This Privacy Policy applies to the handling and management of your personal information by or on behalf of Eight Homes ABN 87 100 090 560 (Eight Homes, we, us or our).

We have created this Privacy Policy to demonstrate our commitment to the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) contained in the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (Privacy Act).  The APPs govern the way in which we collect, use, disclose, store, secure and dispose of your personal information in the course of running our business.

For the purposes of this Privacy Policy, personal information has the meaning set out in the Privacy Act and, in general terms, includes information or an opinion (whether true or not) that identifies an individual.

This Privacy Policy explains in general terms how we manage, and your right to request access to, personal information that we hold about you.

However, please note that this Privacy Policy does not apply to any third-party websites, platforms or applications that may be linked to any Eight Homes website (www.8homes.com.au).  We are not responsible for the privacy practices of the owners of such third-party websites and we recommend that you review the privacy policy of any third-party website, platform or application that asks you to provide your personal information.

1. What types of personal information do we collect?

The types of personal information we collect from you will depend on the type of dealings you have with us.  Generally, the kind of personal information that Eight Homes collects may include, but is not limited to:

• name;
• date of birth;
• email address, postal or residential address and telephone number;
• financial information including information about bank account details, income or financial circumstances;
• information about your access to and use of our websites (this may include information we receive from devices and operating systems used by you in accessing and using our websites;
• information (including image and/or voice recordings) collected via our CCTV systems; and
• any other information you elect to provide to us (whether as part of using our websites or otherwise).

2. How do we collect your personal information?

We will collect your personal information in the course of offering our products or services to you.  Generally, we will collect personal information from you directly, for example:

• when we interact with you in person or over the phone;
• from correspondence (whether in writing or electronically via email);
• when you complete questionnaires or forms or otherwise register your details with us;
• when you interact with us via our websites or via our social media pages;
• during our recruitment processes; and
• when we enter into a contract with you.

If you visit any of our display homes or our business premises, we may collect certain contact details that you provide to us and the date and time of your attendance, as well as personal information about you from our CCTV systems (e.g. your image and/or voice).  We use CCTV systems for the purposes of managing the safety and security of our premises, our staff and the general public.

Our call centre may record any telephone call for quality assurance and training purposes and to ensure that the service we provide to you is of a high standard. When you call us, or we call you, you will be notified that the phone call is being recorded and that you can tell your operator if you do not wish the recording to continue. If you proceed without exercising that option, you are taken to consent to the recording of the phone call and to our use of any personal information collecting during the phone call in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

We may also collect your personal information from third parties if you have consented to this.  Where we collect your personal information from a third party, such personal information will be held, used and disclosed by us in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

In addition, we may also obtain personal information from other sources in certain circumstances, including any personal information that you have made publicly available on social media sites, or from government or regulatory bodies as permitted by law.

3. Why do we need your personal information?

We collect, hold, use and disclose your personal information where it is reasonably necessary for our business functions or activities.  In particular, we collect and use your personal information for the following purposes:

• to offer or provide you with our products and services;
• to provide you with customer support and to seek feedback from you;
• to establish and maintain our relationship with you by, among other things, providing updates on products, promotions and services we think may be of interest to you;
• to conduct research on or evaluate our products and services;
• to confirm your identity;
• to interact with you via our websites;
• for marketing purposes (except where you have ‘opted out’ – see further information relating to direct marketing at section 4 below);
• to comply with our contractual and other legal requirements and to exercise our legal rights;
• in a recruitment context, to determine your eligibility and suitability to be employed by us; and
• for our own internal accounting and administrative purposes,

(the Primary Purposes).

Please note that you do not have to provide us with any personal information, however, if you do not, we may not be able to provide you with the full range of products or services, or otherwise provide you with information or customer support.

4. How do we use or disclose your personal information?

By submitting your personal information to us, you consent to us using or disclosing your personal information for:

• the Primary Purposes set out above; and
• any purpose related to the Primary Purposes that could be reasonably anticipated at the time your personal information was collected.

We may also use and disclose your personal information:

• with your consent (including any consent you have provided via any privacy or information collection statements or notices);
• where we are authorised or required to do so by law;
• to our related entities, third party partners or third party service providers who work with us in our business (for example, website hosting and cloud service providers, payment processors, security service providers and support service providers), to provide, promote or improve our products and services (including our websites);
• where reasonably necessary to assist a law enforcement agency; and
• as permitted under the APPs.

Use and disclosure of personal information outside Australia

We may disclose your personal information to third parties located outside Australia in order to carry out our business functions and assist us in providing our products or services to you.  For example, we may engage overseas service providers to provide services to us (like cloud storage services or other types of network or electronic systems) which may not necessarily always involve a disclosure of your personal information to that overseas service provider.  Where we do provide your personal information to a third party provider overseas, we will take reasonable steps to ensure that the overseas recipient handles and stores such information in accordance with the APPs or otherwise endeavour to only deal with reputable recipients whom we reasonably believe are subject to substantially similar privacy obligations.

By providing us with your personal information, you acknowledge that your personal information may be used, stored and disclosed to overseas recipients, and that overseas recipients may not be required to comply with the APPs.  You further acknowledge and agree that we will not be accountable for any breach of your privacy by any overseas recipient, and that you will not be able to seek redress for any breach of such privacy by the overseas recipient under the Privacy Act.

Use and disclosure of personal information in anonymised and aggregated form

In some cases, we may use and share personal information in anonymised and aggregated form to improve the quality and design of our products and services.  This statistical compilation and analysis of information may also be used by us or provided to others as a summary report for marketing, advertising, financing or research purposes.  For example, we may share information publicly to show trends about the demographic spread of our customers.

Use of your personal information for direct marketing

We may use your personal information for the purposes of directly marketing our services and/or products to you.  We may send this information by mail, email, SMS or telephone.

If you no longer wish to receive these communications, you may opt out at any time by using the unsubscribe facility that we use in our commercial electronic messages (via email or SMS).  Alternatively, you may contact us at enquiry@8homes.com.au.  All requests to opt out of receiving our marketing communications will be respected by us at all times.

Use of cookies

When you visit our websites, the server may attach a “cookie” to your computer’s memory. A “cookie” assists us to store information about how visitors to our websites use them and to make assumptions about what information may be of most interest to you. This information is generally not linked to your identity. We may use knowledge of your user experience to better understand what products or services may be of interest to you and to collect statistical information. We may also use cookies to store a user’s name and password on their computer for future visits to our websites.

5. Can you use a pseudonym or remain anonymous?

We will allow you to use a pseudonym or to remain anonymous unless this is impractical or against the law.

In some instances, if you do not provide us with certain personal information we may not be able to provide you with the relevant product, service, or information or customer support you have requested.

6. How do we store and protect your personal information?

We take your privacy and the security of your personal information very seriously.

We take all reasonable steps to ensure that personal information held by us is protected from misuse, loss, or unauthorised access, modification or disclosure.

We follow generally accepted industry standards to store and protect the personal information submitted to us, both during transmission and once we receive it.  The majority of personal information held by us is stored in electronic form in secure databases.  Any personal information held in hard copy is stored in secured systems.  We use appropriate website protection measures such as firewalls and anti-virus software, security restrictions on access to our computer systems, and controlled access to our corporate premises.  

Our security procedures have been adopted with a view to protecting personal information held by us.  However, it is important to understand that the transmission of data over the internet or other mediums is never guaranteed to be fully secure.  It is therefore possible that third parties that are not under our control may be able to access or intercept transmissions or communications without our permission or knowledge.

Accordingly, while we will take all reasonable steps in these circumstances to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of any information transmitted to us via the internet or other electronic mediums.

If we are involved in a merger, acquisition, asset sale or change in control, we will use our reasonable endeavours to continue to ensure the confidentiality of any personal information and provide affected users’ notice before personal information is transferred or becomes subject to a different privacy policy.  We reserve the right to transfer or assign the information we have collected as part of such merger, acquisition, sale or other change in consent and you consent to the transfer of your personal information in such circumstances.

7. How long will we keep your personal information?

We retain your personal information for as long as necessary to fulfil the purposes for which we collected it unless a longer period is required or permitted by law. 

If you tell us that you do not wish to receive marketing communications, we will keep this information about you until you tell us otherwise.  This is to ensure that we do not send you any further marketing communications in error.

8. Accessing and correcting your personal information

We will use our reasonable endeavours to keep your personal information accurate, complete and up to date.  To assist us, you must provide true, accurate, current and complete information about yourself as requested.

If you wish to access the personal information that we hold about you (including a summary of your personal information we hold), then you may make a request via enquiry@8homes.com.au. For your protection, we may require you to confirm your identity before access to your personal information is granted.

We will endeavour to respond to your request within a reasonable timeframe (but not more than 30 days).  If we need more time, we will seek to agree a longer period of time with you.  If you do not agree, we may not be able to address your request. 

We will give you access to or correct your personal information unless there is a lawful reason for refusing your request.  If we deny access, we will provide you with the reason for such denial.  We may reject requests that are unreasonably repetitive, require disproportionate technical effort, risk the security of our products or services or the privacy of others, or are otherwise impracticable.

In most cases, we can provide you with a summary of your personal information free of charge.  However, in some circumstances, we may recover from you our reasonable costs of supplying you with access to your personal information, subject always to the Privacy Act and any other relevant laws.

9. Queries and complaints

If you have any questions or complaints, please contact us:

email us at: enquiry@8homes.com.au

phone us on: (03) 8398 1000

write to us at: Level 1/90 Maribyrnong Street, Footscray, Vic 3011

If we cannot resolve a complaint related to your personal information, you may wish to contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) directly.  Please refer to www.oaic.gov.au for further information.

10. Changes to our Privacy Policy

We may make changes or updates to this Privacy Policy at any time.  If we do make changes or updates, these will be effective immediately upon being made public on our websites.  We will make a copy of our Privacy Policy available to you upon written request.

It is your responsibility to review our Privacy Policy regularly and make sure you keep up to date with any changes.

Last updated: July2023