Privacy Policy

1.   The kinds of personal information we collect

1.1   The kinds of personal information that we collect include:

1. Contact details such as name, role or position, address, date of birth, driver’s licence and passport details, email address, mobile number, landline number and fax number, tax file number and credit information;
2. information relating to your circumstances and affairs relevant to the matter(s) in which we are instructed;
3. information about your legal interests and requirements and the legal services that you may wish to purchase;
4. information regarding our communications with you and your attendance at seminars and promotional events held by us;
5. if you are an employee or prospective employee, information about your qualifications, skills and work experience;
6. information regarding your access to our premises, website and email systems; and
7. if you are a supplier or prospective supplier, information about your business skills, services, products and prices.

2.   How we collect personal information

2.1   We collect personal information by various means including when:

1. you contact us with a question, message or enquiry or seek legal advice from us;
2. you subscribe to our newsletter or legal updates service;
3. you attend a seminar or event where we are hosting or presenting;
4. you instruct us to act for you and we open a file and conduct a conflict check;
5. our clients provide information relating to related and adverse parties relevant to the advice or services we are providing;
6. we undertake a search or investigation; and
7. you visit our premises or website.

2.2   Where practicable, we collect personal information about you directly from you. However, we may have collected information about you from a third party such as a client, a third party information provider, the courts or a person responding to our questions or enquiries.

2.3   We are required to collect the full name and address of our clients under the Legal Profession Uniform General Rules (NSW) (Uniform Rules). Accurate name and address information must also be collected in order to comply with the trust account record keeping requirements in the Uniform Rules and to comply with our duty to the courts.

2.4    If you are a client and do not provide us with name and address information, we cannot act for you.

2.5    If you do not provide us with accurate personal information, we may not be able to carry out your instructions or achieve the purpose for which the information has been sought.

3.    How we hold information

3.1    We hold personal information by various means including:

1. physically on our premises and with third party storage providers;
2. electronically through internal servers and electronic storage devices such as hard disk drives, solid state drives and USB drives; and
3. electronically with third party data storage providers situated both inside and outside Australia.

3.2    We take all reasonable steps to ensure all personal information we hold is kept secure from unauthorised access, misuse or disclosure. However, we cannot guarantee that the information will not be accessed by unauthorised persons such as hackers or that unauthorised disclosures will not occur.

4.    The purposes for which we collect, hold, use and disclose personal information

4.1    We collect, hold and use personal information in order to:

1. verify your identity as a client;
2. respond to your enquiries;
3. provide legal services;
4. employ competent and diligent personnel;
5. comply with our legal and professional obligations and to defend our legal rights;
6. obtain insurances;
7. monitor or improve the use of and satisfaction with our legal services; and
8. let you know about legal developments, our expertise and legal services that may be of interest to you.

4.2    We disclose personal information:

1. in order to carry out your instructions; and
2. subject to our confidentiality obligations, when using services in support of our legal practice.

5.    The parties to whom your personal information is disclosed

5.1    Subject to our confidentiality obligations, we may share some relevant personal information with:

1. parties related to a matter you have with us, the courts, law enforcement authorities, regulators and government authorities;
2. service providers as reasonably required to carry out your instructions, including barristers, experts and consultants engaged in your matter;
3. our e-mail marketing provider for the purposes of providing you our newsletter, invitations and legal updates; and
4. third party service providers who assist us with practice management, archival, auditing, accounting, legal, business consulting, website or technology services.

5.2    We also will disclose your information if required by law to do so or in circumstances permitted by the Privacy Act – for example, where we have reasonable grounds to suspect that unlawful activity or misconduct of a serious nature that relates to our functions or activities has been, is being or may be engaged in, in response to a subpoena, discovery request or a court order or like process.

6.    Disclosure of information outside the jurisdiction of collection

6.1    We do not disclose personal information to overseas recipients unless your instructions involve dealing with parties located overseas. If your matter involves parties overseas, we may disclose certain personal information to overseas recipients associated with that matter in order to carry out your instructions, but only to the extent necessary. Some of the third parties including our service providers and their related bodies corporate may be situated overseas.

7.    Opting out of marketing communications

7.1    We may, from time to time, send you newsletters, invitations and legal updates about our services. You can opt out of receiving further such communications by notifying us using our contact details below or by clicking the “unsubscribe” option at the bottom of any marketing e-mail received from us.

8.    Security

8.1    We take reasonable physical, technical and administrative safeguards to protect your personal information from misuse, interference, loss, unauthorised access, modification and disclosure. For example, we maintain our files in secure offices and limit access to personal information to individuals with a need to know. We may also keep your personal data on our personal data technology systems, including cloud storage systems, and those of our contractors or suppliers. Some of these cloud storage systems may or may not be located in Australia.

9.    Access/correction/updating personal information

9.1    You can contact us to access, correct or update your personal information. Unless we are subject to confidentiality obligations or some other restriction on giving access to the information and we are permitted to refuse you access under the Privacy Act, we will endeavour to make your information available to you within 30 days. We may require you to verify your identity before providing your personal information to you.

9.2    Examples of circumstances where we may refuse to give you access to your personal information include where:

1. giving access would be unlawful;
2. we reasonably believe that giving you access would pose a serious threat to the life, health or safety of any individual or to public health or public safety;
3. giving access would have an unreasonable impact on the privacy of others;
4. the information could reveal the intentions of a party in negotiations;
5. giving access could prejudice the taking of appropriate action in relation to unlawful activity; and
6. giving access could reveal evaluative information in a commercially sensitive decision-making process.

9.3    If you request to correct your personal information, we will correct it, or, if we consider it more appropriate to do so, we will note your request for amendment of the information on your record.

9.4    We will not charge you to make a request to access your record but we may charge you to actually provide access depending on the costs associated with obtaining and providing the material.

9.5    These actions can usually be taken by contacting us using the contact information in the “Contact Us” section below.

10. Notification of Changes

10.1 We reserve the right to change this Privacy Policy from time to time. If we do so, we will publish the revised policy on our website and the changes take effect as soon as they are published.

11. Complaints/Contact Us

11.1 If you have concerns about a possible breach of this Privacy Policy, you may raise your concerns or make a complaint by sending an email to Rodrique Khoury (Solicitor Director) at info@marcwilliam.com.au or by calling us on +612 9602 0000.

11.2 We will endeavour to respond to any complaint within 30 days. If you are not satisfied with our response to your complaint, you may seek a review by contacting the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner using the information available at http://www.oaic.gov.au/privacy/privacy-complaints.

This policy was last updated on 3 May 2021.

© Marc William Lawyers