Privacy Policy
Aura Design & Integration ("Aura Design – Smart Home Ottawa", "Aura Design", "we", "us") Effective date: October 21, 2026
We design, install, and support smart home, audio/video, networking, and lighting-control systems in Ottawa, Ontario and the surrounding region, including Gatineau and Val-des-Monts, Quebec. This policy explains, in plain language, what personal information we collect, why, how we protect it, and the choices you have.
We follow Canada's Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA). For clients in Quebec, we also follow Quebec's Act respecting the protection of personal information in the private sector, as amended by Law 25.
1. Who is responsible
Our Privacy Officer is responsible for how we handle personal information:
Stephane Doucet, Owner & Project Manager and Privacy Officer
Email:
2. What we collect
We only collect what we need to answer your questions, quote, deliver, and support your project.
- Contact and inquiry information. Your name, email, phone number, address, and message when you use our contact forms, request a quote or service, or otherwise call or email us.
- Jobber client hub requests. Requests, approvals, and messages you send through our Jobber client hub, and the contact and property details attached to them.
- Quotes, orders, and billing. What you asked for, quotes, invoices, payment status, and purchase history. We do not store full credit card numbers. Payments are handled by third-party payment processors.
- Project and site information. Property address, floor plans and drawings, room and wiring details, photos of the installation area, access instructions (for example gate or alarm codes, or key arrangements), and the names of other people we coordinate with, such as builders, designers, or electricians.
- Network and device information. When we install or service your systems, we may record device names, models, serial numbers, MAC and IP addresses, Wi-Fi network names, and system settings. We may also record the usernames and passwords needed to manage your systems. We collect only what we need to do the work, and we store credentials securely (see Section 7).
- Remote monitoring and support information. With your agreement, we may use manufacturer remote-management platforms such as OvrC (Snap One), Control4 4Sight, and UniFi (Ubiquiti) to monitor, troubleshoot, update, and support your systems. These tools may give us device status, uptime and alert history, connected-device lists, network performance data, and the ability to restart or configure equipment. We use this access only to support your systems, never to watch your activity, and we do not view camera feeds or recordings unless you ask us to as part of a service request.
- Website information. Basic technical data such as IP address, browser type, pages visited, and referring site, collected through cookies and analytics (see Section 5).
3. How we use your information
- To answer inquiries and prepare quotes
- To design, schedule, install, service, and support your systems
- To monitor and maintain systems under a service plan or support agreement
- To register products and handle warranty claims and repairs with manufacturers
- To invoice, take payment, and keep business and tax records
- To send updates about your project or order, follow up after you contact us, and send occasional newsletters or service news if you have agreed to receive them (you can unsubscribe at any time)
- To improve our website and services
- To meet legal obligations
We will not use your information for a new purpose without first telling you and, where required, getting your consent.
4. Who we share it with
We do not sell, rent, or trade your personal information. We share it only as needed to provide our services:
- Manufacturers and suppliers. For product registration, warranty, repairs, licensing, and technical support. Examples may include manufacturers of the brands we install, such as Control4/Snap One, Lutron, and Ubiquiti.
- Trusted service providers. Such as email, website hosting, cloud storage, and scheduling/invoicing tools (for example, Jobber and QuickBooks), which hold some information on our behalf.
- Remote monitoring platforms. The platforms named in Section 2 process device and network data to provide the monitoring service.
- Subcontractors and project partners. For example electricians, installers, or your builder or designer, when they are involved in your project.
- Professional advisors and authorities. Accountants, lawyers, or insurers when needed, or when the law requires it.
Our service providers may only use your information to do work for us. We require them to protect it. Some of these providers, including Jobber, QuickBooks, and the remote monitoring platforms, may store or process information outside Canada, for example in the United States. That information may be subject to the laws of those countries. For Quebec clients, before sending personal information outside Quebec we assess whether it will be adequately protected, as Law 25 requires.
5. Cookies and analytics
Our website uses cookies, which are small files stored by your browser. We use them to make the site work (for example, the shop cart), to remember your preferences, and to understand how visitors use the site in aggregate. We may use analytics tools that collect this information on our behalf.
We do not use cookies to collect sensitive information. Where required (including for Quebec visitors), we will ask for your consent before using cookies that are not strictly necessary. We honour browser "Do Not Track" signals where possible.
You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings. If you do, some parts of the site, like the shop cart, may not work properly.
6. How long we keep it
We keep personal information only as long as we need it for the purposes above:
- Inquiries and quotes that don't go ahead: about 2 years after our last contact
- Client, project, and system records (including network and device documentation): for as long as we support your system, plus 2 years, so we can help with warranty and future service
- Invoices and financial records: at least 6 years, as required by Canadian tax law
- System credentials and remote-monitoring access: removed when our support relationship ends, or sooner if you ask
After that, we securely delete or anonymize the information.
7. How we protect it
We use reasonable safeguards for the sensitivity of the information:
- We take reasonable measures to protect our website, including encryption and security monitoring where available.
- System passwords and access codes are stored in an encrypted password manager or secured system and are only available to staff who need them.
- Access to client files, Jobber, QuickBooks, and monitoring platforms is limited to authorized staff and protected by strong passwords and multi-factor authentication where available.
- Paper records are kept secure and shredded when no longer needed.
No system is perfectly secure. If a privacy breach creates a real risk of significant harm, we will notify you and report it to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (and, for Quebec residents, the Commission d'accès à l'information), as the law requires.
8. Your rights: access and correction
You can ask us to:
- tell you what personal information we hold about you, how we use it, and who we have shared it with
- give you a copy of it
- correct information that is inaccurate or incomplete
Quebec residents may also ask us to stop sharing or using their information, to delete information that is no longer needed (or was collected unlawfully), and to receive computerized information they gave us in a commonly used, structured format.
Send your request to our Privacy Officer (Section 1). We may need to confirm your identity first. We will respond within 30 days and in most cases we will not charge a fee. If we cannot give you access to something, we will explain why, unless the law prevents us from doing so.
9. Withdrawing consent
You can withdraw your consent at any time, subject to legal or contractual limits, by contacting our Privacy Officer. For example, you can:
- unsubscribe from newsletters using the link in any email, or by asking us
- ask us to remove our remote monitoring access. Depending on the platform, you may also be able to remove it yourself in your account settings.
- ask us to delete stored system credentials
If you withdraw consent, we may not be able to provide some services, such as proactive monitoring or remote support. We will explain what this means before we act. We may still need to keep some records, such as invoices, where the law requires it.
10. Children
Our website and services are intended for adults. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13.
11. Links to other sites
Our website may link to manufacturer or partner websites. Their own privacy policies apply, and we are not responsible for how they handle information.
12. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time. When we do, we will post the new version on this page and change the effective date. If we make significant changes, we will let current clients know.
13. Questions or complaints
Please contact our Privacy Officer first. We will do our best to resolve your concern:
Stephane Doucet, Privacy Officer, Aura Design & Integration
If you are not satisfied with our response, you can contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada (www.priv.gc.ca, 1-800-282-1376). Quebec residents can also contact the Commission d'accès à l'information du Québec (www.cai.gouv.qc.ca).
