Privacy Policy

Last updated: 23 March 2011

1. Protecting your privacy

TPA (“TPA”, “we” or “us”) is committed to protecting your privacy. Set out below is our policy for protecting and managing the personal information we collect from you.

2. Your personal information

Personal information held by TPA may include your name, date of birth, address, telephone number, email address, bank account or credit card details (if purchasing a product or service from us), occupation, and a TPA username or password (if applicable). We also hold details of TPA products and services you have acquired, as well as certain details about your personal interests.

If you choose not to provide certain personal information (e.g. your email address), we may not be able to provide you with the products or services you have requested, or the levels of service on which we pride ourselves.

3. How we collect personal information

TPA collects personal information in a number of ways, including:

  • directly from you, when you provide information by phone, mail or email, or when you submit your personal details in a form on one of TPA’s websites;
  • from publicly available sources of information;
  • from the organisations identified below under “When we disclose your personal information”;
  • from TPA’s own records of how you use your TPA products or services; or
  • when legally required to do so.

4. How we use your personal information

We may use your personal information to:

  • verify your identity;
  • provide the products or services you have requested;
  • administer and manage those services, including charging, billing and collecting debts;
  • inform you of ways the products or services provided to you could be improved;
  • conduct appropriate checks for credit-worthiness and for fraud;
  • research and develop TPA’s products and services;
  • gain an understanding of your information and communication needs in order for TPA to provide you with a better service;
  • maintain and develop TPA’s business systems and infrastructure, including testing and upgrading these systems; and
  • to promote and market our services to you (including by way of email, direct mail, telemarketing, or other means).

TPA will only send you marketing and promotional material sent via email if you have elected to receive it (i.e. opt-in) or if it is provided in response to your request. You can opt out of receiving emails from us at any time. However, if you do so, we may not be able to supply or continue to supply you with the products or services you have requested from us.

5. When we disclose your personal information

TPA will not sell, rent or disclose your personal information except where:

(a) it is necessary for us to provide our products and services to you – for example, where we need to disclose your personal information to organisations outside of TPA in order for them to carry out TPA’s:

  • customer enquiries;
  • mailing operations;
  • billing and debt-recovery functions;
  • information technology services;
  • installation, maintenance and repair services;
  • marketing, telemarketing and door-knocking services;
  • market research; and
  • website usage analysis.

TPA takes reasonable steps to ensure that these organisations are bound by confidentiality and privacy obligations aimed at protecting your personal information.

(b) you have authorised TPA to disclose your personal information to your authorised representatives or your legal advisers (e.g. when requested by you to do so);

(c) to any of the following:

(i) credit-reporting and fraud-checking agencies;

(ii) credit providers (for credit related purposes such as credit-worthiness, credit rating, credit provision and financing);

(iii) TPA’s related companies (if any);

(iv) TPA’s professional advisers, including its accountants, auditors and lawyers;

(v) government and regulatory authorities and other organisations, as required or authorised by law; and

(vi) organisations who manage TPA’s business and corporate strategies, including those involved in a transfer/sale of all or part of its assets or business (including accounts and trade receivables) and those involved in managing TPA’s corporate risk and funding functions (e.g. securitisation).

6. TPA’s websites

TPA provides products and services via its various websites. When you visit our sites, our web servers record anonymous information such as the time, date and URL of the request. This information assists us to improve the structure of our websites and monitor their performance.

We may use “cookies” on our websites to help remember your preferences, and assist us to improve your experience of our websites. A cookie is a small text file that our websites may place on your computer. These are an industry standard and most major websites use them.

In some cases, cookies may collect and store personal information about you. TPA extends the same privacy protection to your personal information, whether gathered via cookies or from other sources. You can adjust your Internet browser to disable cookies or to warn you when cookies are being used. However, if you disable cookies, you may not be able to access certain areas of our websites or take advantage of the improved website experience that cookies offer.

Third party advertisers or advertising networks may also use cookies to display advertisements on our site, based on your visit to our website and other websites on the Internet. In the case of advertising served by Google, you may opt out of the use of Google’s DART cookie by visiting the Google ad and content network privacy policy.

TPA also collects Internet Protocol (IP) addresses. IP addresses are assigned to computers on the Internet to uniquely identify them within the global Internet network. TPA collects and manages IP addresses as part of the service of providing Internet session management and for security purposes.

7. Help us to ensure we hold accurate information

TPA takes all reasonable steps to ensure that the personal information we collect, use and disclose is accurate, complete and up-to-date. To help us do this you need to:

  • let TPA know if there are any errors in your personal information; and
  • keep TPA up-to-date with changes to your personal information such as your name or address.

8. You can access your personal information

You may access your personal information, subject to some exceptions allowed by law. For security reasons, you need to put your request in writing. You can either send it to us by mail, or email it to us.

TPA reserves the right to charge a fee for searching for and providing access to your information.

9. How to contact us

If you have any questions in relation to privacy, please write to us or call TPA between 9.00am and 5.00pm, Monday to Friday, Australian Eastern time.