At US Cost Index ("we," "our," or "us"), we value and respect the privacy of our visitors. This Privacy Policy outlines the types of personal and anonymous data we collect, how it is used, and the steps we take to protect your information in compliance with the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

1. Information We Collect

When you interact with our website, we may collect information in two ways:

Voluntary Information: If you use our quote comparison forms to connect with licensed local contractors, you may provide your name, zip code, email address, and phone number. This information is transmitted securely to verified contractor matching partners only upon your explicit request.
Automated Usage Data: We automatically collect standard server log data, IP addresses, browser user-agents, device screen resolution, referring URLs, and interactive calculator events (such as square footage sliders or state selections) to improve calculator performance. Calculator inputs are processed locally in your web browser.

2. Cookies and Advertising Partners

We partner with third-party advertising networks, including Google AdSense. Third-party vendors, including Google, use cookies to serve ads based on a user's prior visits to our website or other websites:

Google's use of advertising cookies enables it and its partners to serve ads to users based on their visit to our sites and/or other sites on the Internet.
Users may opt out of personalized advertising by visiting Google Ads Settings or through the Network Advertising Initiative opt-out page at optout.networkadvertising.org.

3. CCPA / CPRA Notice (California Residents)

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) and California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), California residents have specific rights regarding their personal information:

The right to know what personal data is collected and how it is used.
The right to request the deletion of your personal information.
The right to opt out of the sale or sharing of your personal information ("Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information").

To exercise any of these rights, email us at privacy@uscostindex.com with the subject line "CCPA Request".

4. Data Security

We employ industry-standard SSL/TLS encryption across our entire edge delivery network to protect data transmission between your browser and our Cloudflare-hosted infrastructure.