Notice of HIPAA Privacy Practices

1. About This Notice

PawFlicker.com connects California residents with a network of independently licensed California mental health professionals (“Providers”) for clinical evaluation and, where appropriate, issuance of ESA or PSD letters. Each Provider is an independent, separately licensed healthcare professional and operates as their own individual HIPAA “covered entity” — meaning each Provider is independently responsible for their own compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), their own recordkeeping, and their own privacy and security practices.

This page is published as a general, collective overview of the privacy practices you can expect across our Provider network, for your convenience. It is not a substitute for the specific Notice of Privacy Practices your individual Provider will give you directly at the start of your evaluation — that individual notice, and your Provider’s own policies, govern your specific treatment relationship and clinical records.

2. What Counts as Protected Health Information (PHI)

Protected Health Information (“PHI”) is information that relates to your past, present, or future physical or mental health condition, the provision of health care to you, or payment for that care, and that identifies you (or could reasonably be used to identify you). In the context of PawFlicker’s Services, PHI may include information shared during your clinical evaluation, your Provider’s clinical determinations, and the ESA or PSD letter issued as a result.

3. How Your Provider May Use and Disclose PHI

Your individual Provider may use and disclose your PHI, generally without requiring your separate written authorization, for the following purposes:

• Treatment — to evaluate your clinical needs and determine eligibility for an ESA or PSD letter;
• Payment — to process payment for the evaluation and letter through PawFlicker’s payment processor, Stripe;
• Healthcare operations — for quality review, recordkeeping, and administrative purposes related to your care;
• As required by law — including mandatory reporting obligations imposed on licensed California clinicians (such as reporting related to imminent harm to yourself or others, or suspected abuse of a child, elder, or dependent adult), and in response to valid legal process.

Any other use or disclosure of your PHI generally requires your specific written authorization, which you may revoke at any time, except to the extent your Provider has already acted in reliance on it.

4. Your Rights Regarding Your PHI

With respect to the PHI held by your individual Provider, you generally have the right to:

• Request access to inspect or obtain a copy of your health records;
• Request an amendment to your PHI if you believe it is incorrect or incomplete;
• Request restrictions on certain uses or disclosures of your PHI;
• Request confidential communications by a particular method or at a particular location;
• Receive an accounting of disclosures of your PHI made for purposes other than treatment, payment, or healthcare operations;
• Obtain a paper copy of your Provider’s specific Notice of Privacy Practices, even if you agreed to receive it electronically;
• File a complaint if you believe your privacy rights have been violated, without retaliation.

To exercise any of these rights regarding your specific clinical record, contact your individual Provider directly — they are the party responsible for maintaining and controlling that record.

5. PawFlicker’s Limited Role

PawFlicker does not conduct clinical evaluations and does not create, access, or store the clinical content of your evaluation (such as session notes or diagnostic detail) — that information is created and held independently by your Provider, using their own HIPAA-compliant tools and systems, separate from PawFlicker’s platform.

PawFlicker’s own systems do store and transmit the final issued letter itself, for the limited purpose of making it accessible to you and, where applicable, assisting with delivery to a landlord or other requesting party. This narrow set of information is treated as sensitive and is protected using reasonable administrative, technical, and physical safeguards, consistent with our Privacy Policy. If you have questions specifically about how PawFlicker stores or transmits your issued letter, contact our Privacy Officer as described in Section 7 below.

6. Changes to This Notice

This collective Notice may be updated from time to time to reflect changes across our Provider network’s general practices. The effective date at the top of this page will be updated accordingly. Your individual Provider’s own Notice of Privacy Practices may be updated independently and separately by that Provider.

7. Complaints and Contact

If you have a concern about how your PHI has been handled:

• Regarding your specific clinical record, contact your individual Provider directly, using the contact information they provided during your evaluation.
• Regarding PawFlicker’s limited handling of your issued letter, contact our Privacy Officer at support@pawflicker.com.
• You may also file a complaint with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office for Civil Rights. Filing a complaint will not affect the care or services you receive.

8. Contact Us

PawFlicker — Privacy Officer
123 Market Street, Suite 400
Sacramento, CA 95814
support@pawflicker.com
(456) 456-1234