Credit Information Policy

Dobson Mitchell & Allport Pty Ltd (ACN 143 016 586)
trading as Dobson Mitchell Allport

This policy was last updated 22 August 2017.
The latest version of this policy is published online at http://www.doma.com.au/credit/

Dobson Mitchell Allport is committed to ensuring your privacy is protected. We comply with the Privacy Act 1988.

Throughout this policy we are referred to as Dobson Mitchell Allport, we or us. We refer to an individual as you.

This policy explains how we comply with the Privacy Act 1988 when collecting, using, disclosing, storing and destroying your credit information. It also explains how you can access or correct credit information we hold about you and what you can do if you think your privacy has been interfered with.

This policy is divided into sections which apply to different types of individuals whose credit information we collect. There is also a section at the end which applies to everyone.

What credit information does this policy cover?

Personal information is information or an opinion about an identified individual, or an individual who is reasonably identifiable.

Credit information is personal information about you which is also:

• Identification information (including name, address, date of birth, sex, current or last
• mployer, driver licence number, previous names and two previous addresses)
• Information about your current and past consumer credit liabilities
• Information about other credit you have sought or obtained
• Information about your repayment of other credit
• Information held by a credit reporting body about you
• Information about your previous defaults, payments and payment arrangements relating to credit provided to you
• Information about your insolvency
• Information about court proceedings involving you
• Publicly available information about your creditworthiness

This policy deals with credit information when we are acting as a credit provider, agent of a credit provider or a professional legal advisor to a credit provider. We also have a general privacy policy at http://www.doma.com.au/privacy/ which deals with how we handle other personal information.

How do you contact us?

The person responsible for privacy at Dobson Mitchell Allport is our privacy officer. You can contact our privacy officer in the following ways:

What credit information do we collect and hold?

Dobson Mitchell Allport collects and holds a range of credit information, including identification information, insolvency information, court proceedings information, publicly available information including from the Personal Property Securities Register and information obtained from credit reporting bodies. We may also derive information about your credit worthiness from information we obtain from credit reporting bodies, for example by associating you with categories of risk.

We also collect and hold information about your current and previous credit liabilities. This can include information about credit we provide to you as well as information we obtain with your consent from other credit providers.

Where we are providing a legal service we may collect credit information about you from the client for whom we are acting. This may also occur where we are acting for a party considering engaging in a securitisation arrangement, mortgage insurance or business purchase related to an entity that provides you with credit. We will do this only in accordance with the law.

Why do we use your credit information?

We collect, hold, use and disclose your credit information for the purpose of providing you with credit, managing that credit and recovering any debts you owe to us.

We may also collect, hold, use and disclose your credit information for the purpose of providing legal services to one of our clients.

When do we disclose your credit information to others?

We will only disclose your credit information to another entity when permitted by law. When we are acting as a credit provider or agent of a credit provider this includes:

• disclosing information with your consent
• disclosing information to others who are also parties to a credit application you submitted, as principals or guarantors
• disclosing applications for credit, credit terms, defaults and serious credit infringements to credit reporting bodies.

When we are acting as a professional legal advisor to a credit provider we will not disclose your credit information to anyone other than our client unless required or permitted by law.

We are required by law to disclose some information to the Law Society of Tasmania, the Legal Profession Board, the Migration Agents Registration Authority and certain other relevant authorities where applicable.

Your information may be disclosed to our service providers or professional advisors where necessary for our activities, for example to barristers, IT service providers, accountants, auditors or insurers. This will only be done where permitted by the Privacy Act.

We will not disclose your credit information to anyone without an Australian link unless they are the credit provider or the disclosure is otherwise permitted by law.

How can you access credit information we have about you?

You may at any time request access to your credit information and we will give you access by providing you with copies of or allowing you to inspect the requested information, unless:

• giving access would be unlawful
• denying access is required or authorised by or under an Australian law or a court/tribunal order; or
• giving access would be likely to prejudice one or more enforcement related activities conducted by, or on behalf of, an enforcement body.

Please note that generally we are unable to provide access to any material in client files without the consent of that client.

We may charge you a reasonable fee to access that information, for example to recover the costs of photocopying or if we have to spend a significant amount of time to provide you with access. We may need to verify your identity before providing access to your information.

If we refuse you access to your personal information, we will provide you with an explanation for that refusal. We will try to provide you with access to your personal information within 14 days of receipt of your written request for access or 30 days where responding to the request is more complicated.

What if your credit information is not correct?

We will take reasonable steps to ensure your credit information held by us is up-to-date, complete and accurate. If your information changes or you believe our records are not up-to-date, complete and accurate please contact us. If we agree the information needs correcting, we will take reasonable steps to correct that information.

In order to determine whether that information needs to be corrected we may consult a credit reporting body or a credit provider, for example to confirm that a debt has been discharged. If we correct your information and we have previously disclosed that information to another entity then we will also disclose the correction to that other entity.

If we do not agree the information needs correcting, you can ask us to put a statement on your file explaining what you say needs to be corrected. We will do that in such a way as is apparent to our staff who use your personal information. If we refuse to correct your personal information, we will provide you with a written explanation for that refusal.

We will try to resolve all requests within 14 days of receipt of your written request or 30 days where the matter is more complicated. We will not charge a fee to correct information.

How do you complain about interferences with your privacy?

If you are concerned about an interference with your privacy, this policy, the Credit Reporting Code or Part IIIA of the Privacy Act then please submit a complaint in writing, marked to the attention of the Privacy Officer. We will consider and respond to your complaint within 10 working days. We will seek to resolve the complaint with you. We prefer to address all matters in this manner prior to a complaint being taken further.

You can make a complaint about interferences with your privacy to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner. Their contact details are: