1. Who we are
The Hotel Owners Community (“HOC”, “we”, “us”) operates a membership platform for independent hotel owners in the United States, together with an approved insurance programme delivered through Reliance Advisors & Merchant Services LLC and its RAMS insurance operation.
The entity responsible for the personal information described in this policy is Reliance Advisors & Merchant Services LLC, 614 Cranbury Road, Suite 365, East Brunswick, NJ 08816. Questions about this policy can be sent to support@myHOC.org.
2. What this policy covers
This policy covers the HOC member platform, the member dashboard, the public HOC website and any email or text message we send you in connection with your membership. It does not cover the separate practices of insurance carriers, lenders or vendors we introduce you to, each of whom holds your information under their own terms.
3. Information we collect
3.1 Information you give us
- Account and contact details: your name, business name, email address, telephone number and postal address.
- Property information: the name, address, ZIP code, telephone number, room count, brand affiliation, total insured value and, where you provide them, the acquisition date and year of construction of each hotel you own or manage.
- Contact details for the people you designate, such as a general manager, spouse, family member or member of staff whom you invite to access your account.
- Insurance information: policies, carriers, policy numbers, coverage limits, deductibles, premiums, renewal dates and loss run history.
- Documents you upload, including certificates of insurance, evidence of property, policy documents and, where you report an incident, supporting evidence such as incident reports, police or fire reports, photographs and video.
- Payment information, described separately in section 5.
- Anything you write to us, including support requests, suggestions and comments submitted through the platform.
3.2 Information we generate or obtain
- A permanent member identifier and a unique code for each property.
- A crime score for each property, derived from the property’s ZIP code.
- Calculated figures such as your annual saving against benchmark premium.
- Publicly available guest ratings for your properties, where we display them.
- Records of activity on the platform, including sign-ins, document downloads and administrative actions taken on your account, which we retain in an audit log.
- Standard technical information such as IP address, browser type and pages visited.
4. Why we use your information
- To provide the platform and show you your properties, policies, documents and renewal dates.
- To operate the approved insurance programme, including obtaining quotes, arranging cover and handling the intake of incidents you report to us.
- To take payment for membership and any dues owed.
- To answer your questions, including through the platform’s AI assistant, as described in section 6.
- To send you alerts we consider material to your business, which may include severe weather affecting a property’s location, renewal reminders, changes in brand or carrier requirements and loss run reminders.
- To improve the platform, to keep it secure and to detect misuse.
- To meet our legal, regulatory and insurance obligations.
Where the law requires a lawful basis, we rely on the performance of our contract with you, our legitimate interests in operating and securing the platform, your consent where we have asked for it, and compliance with legal obligations.
5. Payments
Membership and dues are processed by ePayPolicy (epay3, Inc.), a third party payment processor. When you add a payment method, your card or bank account details are transmitted directly from your browser to ePayPolicy and are never received or stored on our systems.
We retain only a payment token issued by ePayPolicy, together with the payment method type, the brand of card or account, the last four digits and the name on the account. The token allows us to charge your agreed membership fee on the schedule you have accepted. It cannot be used to view or reconstruct your underlying account details.
ePayPolicy processes this information under its own privacy policy and terms.
6. Artificial intelligence and the HOC assistant
The platform includes an AI assistant that answers questions about your membership, your properties and your policies. So that it can answer accurately, information about you is included in the request sent to our AI provider. This may include your name, your membership tier, your property names and locations, and details of your policies such as carrier, policy number, coverage limit, deductible, premium and renewal date.
Our current AI provider is OpenAI. Requests are made through its commercial application programming interface. That provider does not use information submitted through its API to train its models by default. We do not send uploaded documents, claim evidence or payment information to the assistant. If we change provider, we will update this policy.
If you would prefer that your information is not processed in this way, contact us at support@myHOC.org and we will disable the assistant for your account.
7. When we share information
We do not sell your personal information. We share it only as follows:
- With insurance carriers, wholesalers and licensed producers, where necessary to obtain quotes, place cover, issue certificates or handle an incident you have reported.
- With Reliance Advisors & Merchant Services LLC and its RAMS operation, which delivers the insurance programme.
- With service providers who operate the platform on our behalf, including our hosting and database providers, our payment processor, our email and messaging providers and our AI provider. Each is bound to use the information only to provide their service to us.
- With professional advisers, including the attorney who provides the member consultation benefit, where you choose to use that benefit.
- Where we are required to do so by law, regulation, subpoena or court order, or to establish, exercise or defend legal claims.
- With a buyer or successor, if the business is sold or reorganised, subject to this policy continuing to apply.
Vendors listed in any HOC marketplace or vendor directory receive your details only when you choose to make an enquiry to them.
8. Other people’s information
If you invite a general manager, a member of your family or a member of staff to access your account, or if you give us their contact details as a property contact, you confirm that you are entitled to share their information with us and that you have told them we will hold it for the purposes described in this policy.
If you report an incident, you may provide information about other people, including guests, employees or claimants. We hold that information solely to pass it to the insurance programme and to the extent necessary to handle the matter.
9. Email and text messages
We will send you messages relating to your membership, your policies and your account. These are part of the service and are not marketing.
Where we send text messages, we will do so only after you have given prior express written consent, and you may withdraw that consent at any time by replying STOP. Message and data rates may apply. Where we send marketing email, every message contains an unsubscribe link.
10. How long we keep information
We keep membership and property records for as long as you are a member, and for a further period afterwards set by the periods over which insurance and tax records are required to be retained. Documents relating to a claim or incident are kept for a comparable period running from the closure of the matter. Audit logs are kept for a shorter period. Payment tokens are deleted when you remove a payment method or close your account.
11. Security
Documents you upload are held in private storage that is not publicly reachable. Access is restricted so that each member sees only their own records, enforced at the database level rather than only in the application. Sensitive actions are recorded in an audit log. Access by our staff is limited to those who need it to support you.
No system can be guaranteed to be completely secure. If a breach affects your personal information, we will notify you and the relevant authorities where the law requires it.
12. Your choices and rights
You may review and update most of your information directly in the platform. You may also ask us to provide a copy of the information we hold about you, to correct it, to delete it, or to stop using it for a particular purpose. Requests can be sent to support@myHOC.org.
Depending on where you live, you may have additional rights under state privacy law, including the right to know what information we collect, the right to delete it, the right to correct it and the right not to be discriminated against for exercising those rights. Some information cannot be deleted while it is required for an active insurance policy or claim, or where the law requires us to keep it.
13. Children
The platform is intended for business use by hotel owners and their staff. It is not directed to children and we do not knowingly collect information from anyone under 18.
14. Changes to this policy
If we make a material change to this policy we will tell you through the platform or by email before it takes effect.
15. Contact
Hotel Owners Community, Reliance Advisors & Merchant Services LLC, 614 Cranbury Road, Suite 365, East Brunswick, NJ 08816. Email support@myHOC.org.
This policy is current as of 30 August 2026. Questions can be sent to support@myHOC.org.