privacy

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Advice & Wealth Partners Pty Ltd ('Advice & Wealth Partners') is committed to ensuring the confidentiality of your personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988 and the Australian Privacy Principles (APPS).

1. WHY WE COLLECT INFORMATION

We collect information for a number of reasons including:

• To deliver products or services to you;
• To better understand your requirements and preferences;
• To improve our service to you;
• Preparing your financial plan;
• To provide financial advice to you;
• Establish and manage your investments and accounts;
• Implement your investment and insurance instructions;
• Process any contributions, transfers or payments of benefits;
• Monitor and report the investment performance of your account;
• Reviewing your financial plan;
• To provide you with future products and services you may be interested in; and
• To fulfil our regulatory and legislative requirements.

2. HOW WE COLLECT THE INFORMATION

Information is generally collected:

• When we ascertain from you the facts necessary to make a fair and reasonable assessment of their insurance or financial needs and objectives (“Fact Find”);
• When you complete an application form for insurance;
• When you complete an application form for an insurance claim;
• When you complete an application form for investments;
• When you complete an application form for superannuation
• When you complete an application form to increase their level of insurance; or
• When you complete supplementary medical or financial questionnaires.

If you are unable to provide us with your personal information, we may not be able to organise for you to receive a product or service. You can nominate an Authorised Representative to access your personal information. This authority can be revoked at any time.

Advice & Wealth Partners may collect personal information from a third party (such as another Financial Adviser, Product Provider or Medical Practitioner) or a publicly available source but only if you have consented to the collection or it can reasonably be expected that consent has been provided by you.

2.1 - Privacy on the internet

Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives may use websites to collect personal information from you. Advice & Wealth Partners and Authorised Representatives may receive a password and a personal identification number to access details online. This information will be kept confidential and secure at all times.

2.1.1 - Cookies

These are text files stored on a person’s computer when they visit a website. Their sole purpose is to identify users and possibly prepare customised web pages or to save site login information. Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives may use cookies on our websites.

Cookies can be purged from your browser after every use. This is generally a very simple procedure. Please refer to your browser’s help file for more information.

2.1.2 - Links to third party websites

Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives may provide links on our web pages to external industry parties. The content and views expressed on these third-party websites are not the responsibility of Advice & Wealth Partners or our Authorised Representatives.

2.2 - Tax File Numbers

Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives may need to collect your tax file number to provide you with a product or a service (for example, managed fund investments and superannuation products). However, this information will be kept securely and destroy or we will permanently de-identify T.F.N. information where it is no longer required.

3. WHAT WE COLLECT

The personal information generally collected includes:

• Name;
• Address;
• Phone number;
• Email address;
• Age details;
• Occupation;
• Financial details;
• Health Details;
• Transaction information;
• Bank account details;
• Tax File Number;
• Income details from employers;
• Details of dependents;
• Beneficiary details.

Where the information is deemed to be sensitive, for example, the collection of health information, there will be higher level of privacy protection afforded.

4. DISCLOSURE OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

There may be cases where Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives will need to disclose your personal information to third parties. This is generally to assist us in providing you with a product or service. This may include:

• Doctors, medical services or other organisation to help assist with the collection of information for an insurance application or a claim;
• Any fund (investment administrator or superannuation trustee) to which your benefit is      transferred, created or rolled over;
• Your employer where it relates to your employer sponsored superannuation arrangement;
• Your personal representative or any other person who may be entitled to receive your death benefit;
• An external dispute resolution service, insurer or legal representative (where required or applicable);
• The policy owner (where you are the life insurer but not the owner);
• Exchange of information with authorised financial institutions to confirm bank account details for payment;
• Service providers that maintain, review and develop our business systems;
• Regulatory bodies (including the Australian Securities and Investment Commission) as required by law.

If required by law or a regulatory body to do so, Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives will comply and provide the appropriate body with the required information.

We do not currently disclose your personal information overseas. 

5. COLLECTION OF SENSITIVE INFORMATION

Where you apply for certain life risk products (such as life insurance, income protection insurance, trauma insurance, total and permanent disability insurance) it will be necessary for Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives to collect sensitive information about your health. This information will only be collected when you give consent by completing the product’s application form. The information will be sourced by the Life Insurance company from you, your medical professional and by other medical professionals where medical tests may have been performed. Due to confidentiality, it is sometimes the case whereby Advice & Wealth Partners or the Authorised Representative may not be made fully aware of the medical circumstances by the Life Insurance Company. 

Unless required by law, the collection of sensitive information should only occur if the client has consented to the collection of the information.

6. PRIVACY OFFICER

Advice & Wealth Partners and its directors will handle any queries or issues related to Privacy. The directors can be contacted as per below: 

Email: contact@awpartners.com.au
Post: PO Box 5007, North Rocks NSW 2151

Phone: 02 8006 1688

If you wish to make a complaint in relation to a potential breach of the Privacy Act or the APPs, Advice & Wealth Partners will address your concerns through their complaints handling process. All complaints will be given fair consideration and will aim to be resolved within 45 days. We encourage you to submit your complaint to the details above either via email to post. Where it is found that they are unable to finalise the investigation of a client’s complaint within 45 days, Advice & Wealth Partners will contact you to request an extension.

If you believe you did not receive a satisfactory resolution to your concern, you may contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner. You are able to do so by:

• Visiting www.oaic.gov.au and submitting an online form;
• Obtaining a hard copy form at www.oaic.gov.au/about-us/contact-us-page;
• Phone: 1300 363 992;
• Fax: 02 9284 9666;
• Email: enquiries@oaic.gov.au

The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner is also available via Social Medial outlets. Please refer to the Contact Us page at www.oaic.gov.au/about-us/contact-us-page.

7. SALE OF AN AUTHORISED REPRESENTATIVE'S BUSINESS

In the event that an Authorised Representative proposes to sell their business, or if an Authorised Representative is no longer eligible to provide advice, we may disclose some of your personal and sensitive information to potential purchasers for the purpose of conducting due diligence investigations. Any such disclosures will be made in the strictest confidence and conditional that no personal information will be used or disclosed by them. In the event of a sale being effected, Advice & Wealth Partners or our Authorised Representatives may transfer your personal information to the purchaser of the business.

In this instance, you will be provided a notice by mail to your last known mailing address that such a transfer will be taking place. You will then have the opportunity to object to the transfer within 14 days of the date of the notice.

8. ACCESS TO PERSONAL INFORMATION

You are able to access any personal information that is held by Advice & Wealth Partners or our Authorised Representatives subject to limited exceptions or required by law. The following factors will be considered:

• The information is related to a commercially sensitive decision-making process;
• Access would be unlawful;
• Denying access is required or authorised by or under law;
• Providing access would be likely to prejudice an investigation of possible unlawful activity.

To access the information, you will need to contact the Privacy Officer as detailed in this policy.

You may be charged a small fee applicable to the collection and provision of your personal information but will be notified of this fee prior to processing their request. The directors of Advice & Wealth Partners will be able to advise you how long it will take to provide the information. Generally, however, you will receive the requested information within 14 days of the request.

If you believe that the personal information, we hold about you is incorrect, you have a right to request your personal information be corrected.

Where we are unable to provide you with the information you have requested or correct your information, we will inform you and explain the reasons why.

8.1 - Anonymity and pseudonymity

You may remain anonymous or use a pseudonym when dealing with us. However, it may not be possible for us to assist you with your request if you wish to use a pseudonym or remain anonymous.

9. SECURITY

Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives strive to ensure the security, integrity and privacy of personally identifiable information. Only those authorised to do so are able to access such information. All your information is kept in a secure location and can only be accessed by authorised personnel.

However, although Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives strive to ensure a client’s security, no data transmission over the internet can be guaranteed to be completely secure.

Your personal information is kept for as long as it is required to meet the client’s financial product or service needs. For record keeping, it is generally kept for a further period of at least seven years.
Advice & Wealth Partners and Authorised Representatives are required to hold personal and sensitive information in as secure a position as possible. This will include but is not limited to:

• Locked offices;
• Locked filing cabinets;
• Limited access by staff;
• Storage via a third-party online provider;
• Storage via a third-party online platform.

Where the data is held by an online provider, Advice & Wealth Partners or the Authorised Representative should ensure that access is limited and the data is held by a provider whose only aim is storage. Those who have access to personal information should have the appropriate training, knowledge, skills and commitment to protect personal information from unauthorised access or misuse.

Advice & Wealth Partners and our Authorised Representatives are required to take reasonable steps to destroy or de-identify personal information held once it is no longer needed for any purpose for which it may be used or disclosed.