Protecting Clients’ Private Information

As a valued partner of American Equity, we appreciate your hard work and accomplishments. Your continued success helps facilitate our own success. In an effort to assist you with conducting proper business, we will continue to send you updates about the compliance rules and regulations of our industry. Thank you for your partnership with us.

We should all take the protection of our customer’s private information seriously. Sometimes, in spite of our best efforts, that private information may be improperly exposed or accessed, and our customers’ information is exposed to the public in some manner.  When this happens, certain steps, corrections and notifications may need to occur.

As insurance agents and providers, you hold a great deal of private information about your customers. If this information is exposed, you first need to determine the breadth of the exposure. Is it a single individual involved, or were many individuals’ private information exposed? 

Next, you need to determine if the information exposed is identifiable with American Equity or any other carrier you may represent. Is the exposed information specific only to the customer’s relationship with American Equity? For example, is it information indicating the individual is a customer of American Equity, such as a contract number? If so, American Equity has a process in place and can assist you in with any notifications and reporting required. 

If the information is not specific to American Equity, such as the individual’s Social Security number, but nothing ties that number to American Equity, you may still have notification and reporting responsibilities.  While we cannot assist you in filing the proper report, we can provide you some general guidance.

You can review our Agent Guide to Consumer and Customer Privacy located on our agent website. This guide gives an overview of consumer/customer rights with regard to their private information. It also provides information you need to consider on how to protect your customer’s private information. And, in the unfortunate event you suffer a privacy leak, steps you need to take to ensure your customer and the proper authorities, if required, are properly notified.

If you have any questions, contact the compliance department at 1-888-221-1234 or compliance@american-equity.com.

Thank you for your business and support of American Equity.