Privacy Policy
Contents
2. What personal information do we collect?
3. How do we collect your personal information?
4. Are you required to provide your personal information?
5. Why do we collect, use and disclose your personal information?
6. To whom do we disclose your personal information?
7. Direct marketing communications
8. Using our website and cookies
9. How do we store and keep your information secure?
10. Links to other websites
11. How long do we retain your personal information?
12. Accessing or correcting your personal information
13. Making a complaint
14. Contact us
Our commitment to privacy
RateUnity Pty Ltd (ACN 668 166 283, Australian Credit Licence 554016) (“RateUnity”, “we”, “us” or “our”) recognises the importance of protecting your privacy. We take privacy seriously and are committed to safeguarding individuals’ personal information.
We comply with all relevant privacy laws, including the requirements of the Australian Privacy Principles under the Australian Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (Privacy Act) and any other applicable privacy laws.
Our Privacy Policy sets out how we look after personal information. It explains the kinds of personal information we collect and why we collect it. It also describes how we hold, use, and disclose personal information.
​
We may modify this policy from time to time by publishing updates to it on our website. We encourage you to check our website periodically to ensure you are aware of our current privacy policy.
What personal information do we collect?
Personal information includes information or an opinion, whether true or not, about an identified individual or an individual who is reasonably identifiable. The personal information we hold about you may also include sensitive information which is a subset of personal information and credit information.
The personal information that we collect depends on the nature of your interactions with us. RateUnity only collects personal information that is reasonably necessary for us to conduct and operate our business, including the marketing of our services. The types of personal information which we collect may include:
-
personal details such as your name, age or date of birth, nationality, gender, contact number, address (including the length of time at your current address) and email address, tax file number, marital or relationship status and the ages and number of your dependents;
-
identity verification information such as your passport, driver’s licence or Medicare details;
-
professional details such as your occupation and other information as necessary and relevant about your employment history;
-
the name of your current bank or credit provider and information about the products you have with each current bank or provider;
-
information about your financial position and credit-worthiness, such as your assets and liabilities, annual income, tax and financial statements, credit report or credit score, information in respect of any loans you hold including current balance, repayment history and any defaults, financial hardship information, information about any credit cards you hold including the type of card, average monthly spend and average monthly repayments;
-
where it is reasonably necessary for us to do so and with your consent, sensitive information such as information about your race or ethnicity, political or religious beliefs, sexual preferences, criminal record and health (including biometric data);
-
information about you that is collected from publicly available sources or provided to us by others, for instance, the media, social networking websites, regulatory websites and credit reporting bureaus;
-
information regarding your use of our website, including through the use of browser cookies, such as information to identify the device, IP address and internet service provider you use to access our website and information that you provide to us via our website such as your user name and password or if you use a forum, feedback/rating tool, calculator, online survey or other tool or input form on our website (as further set out under "Using our website and cookies" below);
-
records of communications and dealings with you, such as emails, SMS, telephone, live chat and in-person communications;
-
your marketing and communication preferences; and
-
any other personal information that may be required or relevant to assess your eligibility to be provided with finance or otherwise to facilitate your dealings with us.
​
We generally do not seek to collect sensitive personal information, unless it is necessary for our business purposes. Sensitive personal information includes information relating to your race or ethnicity, religious or political beliefs, sexual preferences, trade union or other professional associations or memberships, criminal record and health (including biometric data). If we do have to collect sensitive personal information, we will do so in accordance with the Australian Privacy Principles — for example, we will only collect sensitive personal information about you with your consent and where it is reasonably necessary for us to do so, or if we are otherwise allowed or required by law to collect that information. If you provide us with sensitive personal information, we will consider that you have consented to us collecting it.
How do we collect your personal information?
We generally endeavour to collect your personal information directly from you. However, in some circumstances we may collect your personal information from third parties, such as your bank or credit provider, your advisers, mortgage broker, financial adviser, regulatory or credit reporting agencies or from a publicly available record.
We may also collect personal information about you indirectly through forms, emails, online queries and telephone conversations, promotional activities or surveys and through use of our website, applications and social media channels.
For other methods of collection, please see "Using our website and cookies" below.
Are you required to provide your personal information?
You may choose not to provide us with your personal information. However without such information, we may not be able to provide or tailor our services, products or information to you.
Why do we collect, use and disclose your personal information?
The personal information we collect will generally be used or disclosed for the purposes for which it is collected, and for any other purpose related to that primary purpose and for which you might reasonably expect us to use it (including as described in this policy).
In general, we may use your information to:
-
communicate with you and build and maintain our relationship with you;
-
provide our services and products to you and the services and products of our business partners, including to give you information about loan products or related services, or assessing your eligibility for a loan or any related service;
-
manage, develop and enhance our services and products, including for analytics, market research and business development;
-
conduct, monitor and analyse our business and internal operations;
-
send you marketing and promotional details and new service or product offerings, including information about the services and products of our business partners that we consider may be of interest to you (however, if you do not want to receive marketing emails from us, you can opt out at any time using the contact details set out below, or unsubscribe at this link: Unsubscribe)
-
comply with our legal and regulatory obligations; and
-
process and respond to your requests, enquiries or complaints.
To whom do we disclose your personal information?
We only disclose personal information for a purpose for which it was collected, or for a secondary purpose in circumstances permitted by law. This includes where you consent to us disclosing your personal information. You can give us your consent expressly or your consent may be implied.
We may disclose your personal information to:
-
your existing bank or credit provider and any prospective funder/ lender or other intermediary in relation to your finance requirements. We only work with those lenders who are able to provide competitive rates for our customers. Currently our lenders are: Hume Bank;
-
third-party service providers who assist us in the operation of our business or provide services to us or our customers (for example, information technology, web-hosting and data service providers, mortgage brokers, financial advisers, product specialists, credit reporting agencies, insurers, marketing or advertising providers, companies that provide identification verification services and customer analytics providers);
-
anybody who represents you, such as your financial adviser, broker, lawyer or accountant;
-
our officers, employees, related entities, agents, subcontractors, advisers, auditors, insurers, financiers, consultants and associates in connection with the conduct of our business; as permitted by law;
-
other organisations where necessary or reasonable to do so in relation to the operation of our business;
-
to any prospective investor or anyone who acquires or is considering acquiring our assets or business (or part of it);
-
specific third parties authorised by you to receive information held by us; and
-
other persons, including government agencies, regulatory bodies, law enforcement agencies and courts and as otherwise required or authorised by law.
In some circumstances, the parties to whom we disclose personal information may operate outside of Australia (for example, web-hosting and data storage providers located in the United States of America). When this occurs, we take reasonable steps to protect personal information against misuse or loss and must comply with certain safeguards under the Privacy Act in respect of the transfer of your data from one jurisdiction to another. Those parties may make such personal information available to their regulators and government of such countries in accordance with their respective local law requirements.
Sometimes, we disclose personal information to a third party who has the right to use our brand or logo. The third party may provide products or services, or operate a website or App, but these are not our products, services, websites or Apps. We do not accept responsibility for the privacy practices of the third parties in these circumstances.
Direct marketing communications
We may use or disclose your personal information for the purpose of sending you marketing materials to inform you about our services and products, the services and products of our business partners (including offers we may have negotiated for our customers), or other opportunities that may interest you or as otherwise permitted under applicable laws.
By providing us with your personal information, you consent to the use and disclosure of such information for marketing purposes via various means including e-mail, SMS and phone communications, push notifications, social media posts or chats, hardcopy mail and other similar means. If you no longer wish to receive marketing materials from us, you can opt-out via the relevant method provided for in an electronic marketing message you receive (e.g. via an ‘unsubscribe’ link) or write to the RateUnity Privacy Officer (refer to contact details below) at any time.
If you opt-out of receiving marketing material from us, we may still contact you in relation to our ongoing relationship with you.
Using our website and cookies
We may collect and store information about your use of our website, such as which pages you visit, the time and date of your visit and the IP (internet protocol) or MAC (media access control) address assigned to your device.
We and our internet service provider also collect information such as the pages you access on our website, the documents you download, the amount of time you spend on a page, which links you use to access our website and the type of device and browser you use. This information is used to improve the services we offer you, for statistical, website development and functionality purposes.
We may also use cookies to collect information about your activity on our website so that we can send you information we think may be of interest to you. A cookie is a small data file that may be placed on your computer by the websites that you visit. Cookies are necessary to allow our website and your computer to interact effectively and enhance security. Cookies can record information about your visit (such as a unique identifier or value to indicate whether you have visited a webpage) to assist us in better understanding your needs. For example, this data may be collected and used to infer demographic information about you using various web analytic technologies (e.g. Google Analytics) to help us analyse trends and understand our website users’ behaviour patterns in the aggregate. These technologies can also be used for targeted marketing, including across platform marketing. Information collected by the Google Analytics cookie or tracking tag is transmitted to, and stored by, Google in accordance with its privacy practices. To opt out of Google Analytics, please visit: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.
We may also use cookies from third party ad servers for the purpose of targeting our online advertisements on other sites. The cookies provided by the third party ad servers will collect information about the device you use to access our website (such as the type of device, the browser type or the operating system), your browsing behaviour (such as what you searched for, the pages you viewed, the date and time of the visit and how long you stayed) and the performance of our marketing campaigns (such as which ads or online content the user viewed or accessed). The information collected through this technology is not personally identifiable but such information will be shared with the third party ad servers for the purposes of showing you more relevant advertising on our website.
Most internet browsers are set up to accept cookies. If you do not wish to enable cookies, you may be able to change the settings of your browser to refuse all cookies or to notify you each time a cookie is sent to your computer. However if you do this, certain parts of our website may not function properly. If you do not want third party ad servers to use cookies for targeted advertising purposes, you can use an opt out mechanism provided by various advertising industry bodies such as Network Advertising Initiative opt-out (http://www.networkadvertising.org/choices/DAA).
When you download and use applications developed by us, we may collect and use your personal information in relation to your use of those applications, and for any other purposes which you consent to at the time. Where we do so, we will handle your personal information in accordance with any applicable terms of use of the application, and this policy.
How do we store and keep your information secure?
We may hold your personal information in either electronic or hard-copy form. We use a variety of physical and electronic security measures to keep your personal information secure from misuse, interference, loss or unauthorised access, use or disclosure. For example, we restrict physical access to our premises, employ firewalls, secure databases, user identifiers and passwords, data encryption, use cyber security services and frequently update our anti-virus software.
Although due care is taken, we cannot guarantee the security of information provided to us via electronic means or stored electronically. The internet is not a secure environment. No security measures are perfect and we cannot promise to be able to withstand security threats in all circumstances, although we take every precaution possible.
Where required by applicable law, we will notify you, and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner and/or other relevant regulatory authorities, of data breaches affecting your personal information.
Links to other websites
Our website and electronic communications may contain links to other websites operated by third parties. Unless expressly stated otherwise, RateUnity is not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of those linked websites. The privacy policies that apply to those other websites may differ from our privacy policy, so we encourage you to read them before using those websites.
How long do we retain your personal information?
Where we no longer need to use or disclose your personal information for any purpose required under the Privacy Act, this policy, or where we are not otherwise legally required to retain that information, we will take reasonable steps to either destroy or de-identify personal information.
Accessing or correcting your personal information
You have rights under the Privacy Act and Spam Act 2003 (Cth) to:
-
request access to personal information we hold about you;
-
ask us to update or correct any information that is inaccurate, incomplete or outdated; and
-
opt out of receiving direct marketing communications from us.
You can do any of these things by contacting our Privacy Compliance Officer using the contact details below.
If you request access to your personal information or ask us to correct or update information about you, we may need to verify your identity. We will process your request within a reasonable time, usually within 14 days after the request is made. More time may be needed, depending on the nature of the request. If a fee is charged for providing access to, or correcting, your personal information, you will be advised of the likely cost in advance.
​
In some circumstances, there may be a valid reason for us to deny your request to access or correct your information. If we do this, we will tell you why.
Making a complaint
If you think we have breached the Privacy Act, or you wish to make a complaint about the way we have handled your personal information or a request from you to access or correct your personal information, you can contact us using the details set out below. Please include your name, email address and telephone number and clearly describe your complaint.
Any complaint will be investigated by our Privacy Officer and the outcome of that investigation will be communicated to you as soon as we can do so. In most cases, we will investigate and respond to a complaint within 30 days of receipt of the complaint. If the matter is more complex, our investigation may take longer, in which case we will let you know.
If you are not satisfied with the outcome of any internal investigation we conduct, you may lodge a complaint with the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) at enquiries@oaic.gov.au or on 1300 363 992. More information is available on the OAIC’s website at https://www.oaic.gov.au/.
Contact Us
If you would like more information about how we handle your information or our approach to privacy, or to exercise any of your rights outlined above, please contact:
RateUnity Privacy Compliance Officer
info@rateunity.com.au
Updated 9 June 2024