Privacy Policy & Collection Statement

1. INTRODUCTION

Holley Nethercote Pty Ltd ACN 068 367 046 trading as Holley Nethercote Lawyers, Holley Nethercote Compliance, including the HN Hub (collectively ‘Holley Nethercote’, ‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’) is bound by the Privacy Act 1988 ('Privacy Act'), including the Australian Privacy Principles ('APPs').  Holley Nethercote recognises the importance of ensuring the confidentiality and security of your personal information.

To the extent that it is necessary to do so, Holley Nethercote also complies with the requirements of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) as adopted by EU Member States.[i]  The AAPs and the GDPR Policy share many common requirements.  Where an obligation imposed by the AAPs and the GDPR are the same, but the terminology is different, Holley Nethercote will comply with the terminology and wording used in the AAPs, and this will constitute Holley Nethercote’s compliance with the equivalent obligations in the GDPR.

If the GDPR imposes an obligation on Holley Nethercote that is not imposed by the APPs, or the GDPR obligation is more onerous than the equivalent obligation in the APPs, Holley Nethercote will comply with the GDPR (see Annexure A).

All third parties (including clients, suppliers, sub-contractors, or agents) that have access to or use personal information collected and held by Holley Nethercote, must abide by this Privacy Policy and Collection Statement (Privacy Policy).

In this Privacy Policy:

  • ‘Disclosing information’ means providing information to persons outside Holley Nethercote;
  • ‘Personal information’ means information or an opinion relating to an individual, which can be used to identify that individual;
  • ‘Privacy Officer’ means the contact person within Holley Nethercote for questions or complaints regarding Holley Nethercote’s handling of personal information;
  • ‘Sensitive information’ is personal information that includes information relating to a person's racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religion, trade union or other professional or trade association membership, sexual preferences and criminal record, and also includes health information; and
  • ‘Use of information’ means use of information within Holley Nethercote.
  • ‘Website’ means hnlaw.com.au and hnhub.com.au

[i] The EU General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) can apply to companies outside of the EU.  You will need to be aware of whether you are required to comply with the GDPR.

Examples of when a company situated outside of the EU will have to comply with the GDPR are:

  • If you process personal data of an EU citizen on behalf of, or in connection with another business, or an office situated in the EU;
  • If you offer of goods or services to EU citizens (this requires some type of actively marketing goods or services to EU citizens); or
  • You have website cookies and/or use website analytics.

2. WHAT KINDS OF PERSONAL INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT AND HOLD?

We may collect and hold a range of information about you to provide you, your business or employer with our services, including:

  • your full name and contact details;
  • your employer, employment history, and professional memberships;
  • bank account and credit card details;
  • your occupation;
  • your driver’s licence (for KYC purposes);
  • your areas of interest in legal and compliance developments;
  • attendance at any training events we have run;
  • information about your employer or business (including financial information); and
  • any other information relevant to the services we provide.

3. HOW DO WE COLLECT PERSONAL INFORMATION?

We generally collect personal information directly from you in the course of providing you or your employer with our legal or compliance services, template compliance procedures or any other of our products, or when a client instructs us to collect information on their behalf.

For example, personal information will be collected through our processes, forms and other interactions with you in the course of providing you with our products and services, including when you visit the Website, call or meet with us, or send us correspondence.  Generally, information we collect from the Website is provided intentionally by you, such as when you purchase a product, register your details on the Website, or send us a query.

We may also collect personal information about you from a third party, such as debt collectors, government regulators or accountants.  If so, we will take reasonable steps to ensure that you are made aware of this Privacy Policy.  We may also use third parties to analyse traffic at our website, which may involve the use of ‘cookies’.  Information collected through such analysis is anonymous.

Holley Nethercote will not collect sensitive information about you without your consent unless an exemption in the APPs applies.  These exceptions include if the collection is required or authorised by law, or is necessary to take appropriate action in relation to suspected unlawful activity or serious misconduct.

If the personal information we request is not provided by you, we may not be able to provide you with the benefit of our services, or meet your needs appropriately.

Holley Nethercote does not give you the option of dealing with us anonymously, or using a pseudonym.  This is because it is illegal or impractical for Holley Nethercote to deal with individuals who are not identified.

4. UNSOLICITED PERSONAL INFORMATION

Holley Nethercote may receive unsolicited personal information about you.  We destroy or de-identify all unsolicited personal information we receive, unless it is relevant to Holley Nethercote’s purposes for collecting personal information.  We may retain additional information we receive about you if it is combined with other information we are required or entitled to collect.  If we do this, we will retain the information in the same way we hold your other personal information.

5. WHO DO WE COLLECT PERSONAL INFORMATION ABOUT?

The personal information we may collect and hold includes (but is not limited to) personal information about:

  • clients and potential clients, their employees or other representatives;
  • visitors to our website, when making general enquiries, we may collect data such as the user’s IP address and browser user agent string to help spam detection;
  • service providers or suppliers;
  • prospective employees, employees and contractors; and
  • other third parties with whom we or our clients come into contact.

6. WEBSITE COLLECTION

We collect personal information when we receive completed online generated forms from our website – www.hnlaw.com.au and hnhub.com.au.  We may also use third parties to analyse traffic at that website, which may involve the use of cookies.  Information collected through such analysis is anonymous.

To use our website, you must consent to our use of cookies.  You can withdraw or modify your consent to our use of cookies at any time.  If you no longer wish to receive cookies, you can use your web browser settings to accept, refuse and delete cookies.  To do this, follow the instructions provided by your browser.  Please note that if you set your browser to refuse cookies, you may not be able to use some the features of our website.

Cookies do not contain personal information in themselves, but can be used to identify a person when combined with other information.  Cookies are small text files which are transferred to your computer’s hard drive through your web browser that enables our website to recognise your browser and capture and remember certain information.  This includes facilitating your use of previously viewed pages on our website, as well as saving your login details to use our HN Hub.

We also use cookies to understand how users interact with our website, to compile aggregate data about our website traffic, including where our website visitors are located, and interaction so that we can offer better user experiences.

We also use analytics on the site.  We do not pass any personally identifiable information through this function, however, the data we collect may be combined with other information which may be identifiable to you.

As we use website cookies, and are required to comply with the GDPR, we have a created a ‘pop up’ message on our website, which states:

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website.  By using this website, you agree to the use of cookies in accordance with our Privacy Policy. [OK]

If you visit our login page on the HN Hub, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies.  This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.

When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices.  Login cookies last for thirty days and screen options cookies last for a year.  If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed.

7. WHY DO WE COLLECT PERSONAL INFORMATION?

We may use and disclose the information we collect about you for the following purposes:

  • provide you with our legal services and compliance products or services;
  • review and meet your ongoing needs;
  • provide you with information that might be of interest to you;
  • let you know about other products or services we offer;
  • send you information about special offers or invite you to events;
  • consider any concerns or complaints you may have;
  • comply with relevant laws, regulations and other legal obligations; and
  • help us improve the products and services offered to our clients and enhance our overall business.

We may use and disclose your personal information for any of these purposes.  We may also use and disclose your personal information for secondary purposes which are related to the primary purposes set out above, or in other circumstances authorised by the Privacy Act.

Sensitive information will be used and disclosed only for the purpose for which it was provided (or a directly related secondary purpose), unless you agree otherwise, or an exemption in the Privacy Act applies.

8. WHO MIGHT WE DISCLOSE PERSONAL INFORMATION TO?

We may disclose your personal information to:

  • a related entity of Holley Nethercote;
  • other parties you have engaged (or we have engaged on your behalf) or that we are associated with, such as barristers, consultants, and business associates;
  • agents, professional advisers or service providers we engage to carry out our functions and activities, such as our lawyers, accountants, insurers, mercantile agents, website analytics and spam detection service providers and couriers;
  • organisations involved in managing our payments, including payment merchants and financial institutions, such as banks;
  • regulatory bodies, government agencies, law enforcement bodies and courts;
  • others you have authorised us to disclose it to, or as required by law.

If we disclose your personal information to service providers that perform business activities for us, they may only use your personal information for the specific purpose for which we supply it.  We will ensure that all contractual arrangements with third parties adequately address privacy issues, and we will make third parties aware of this Privacy Policy.

9. SENDING INFORMATION OVERSEAS

We will not send personal information to recipients outside of Australia unless:

  • we have taken reasonable steps to ensure that the recipient does not breach the Privacy Act, or the APPs; or
  • the recipient is subject to a similar information privacy regime, similar to the Privacy act; or
  • the individual has consented to the disclosure.

If you consent to your personal information being disclosed to an overseas recipient, and the recipient breaches the APPs, we will not be accountable for that breach under the Privacy Act, and you will not be able to seek redress under the Privacy Act.

10. MANAGEMENT OF PERSONAL INFORMATION / HOW WE HOLD YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

Holley Nethercote recognises the importance of securing the personal information of our clients.  We take steps to ensure your personal information is protected from misuse, interference or loss, and unauthorised access, modification or disclosure.

Your personal information is generally stored in our computer database and secure third party systems.  Any paper files are stored in secure areas.  In relation to information that is held on our computer database, we apply the following guidelines:

  • passwords are required to access the system;
  • employees have restricted access to certain sections of the system;
  • the system automatically notifies admin of all unauthorised access attempts;
  • unauthorised employees are barred from updating and editing personal information;
  • all computers which contain personal information are secured both physically and electronically;
  • data is encrypted during transmission over the network;
  • hard copy personal information is limited; and
  • all computers which contain personal information are secured electronically.

Any PAN information relating to bank accounts and credit cards that are stored on our system will be rendered unreadable in line with Payment Card Industry Data Security Data Standards.

Where our employees work remotely or from home, we implement the following additional security measures:

  • two-factor authentication is enabled for all remote working arrangements;
  • password complexity is enforced, and employees are required to change their password at regular intervals;
  • employees may not make hard copies of documents containing personal information, nor may they email documents containing personal information to their personal email accounts; and
  • employees may not disclose an individual client’s personal information to third parties (including, but not limited to, persons or entities which are not employed by or contracted to us) via online messaging apps or social media accounts.

11. DIRECT MARKETING

Holley Nethercote may only use personal information we collect from you for the purposes of direct marketing without your consent if:

  • the personal information does not include sensitive information;
  • you would reasonably expect us to use or disclose the information for the purpose of direct marketing;
  • we provide a simple way of opting out of direct marketing; and
  • you have not requested to opt out of receiving direct marketing from us.

If we collect personal information about you from a third party, we will only use that information for the purposes of direct marketing if you have consented (or it is impracticable to obtain your consent), and we will provide a simple means by which you can easily request not to receive direct marketing communications from us, for example, through an ‘unsubscribe’ button or by emailing us to notify us directly.  We will draw your attention to the fact you may make such a request in our direct marketing communications.

You have the right to request us not to use or disclose your personal information for the purposes of direct marketing, or for the purposes of facilitating direct marketing by other organisations.  We must give effect to the request within a reasonable period of time.  You may also request that we provide you with the source of the information.  If such a request is made, we must notify you of the source of the information free of charge within a reasonable period of time.

12. IDENTIFIERS

We do not adopt identifiers assigned by the Government (such as driver’s licence numbers) for our own file recording purposes, unless one of the exemptions in the Privacy Act applies.

13. HOW DO WE KEEP PERSONAL INFORMATION ACCURATE AND UP-TO-DATE?

We are committed to ensuring that the personal information we collect, hold, use and disclose is relevant, accurate, complete and up-to-date.

We encourage you to contact us if any personal information we hold about you needs to be updated.  For users that register for our HN Hub, we store your personal information provided in your user profile and our secure database.  All users can see, edit or delete their personal information at any time (except the username).  Website administrators also have access to view and edit such information.  If we correct any personal information that has previously been disclosed to another APP entity, we will take reasonable steps to notify the other APP entity of the correction, unless it is impracticable or unlawful to do so.  Where we are satisfied information is inaccurate, we will take reasonable steps to correct the information within 30 days, unless you agree otherwise.  We will not charge you for correcting your personal information.

14. ACCESSING YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

Subject to exceptions in the Privacy Act, you can access the personal information that we hold about you by contacting our Privacy Officer.  We will generally provide access within 30 days of your request.  If we refuse to provide you with access to the information, we will provide reasons for the refusal.

We will require identity verification and specification of what information is required.  An administrative fee for search and photocopying costs may be charged for providing access.

For users who have registered to the HN Hub via our website, you can access your user profile and edit or delete any personal information contained there.  You can also request to receive an exported file of the personal data we hold about you, or any user comments left on our website, including any data you have provided to us.  You can request that we erase any personal data we hold about you.  (Note, this does not include any data we are obliged to keep for, legal, or security purposes.)

15. EMBEDDED CONTENT FROM OTHER WEBSITES

Articles on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.).  Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.

These websites may collect data about you, use of cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

16. UPDATES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY

This Privacy Policy will be reviewed from time-to-time to take account of new laws and technology, and changes to our operations and the business environment.

17. RESPONSIBILITIES

It is the responsibility of management to inform employees and other relevant third parties about this Privacy Policy.  Management ensures that employees and other relevant third parties are advised of any changes to this Privacy Policy. All new employees are provided with timely and appropriate access to this Privacy Policy.  Employees or other relevant third parties that do not comply with this Privacy Policy may be subject to disciplinary action.

18. NON-COMPLIANCE AND DISCIPLINARY ACTIONS

Privacy breaches are to be reported to management by employees and relevant third parties.  Ignorance of this Privacy Policy will not be an acceptable excuse for non-compliance.  Employees or other relevant third parties that do not comply with this Privacy Policy may be subject to disciplinary action.

19. MAKING A COMPLAINT / INCIDENTS / COMPLAINTS HANDLING

We have an effective complaints handling process in place to manage privacy risks and issues.

The complaints handling process involves:

  • identifying (and addressing) any systemic/ongoing compliance problems;
  • publishing our privacy procedures; and
  • helping to build and preserve our reputation and business.

You can make a complaint to us about the treatment or handling of your personal information by lodging a complaint with the Privacy Officer.

If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, or wish to make a complaint about how we have handled your personal information, you can lodge a complaint with us by:

  • telephoning – +61 3 9670 8200
  • writing – Holley Nethercote Privacy Officer, 22/140 William Street, Melbourne VIC 3000
  • emailing – law@hnlaw.com.au

If you are not satisfied with our response to your complaint, you can also refer your complaint to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner by:

20. CONTRACTUAL ARRANGEMENTS WITH THIRD PARTIES

We ensure that all contractual arrangements with third parties adequately address privacy issues, and we make third parties aware of this Privacy Policy.

Third parties will be required to implement policies in relation to the management of your personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act.  These policies include:

  • regulating the collection, use and disclosure of personal and sensitive information;
  • de-identifying personal and sensitive information wherever possible;
  • ensuring that personal and sensitive information is kept securely, with access to it only by authorised employees or agents of the third parties; and
  • ensuring that the personal and sensitive information is only disclosed to organisations which are approved by us.

21. YOUR RIGHTS

This Privacy Policy contains information about how:

  • you may access the personal information we hold about you;
  • you may seek the correction of your personal information;
  • you may ask us to provide an alternative means of identity verification for the purposes of the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006 (Cth);
  • you may complain about a breach of the Privacy Act, including the APPs; and
  • we will deal with a privacy complaint.

ANNEXURE A: GDPR

The following are key terms used in the GDPR which are not used in the APPs:

Controller means the natural or legal person which, alone or jointly with others, determines the purposes and means of the processing of personal data.  (This is an APP entity under the Privacy Act).

Data Subject means an identified or Identifiable Natural Person.  (This is an individual under the Privacy Act.)

Identifiable Natural Person means one who can be identified, directly or indirectly, in particular by reference to an identifier such as a name, an identification number, location data, an online identifier or to one or more factors specific to the physical, physiological, genetic, mental, economic, cultural or social identity of that natural person. (This is an individual under the Privacy Act.)

Personal data means any information relating to a Data Subject.  (This is similar to personal information under the Privacy Act.)

Processing means any operation or set of operations which is performed on personal data or on sets of personal data, whether or not by automated means, such as collection, recording, organisation, structuring, storage, adaptions or alteration, retrieval, consultation, use, disclosure by transmission, dissemination or otherwise making available, alignment or combination, restriction, erasure or destruction.  (There is no single concept in the Privacy Act that is equivalent.  The Privacy Act uses concepts of “collection”, “use” and “disclosure”.)

Processor means a natural or legal person, or other body which processes personal data on behalf of the controller.  (There is no direct equivalent concept in the Privacy Act other than references to “third parties” who deal with personal information on behalf of or for an APP entity.)