect you with a funeral home, cremation provider, cemetery, insurer, attorney, or another third-party provider, we may share the information necessary to fulfill your request.

Once information is provided to a third party, that party's own privacy policy and practices may apply.

Callback requests. On our compare page you can ask funeral homes you picked to call you back. We don't pass requests to law firms. Only then do we ask for your first name, phone number and email, and only with your approval: you tick a box saying the businesses you picked may call you at that number about your request, and we keep a record of that approval with the time. Nothing is passed on until you confirm from the link we email you; if you don't, we delete the details within 7 days. Once you've confirmed, we remember that email and phone together for 24 hours, so another request in that time goes through without a second confirm (you still get a receipt). When a request is confirmed, we share your first name, phone number, the best time to call and, if you said so, that you need help as soon as possible, with the funeral homes you picked: by email and in their partner account, or by our team phoning the home. A home with a partner account also sees any note you wrote; when our team phones a home, we may pass on the note. We use your email only for the confirm link, a receipt and one check-in, for our newsletter only if you ticked that box, for one email about a month later with a link to our estate checklist, only if you asked for it, and for one thank-you if you rate a call 4 or 5. If you also tick the box saying Trustpilot may invite you to review us, we copy that thank-you to Trustpilot, more than 72 hours after your request, so Trustpilot receives your name and email address and can send you one review invitation. Trustpilot handles them under its own privacy policy. We keep your name and phone number for 90 days, then delete them, keeping only a record of the request without them. When a funeral home callback request is confirmed, we also keep a one-way code made from your email address, with only the date it was first made, so that we never send you marketing asking you to come back. We keep that code after your other details are deleted. We never sell them and never use them for marketing. A funeral home that calls you handles your details under its own privacy practices.

5.3 Advertising and Affiliate Partners

We may share certain information with advertising, attribution, measurement, affiliate, and marketing partners to measure campaigns, provide advertising, prevent fraud, and understand referral activity, subject to applicable law.

5.4 Legal and Safety Disclosures

We may disclose information when we reasonably believe disclosure is necessary to:

• comply with applicable law, regulation, legal process, or governmental request;
• protect the rights, property, or safety of HonestReviews, HonestFarewell, users, or others;
• investigate fraud, abuse, or security incidents; or
• enforce our agreements or policies.

5.5 Business Transfers

If HonestReviews is involved in a merger, acquisition, financing, restructuring, sale of assets, bankruptcy, or similar transaction, information may be transferred as part of that transaction, subject to applicable law.

5.6 Aggregated or De-Identified Information

We may create aggregated, statistical, or de-identified information that cannot reasonably be used to identify an individual. We may use and disclose that information for lawful business purposes.

6. Reviews and Public Content

HonestFarewell may allow users to submit reviews, ratings, comments, photographs, responses, questions, or other content ("User Content").

If you submit User Content for publication:

• you should assume that the content may be publicly visible;
• do not include information you want to keep confidential;
• you are responsible for the content you submit;
• you should not publish another person's private information without appropriate authorization;
• we may moderate, edit for formatting or clarity, remove, or decline to publish content; and
• publication does not mean that HonestFarewell independently verifies every statement in the content.

We may retain records associated with reviews for moderation, fraud prevention, dispute resolution, legal compliance, and platform integrity.

7. Data Retention

We retain information for as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes described in this Policy, including to provide services, maintain business records, resolve disputes, enforce agreements, prevent fraud, and comply with legal obligations.

Retention periods may vary depending on the type of information and the purpose for which it was collected.

Email lists. If you stop one of our email lists, we keep a coded (hashed) form of your address with that list's past send records for up to 35 days. We use it only to space emails from any other list of ours you're still on, so they don't arrive too soon after the last one. Then it is deleted. So that we keep our promise not to email you, we also keep a coded form of your address on a do-not-email list, with no end date: for that one list when you unsubscribe from it, and for all our lists when you choose "Stop everything", ask us to delete your information, mark one of our emails as spam, or your address can no longer receive email. When you ask us to delete your information, everything else about you in our systems is deleted. Our email service provider keeps its own sending logs for a limited time before deleting them.

8. Data Security

We use reasonable administrative, technical, and organizational safeguards designed to protect information.

However, no website, database, transmission, or storage system can be guaranteed to be completely secure.

You should not send confidential or highly sensitive information through ordinary email or public review fields.

9. Your Privacy Choices

Depending on your location and applicable law, you may have rights concerning your personal information, including rights to:

• request access to certain personal information;
• request correction of inaccurate information;
• request deletion of personal information;
• request information about categories of personal information collected or disclosed;
• opt out of certain targeted advertising or sharing;
• opt out of certain marketing communications;
• appeal certain privacy-rights decisions; and
• exercise other rights provided by applicable law.

We may need to verify your identity before completing certain requests.

You may unsubscribe from promotional email communications by using the unsubscribe mechanism included in the communication. Transactional, security, or service-related communications may continue where legally permitted.

10. California Privacy Rights

If you are a California resident, California privacy law may provide additional rights regarding your personal information.

Depending on the circumstances and applicable law, California residents may have rights to:

• know or access categories and specific pieces of personal information collected;
• request deletion;
• request correction;
• opt out of certain sales or sharing of personal information;
• limit certain uses of sensitive personal information where applicable;
• receive equal treatment for exercising applicable privacy rights; and
• appeal certain decisions concerning a privacy request.

HonestFarewell does not condition ordinary access to the Site on a consumer waiving legally protected privacy rights.

Where required by law, we will provide additional California-specific notices and opt-out mechanisms.

11. Other State Privacy Laws

Several U.S. states provide residents with privacy rights that may apply to HonestFarewell depending on our activities, applicable thresholds, and the state in which you reside.

Where applicable, we will honor rights required by those laws, subject to statutory exceptions and verification requirements.

12. Do Not Track and Global Privacy Controls

Some browsers and devices provide "Do Not Track" or similar signals. There is currently no universally accepted standard for responding to all such signals.

Where required by applicable law, we will recognize and process legally required opt-out preference signals, such as Global Privacy Control, in accordance with applicable requirements.

13. Third-Party Links and Services

The Site may contain links to third-party websites, applications, providers, insurers, attorneys, advertisers, payment processors, or other services.

We do not control those third parties.

Your use of a third-party service is governed by that third party's terms and privacy policy. HonestFarewell is not responsible for the privacy, security, accuracy, or practices of third-party websites or services.

Trustpilot. Most pages show a Trustpilot box in the footer that invites reviews of HonestFarewell. When the footer comes into view, your browser loads the box from Trustpilot (widget.trustpilot.com), which receives the technical information any website receives, such as your IP address and browser type. We don't send Trustpilot any information about you, unless you ask us to after a callback request (see Callback requests). If you leave a review, Trustpilot's own privacy policy applies.

14. Children's Privacy

HonestFarewell is not directed to children under 13, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13.

If you believe a child has provided personal information to us, please contact us so that we can evaluate and, where appropriate, delete the information.

Where applicable law establishes a higher minimum age or additional requirements, those requirements will apply.

15. International Visitors

HonestFarewell is designed primarily for consumers in the United States.

If you access the Site from outside the United States, information you provide may be processed in the United States or other jurisdictions where we or our service providers operate.

You are responsible for determining whether use of the Site is appropriate under the laws applicable to you.

16. Premium Business Accounts

This section applies to businesses (funeral providers and law firms) that sign up for HonestFarewell Premium and the people who manage those accounts.

Premium business accounts

When someone signs up for Premium on behalf of a business, we collect:

• their name, email address and role at the business;
• the business or law firm’s name, its locations, addresses, website, phone numbers, and listed lawyers’ names, jurisdictions and professional identifiers;

• the evidence we use to verify that they represent each home, such as the email domain, notes of a verification call and any documents they send;
• the tier, billing period, ZIP codes or metro area, and homes they choose;

• the content they submit for their profiles.

We use this to run the account, verify ownership, provide Premium, bill for it, and contact the account holder about it. We use business phone numbers only to verify ownership and for account matters, never for marketing calls or text messages.

We send emails about the account and billing. We send news about Premium only if you agree, and each such email has an unsubscribe link. At present we send none.

Signing in

• Google sign-in. If you sign in with Google, we receive your name, email address, Google account identifier and, for a Google Workspace account, the organisation's domain. We don't receive your Google password.
• Email codes. If you sign in with your email address, we send a six-digit code through our email provider. It expires after 10 minutes, and we store only a scrambled (hashed) copy of it.

• Session cookie. Once you sign in, we set a cookie on premium.honestfarewell.org that keeps you signed in. It is needed for the account to work, lasts 30 days and is renewed while you keep using the account. We store only a hashed copy of its value. We don't use it for advertising or analytics.
• Partner measurement cookie (hf_nt). While you're signed in to the Premium portal, we also set a cookie named hf_nt on honestfarewell.org. It holds no identifier, only the value 1. It tells our site measurement not to count visits from that browser, so partners' own visits never inflate their numbers. It lasts one year.

Signing in with Facebook

If you sign in to a Premium account with Facebook, we receive three things from Facebook: your name, your email address and an ID number Facebook creates only for HonestFarewell. We don't ask for, and don't receive, your friends list, posts, photos or Facebook password. We use these details only to sign you in and to contact you about your account.

To have us delete your account and the details Facebook shared, email privacy@honestfarewell.org from the address on the account. We confirm by email and finish within 30 days, except billing and tax records the law requires us to keep (see Retention below).

To stop Facebook sharing with us, open Facebook's Settings, go to Apps and Websites, find HonestFarewell and remove it. That stops future sharing but doesn't delete what we already hold, so email us too if you want that deleted.

Payments and tax

Stripe receives payment details directly; we do not receive or store your full card number. We receive transaction, subscription, billing-address and relevant tax records. If checkout and the receipt name a Stripe entity as merchant of record, it handles that sale and related tax, fraud, dispute and transaction-support functions. Otherwise Stripe processes payment for Honest Reviews Tech LLC. Stripe may process information independently for its own legal, security and payment purposes under its privacy policy at https://stripe.com/privacy. We use the records we receive to provide Premium, reconcile billing and meet our legal obligations.

Sponsor statistics

We give Premium partners monthly totals: how often their pages were viewed, their prices were viewed, the Call button was tapped, their website link was clicked, and their sponsored units were shown and clicked. These come from our own site measurement, described in site analytics. Visits from people who decline statistics or whose browser sends a Global Privacy Control signal are not counted. Visits from a browser signed in to the Premium portal aren't counted either (the hf_nt cookie above).

Sponsors never receive personal information about visitors. They see only totals. We don't sell leads, and we don't pass on names, contact details, searches or locations. The one exception is a callback request: when you ask a funeral home to call you back, it gets the first name, phone number, any best time to call and, if you said so, that you need help as soon as possible, for that request. A home with a partner account also sees any note you wrote, and when our team phones a home, we may pass on the note (see Callback requests).

To choose which sponsors to show, a page uses the ZIP code you entered or the location you shared, which your browser keeps in a cookie and sends to us with the request. We use it only to pick the sponsors and don't give it to them.

If a browser location request supplies precise coordinates, the main Privacy Policy must explain their actual handling before collection; location permission is optional. The use described here is limited to local placement selection and does not authorise advertising tracking.

Service providers

We disclose relevant information to vendors needed to operate Premium. We use contractual protections appropriate to their roles. Some act on our instructions; others, including payment and sign-in providers for certain purposes, act independently under their own privacy policies:

• Stripe: payments and sales tax.
• Google: sign-in.

• Resend: sending sign-in codes and account emails.
• Cloudflare: hosting, security and site measurement.

• Neon: our database.
• Sentry: error reports when a page or scheduled job fails (see section 5.1).

We do not sell personal information collected through Premium business accounts or share it for cross-context behavioural advertising. This statement does not mean we never disclose data: the operational disclosures above, legally required disclosures and protected transfers in a business reorganisation may occur. The main Privacy Policy separately describes public-site processing.

Retention

• Account and profile details: while the account is active and for 12 months after it closes.
• Verification evidence: while the home's claim is active and for 12 months after it ends.

• Billing and tax records: seven years after the transaction under our record-retention schedule, subject to any applicable longer legal requirement. We limit retained records to what is necessary.
• Sign-in codes: until used or expired (10 minutes).

• Sign-in sessions: up to 30 days after your last use.
• Sponsor statistics: the underlying measurements for 13 months; monthly totals while the account is active.

Your rights

You may request access, correction, deletion or a portable copy of your personal information by emailing privacy@honestfarewell.org. We aim to respond within 30 days and comply with shorter mandatory deadlines; we explain any lawful extension. We may verify identity proportionately for account-data requests, but do not require a new account or identity verification for a legally protected sale/sharing opt-out. An authorised agent may submit a request with appropriate proof of authority; we may seek direct confirmation where lawful. If we deny a request, we explain why and you may appeal by replying with Privacy appeal. We review appeals and aim to answer within 30 days, subject to applicable deadlines, and explain how to contact your state attorney general or privacy regulator. Applicable state rights may include opting out of sale, sharing, targeted advertising or qualifying profiling, and limiting certain uses of sensitive data. We honour legally applicable preference signals and do not retaliate for exercising rights. Exceptions may permit necessary tax, security or legal records to be retained. These voluntary request channels do not limit mandatory state rights.

17. Changes to This Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time.

When we make changes, we will update the Last Updated date at the top of this Policy. If a change is material and applicable law requires additional notice, we will provide notice through the Site or another appropriate method.

Your continued use of the Site after an updated Policy becomes effective constitutes acceptance of the updated Policy to the extent permitted by law.

18. Contact Us

For privacy questions, requests, or concerns, contact:

Honest Reviews Tech LLC (HonestReviews)

Operator of HonestFarewell

611 South Dupont Highway, Suite 102, Dover, DE 19901, United States

Website: https://honestfarewell.org

Company website: https://honest-reviews.org

Email: privacy@honestfarewell.org

Related policies

• Terms of Use
• Disclosures: how we make money and how listings are ordered

Questions about this policy: privacy@honestfarewell.org.