Sample - Opt-Out Letters

You have an ongoing right to tell financial institutions that you do not want them to sell or share your customer information -- in other words, to "opt-out." -- within the constraints of the law.

July 1, 2001, was the deadline for financial institutions, including insurance companies and brokerage firms, to mail you their privacy notices and to be in compliance with federal law. But you may opt-out at any time. Be aware that the Financial Services Modernization Act (also known as the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, or GLB) has many loopholes. For example, the law does not enable you to opt-out of data sharing with companies' service providers and with companies with whom they establish joint marketing agreements. See our Fact Sheets 24 and 24(a) for more information on the GLB.

If you do not recall receiving privacy notices and opt-out forms from your financial institutions, or if you have thrown them away, you should ask the company for another copy of its privacy policy. Federal regulations say the company can require you to follow the procedure it establishes for opting out. Some of the choices you may have for opting out are:

• Calling a toll-free telephone number.
• Writing a letter to a specific address shown in the privacy notices.
• Returning a tear-off postcard attached to the privacy notice.
• Opting out online if that is the way you normally do business.

If one of the choices given in the privacy notices is to write a letter to a specific address, you may use one of our sample letters to mail to your banks, credit card companies, insurance companies, and investment services. Even if you opt-out by another means (such as calling a toll-free number) there is no harm in also writing a letter if you want to let your company know how you feel about its privacy policy.

We have provided three types of sample letters. You can choose whichever works best for you.

• Choice number one is a short letter that you can print out and fill in the blanks.
  
• Number two is a longer letter that you can download to your word-processor and customize it to fit your own needs.
  
• Number three is a service provided by Junkbusters.com. It enables you to click on the name of your financial company and generate a formatted self-mailer.

1. Click here to show the short form letter. You can print out as many copies as you want, fill in the blanks, and mail it to your financial companies. (Courtesy of www.junkbusters.com).

2. Click below to download a longer letter to your computer. You can customize this letter to your own needs.

To download the letter to your computer, right click on one of the following links and then select save-link or save-target to save the file. Remember where you saved the file so you can open it later with your text or word-processing editor.

• Download Letter (Plain Text Format)

To view the Adobe PDF file you will need to install the free Adobe Acrobat reader which is available here: www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep.html

3. See also Junkbusters opt-out letters at http://www.junkbusters.com/optout.html  (Use numbers 3 and 4.)

Click here for a list of addresses for financial institutions: opt-out addresses

Visit www.privacyrightsnow.com for a sample letter you can send to your Congressional representatives demanding stronger privacy protection for your financial information. Click on the "Take Action" box.

Copyright © 2001-2007. Privacy Rights Clearinghouse/UCAN. For distribution of this fact sheet, see our copyright and reprint guidelines. This copyrighted document may be copied and distributed for nonprofit, educational purposes only. The text of this document may not be altered without express authorization of the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse. This fact sheet should be used as an information source and not as legal advice. PRC fact sheets contain information about federal laws as well as some California-specific information. Laws in other states may vary. Overall, our fact sheets are applicable to consumers nationwide.

Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, 3100 - 5th Ave., Suite B, San Diego, CA 92103. Web: www.privacyrights.org