About us

When we refer to personal information we mean information from which your identity is reasonably apparent.  This information may include information or an opinion about you.

The kinds of personal information we may collect about you include your name, date of birth, address, account details, occupation, and any other information we made need to identify you.

If you are applying for finance we may also collect the ages and number of your dependants and cohabitants, the length of time at your current address, your employment details and proof of earnings and expenses. If you apply for any insurance product through us we may also collect your health information.  We will only collect health information from you with your consent.

The personal information we collect and hold about you may include credit information.  Credit information is information which is used to assess your eligibility to be provided with finance and may include any finance that you have outstanding, your repayment history in respect of those loans, and any defaults.  Usually, credit information is exchanged between credit and finance providers and credit reporting bodies.

If you want to purchase any of our services we may also need to collect your payment information.  We will also collect this information if we need to make payments to you.  If you apply for employment with us we will collect information about your work history and ask your referees about you.

We collect personal information for the purposes of assessing your application for finance and managing that finance.  We may also collect your personal information for the purposes of direct marketing and managing our relationship with you.  From time to time we may offer you other products and services.

If you apply for employment with us we will collect information about you to assist us to decide whether to appoint you.

We collect payment information if necessary in order to process your payments.

To enable us to maintain a successful business relationship with you, we may disclose your personal information to other organisations that provide products or services used or marketed by us.  The types of organisations to which we are likely to disclose information about you include other mortgage intermediaries, lenders, valuers, lenders mortgage insurers, surveyors, accountants, credit reporting bodies, recoveries firms, debt collectors and lawyers.

Where reasonable and practical we will collect your personal information directly from you.  We may also collect your personal information from credit reporting bodies, finance brokers and other people such as accountants, lawyers and referees.

We may disclose your personal information:

to prospective funders/lenders, lenders mortgage insurers and credit reporting bodies or other intermediaries in relation to your finance requirements (Note: this will only occur with your authorisation);

• to companies that provide software and infrastructure systems to us;
• to our affiliated companies, such as The Property Couch and Location Score. (Note: The provision of this information will be for marketing purposes only.)
• to anybody who represents you, such as finance brokers, lawyers, financial planners and accountants (Note: this will only occur with your authorisation);
• where we are required to do so by law, such as under the Anti-Money or Laundering and Counter Terrorism Financing Act 2006 (Cth) or in accordance with a subpoena or summons issued by a court.

We may collect the following kinds of credit information and exchange this information with credit reporting bodies and other entities:

• credit liability information about your existing finance which includes but is not limited to the name of the credit provider, the type of finance, the day the finance is entered into, the terms and conditions of the finance, the maximum amount of finance available, borrowing capacity and the day on which the finance was terminated;
• repayment history information which is information about whether you meet your repayments on time;
• information about the type of finance that you are applying for; and
• default and payment information.

We exchange this credit information for the purposes of assessing your application for finance, managing that finance and any outstanding liabilities to us.

This credit information may be held by us in electronic form on our secure servers and may also be held in paper form.  We may use cloud storage to store the credit information we hold about you.

If or when we obtain credit information from a credit reporting body about you, we may also seek publicly available information and information about any serious credit infringement that you may have committed.

The law requires us to advise you of ‘notifiable matters’ in relation to how we may use your credit information.  You may request to have these notifiable matters (and this privacy policy) provided to you in an alternative form.

We exchange your credit information with credit reporting bodies and/or debt collection companies.  We use the credit information that we exchange with the credit reporting body and/or debt collection companies to assess your creditworthiness, assess your application for finance, manage your finance or any outstanding liabilities with us.

If you fail to meet your payment obligations in relation to any finance that we have provided or arranged or you have committed a serious credit infringement then we may disclose this information to a credit reporting body and/or debt collection companies.

You have the right to request access to the credit information that we hold about you and make a request for us to correct that credit information if needed.  Please see the heading Access and correction to your personal and credit information below.

Sometimes your credit information will be used by credit reporting bodies for the purposes of ‘pre-screening’ credit offers on the request of other credit providers.  You can contact the credit reporting body at any time to request that your credit information is not used in this way.

You may contact the credit reporting body to advise them that you believe that you may have been a victim of fraud.  For a period of 21 days after the credit reporting body receives your notification the credit reporting body must not use or disclose that credit information.  You can contact any of the following credit reporting bodies for more information:

• veda.com.au,
• dnb.com.au, or
• experian.com.au.

From time to time we may use your personal information to provide you with current information about finance, financial services, Property and money matters, offers you may find of interest, changes to our organisation, or new products or services being offered by us or any company with whom we are associated.

Empower Wealth may in its absolute discretion choose to provide the name and email address of subscribers to its affiliated companies. The provision of this information will be for marketing purposes only.

If you do not wish to receive marketing information, you may at any time decline to receive such information by emailing us at info@banctecmortgages.com.au or by phoning us on 1300 664 229.  If the direct marketing is by email you may also use the unsubscribe function. We will not charge you for giving effect to your request and will take all reasonable steps to meet your request within a reasonable timeframe.

It is important to us that the personal information we hold about you is accurate and up to date.  During the course of our relationship with you we may ask you to inform us if any of your personal information has changed.

If you wish to make any changes to your personal information, you may contact us.  We will generally rely on you to ensure the information we hold about you is accurate and complete.

Most of the personal information that we hold about you will be kept under the Banctec Mortgages CRM system. Upon your request, you will have access to this information via our Secure Link with your own username and password and you can update it at any time.

We will provide you with access to any other personal and credit information we hold about you.  You may request access to any of the personal information we hold about you at any time.

We may charge a fee for our costs of retrieving and supplying the information to you.

Depending on the type of request that you make we may respond to your request immediately, otherwise we aim to respond within 30 days of receiving your request.  We may need to contact other entities to properly investigate your request.

There may be situations where we are not required to provide you with access to your personal information, for example, if the information relates to existing or anticipated legal proceedings, or if your request is vexatious.

An explanation will be provided to you if we deny you access to the personal information we hold about you.

If any of the personal information we hold about you is incorrect, inaccurate or out of date you may request that we correct the information.  If appropriate we will correct the personal information.  At the time of the request, otherwise, we will provide an initial response to you within seven days of receiving your request.  Where reasonable, and after our investigation, we will provide you with details about whether we have corrected the personal information within 30 days.

We may need to consult with other entities as part of our investigation.

If we refuse to correct personal information we will provide you with our reasons for not correcting the information.

When we collect government identifiers, such as your tax file number, we do not use or disclose this information other than as required by law.  We will never use a government identifier to identify you.

In most circumstances it will be necessary for us to identify you in order to successfully do business with you, however, where it is lawful and practicable to do so, we will offer you the opportunity of doing business with us without providing us with personal information, for example, if you make general inquiries about interest rates or current promotional offers.

We will only collect sensitive information about you with your full consent.  Sensitive information is personal information that includes information relating to your racial or ethnic origin, political persuasion, memberships in trade or professional associations or trade unions, sexual preferences, criminal record, or health.

We will take reasonable steps to protect your personal information by storing it in a secure environment.  We may store your personal information in paper and electronic form. We will also take reasonable steps to protect any personal information from misuse, loss and unauthorised access, modification or disclosure.

When we share data, it may be transferred to, and processed outside of Australia. Some data is stored within 3rd party software suppliers, where external access is prevented; and cloud service providers whose servers are located outside of Australia.

Personal data on servers operated by cloud service providers are protected by the appropriate safeguards, which are incorporated into our agreements with such cloud service providers. For further information, please contact us via  info@banctecmortgages.com.au.

If you are dissatisfied with how we have dealt with your personal information, or you have a complaint about our compliance with the Privacy Act, you may contact our complaints officer by email at: info@banctecmortgages.com.au.

We will acknowledge your complaint within seven days.  We aim to provide you with a decision on your complaint within 30 days.

If you are dissatisfied with the response of our complaints officer you may make a complaint to our External Dispute Resolution Scheme, the Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA)  which can be contacted on either www.afca.com.au or 1800 931 678 or the Privacy Commissioner which can be contacted on either www.oaic.gov.au or 1300 363 992.

You may request further information about the way we manage your personal or credit information by contacting us at info@banctecmortgages.com.au.

We are constantly reviewing all of our policies and attempt to keep up to date with market expectations.  Technology is constantly changing, as is the law and market place practices.

As a consequence we may change this privacy policy from time to time or as the need arises.