Privacy Policy

We generally collect personal information directly from you, the individual. For example, we collect your personal information when you enquire about or apply for credit, or contact us about your loan, including when you visit our website or a Fundency kiosk, call us or send us correspondence. Sometimes we may need to collect personal information about an individual from a third party, such as financial institutions, other credit providers, electronic verification services or a CRB. We may collect personal information about you when a person you hold a bank account with gives us information about that account. When we are provided with personal information from a third party, we will take reasonable steps to ensure that you are made aware of the matters set out in this Privacy Policy. Fundency will not collect your Sensitive Information unless you have consented or an exception under the APPs applies. These exceptions include if the collection is required or authorised by law or is necessary to take appropriate action in relation to suspected unlawful activity or serious misconduct. If the personal information we request is not provided, we may not be able to process your application for credit, or meet your needs appropriately.

Fundency does not give you the option of dealing with it anonymously, or under a pseudonym. This is because it is impractical, and in some circumstances illegal, for Fundency to deal with individuals who are not identified.
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Fundency may receive unsolicited personal information about you. We destroy or de-identify all unsolicited personal information, unless it is relevant to Fundency’s purposes, under this Policy, for collecting personal information. We may retain additional information we receive about you if it is combined with other information we are required or entitled to collect. If we do this, we will retain the information in the same way we hold your other personal information.

We may collect personal information from you electronically from our website: fundency.com.au, when we receive emails and online account application forms. We may also use third parties to analyse traffic at that website, which may involve the use of a technology called 'cookies'.

Cookies are small text files that are placed on your computer's hard drive through your web browser when you visit any web site. They are widely used to make web sites work, or work more efficiently, as well as to provide information to the owners of the site. Like all other users of cookies, we may request the return of information from your computer when your browser requests a web page from our server. Cookies enable our web server to identify you to us, and to track your actions and the pages you visit while you use our website. The cookies we use may last for a single visit to our site (they are deleted from your computer when you close your browser), or may remain on your computer until you delete them or until a defined period of time has passed. Although your browser software enables you to disable cookies, we recommend that you allow the use of cookies in order to take advantage of the features of our website that rely on their use. If you prevent their use, you will not be able to use all the functionality of our website.

We or our service providers use cookies for different purposes such as:
1. To allocate a unique number to your internet browsers.
2. To customise our website for you.
3. For statistical and/or behavioural analysis purposes.
4. To identify if you have accessed a third party website.
5. And for security purposes.

In certain circumstances, data collected from use of cookies, may reasonably identify you and/or potentially constitute personal or sensitive information. By using our website you consent to our use of the cookies as described above and the data they may collect or disclose, including to overseas entities.

Fundency does not collect Sensitive Information as defined in section 1 and as described in the Google AdWords sensitive category restrictions or sensitive interest information (which include personal hardship, identity and belief and sexual interests). The Google Analytics Advertising Features that we use include re-marketing, Google Display Network Impression Reporting and Google Analytics Demographics and Interest Reporting. These features require the collection of data via advertising cookies and identifiers. For more information about Google Analytics please refer to the Google Analytics link at : https://www.google.com.au/analytics. You can opt-out of Google Analytics Advertising Features by following the instructions in this link: https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gaoptout.

• Verify your identity and financial situation.
• Assess whether our credit products are suitable for you.
• Assess any applications by you for credit.
• Managing credit provided to you, collect payments and collect overdue payments from you.
• Provide you with our promotional material.
• To assist us in tailoring existing or develop new products, services or offers which may be offered to you, and to help us selectively target promotional offers and opportunities that meet your needs
• Develop or seek to deliver new ranges of products or services.
• Protect our business and other customers from fraudulent or unlawful activity.
• Conduct our business and perform other management and administration tasks.
• Consider any concerns or complaints you may have.
• Bring, defend, or manage any legal action involving you and Fundency.
• Comply with relevant laws, regulations and other legal obligations, including the National Consumer Credit Protection Act 2009 (Cth) or Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006(Cth)  ; and
• Help us improve our products and services, and to enhance our overall business.
• Conduct our business and perform other management and administration tasks.
• Assist Fundency in providing you with credit.

The main consequences of us not collecting your personal information are our inability or delay in being able to identify you, contact you or provide services to you.

Fundency may use and disclose your personal information for:

• The primary purpose for which it is collected of providing you with credit and managing your loan
• Secondary purposes which are related to this primary purpose that you may reasonably expect, such as keeping you informed about changes to your loan, or new products and services.
• Other purposes authorised by the Privacy Act.

We use and disclose personal information for the purposes outlined in section 7 above. Sensitive Information will be used and disclosed only for the purpose for which it was provided or a directly related secondary purpose, unless the individual agrees otherwise, or if certain other limited circumstances apply (e.g., where required by law). Credit information will only be used and disclosed for the purposes outlined in section 10 below.

We engage other people to perform services for us (“Contractors”), which may involve them handling personal information we hold. In these situations, we prohibit Contractors from using personal information about you except for the specific purpose for which we supply it. We prohibit Contractors from using your information for the direct marketing of their products or services. Fundency will attempt to de-identify Sensitive Information held by us, wherever possible. We also undertake to delete all personal information about you when it is no longer needed or relevant.

We may disclose your personal information, excluding credit information, to:

• A related entity of Fundency
• An agent, contractor or service provider we engage to carry out functions and activities in connection with approving or administering credit products or services, such as our electronic verification service, lawyers, accountants, debt collectors or other advisors
• Direct marketers (that is, associated business that may want to market products to you). If you do not wish to receive marketing information, you may at any time decline to receive such information by contacting us. We will not charge you for fulfilling your request and will take reasonable steps to meet your request at the earlier possible opportunity
• Social media platforms, such as Facebook, for marketing related purposes
• Lead generation businesses and other credit providers. We may exchange or sell your information (including personal information or credit-related information) to third party lead generation companies or other credit providers, who may use that information for any of the purposes for which we can use it. That information may also be disclosed to agents, contractors or advisors of the lead generation business or other credit provider
• To third parties that assist us in improving our business performance and the quality of our services to you such as:
• Website behaviour analysis providers
• Interest data, remarketing and network impression reporting providers
• Customer, product, business or strategic research and development organisations
• Administration or business management services, consultancy firms, auditors and business management consultants
• Print/mail/digital service providers; and
• Imaging and document management service
• Search engine optimisation service providers; and
• Credit reporting agencies
• To your employer, referees or identity verification service providers
• Organisations involved in a transfer or sale of all or part of our assets or business
• Organisations involved in managing our payments, payment merchants and other financial institutions such as banks
• Regulatory bodies, government agencies, law enforcement bodies and courts
• An individual’s financial institutions, referee(s), employer, co-account holder or authorised signatory; and anyone else to whom the individual authorises us to disclose it

We will only use and disclose your credit information for the following purposes:

• Assessing an application by you for credit
• Collecting payments that are overdue in relation to credit provided by us
• Dealing with a serious credit infringement we believe you have committed
• Responding to questions in the course of an investigation by the Australian Financial Complaints Authority (“AFCA”), or any other external dispute resolution body of which we are a member
• Purposes required or authorised by law
• Assisting you to avoid defaulting on your obligations; or
• Internal management purposes that are directly related to the provision or management of credit to you.

We will only disclose your credit information to:

• A related body corporate.
• A person who will be processing your application for credit.
• A person who manages credit provided by us for use in managing that credit.
• Another credit provider if we believe you have committed a serious credit infringement, or the individual has consented to the disclosure.
• A CRB. If we intend to provide default information about an individual to a CRB, we will give you at least 14 days’ written notice. If we disclose default information to a CRB, and you subsequently repay the amount owed, we will tell the CRB that you have repaid the amount owing. We will not disclose credit repayment history information to the CRB which is more than 2 years old or relates to an amount owing of less than $150.

We will not send personal information to recipients outside of Australia unless:

• We have taken reasonable steps to ensure the recipient does not breach the Privacy Act, the APPs and the Credit Reporting Privacy Code.
• The recipient is subject to an information privacy scheme similar to the Privacy Act.
• The individual has consented to the disclosure.

The APPs require us to take all reasonable steps to protect the security of personal information, including credit information. Fundency employees respect the confidentiality of the personal information we collect. Fundency takes reasonable steps to protect personal information held from misuse, loss, unauthorised access, modification or disclosure. All personal information contained in hard copy documents held by Fundency is stored in locked cabinets. All personal information stored on Fundency’s computer system is backed up regularly, and back-up copies are held in a secure location. In relation to our customer database, we apply the following guidelines:

• Data ownership is clearly defined within Fundency.
• Passwords are routinely checked.
• We change employees’ access capabilities when they are assigned to a new position.
• Employees have restricted access to certain sections of the system.
• The system automatically logs and reviews all unauthorised access attempts.
• The system automatically limits the amount of personal information appearing on any one screen.
• Unauthorised employees are barred from updating and editing personal information.
• All personal computers which contain personal information are secured, physically and electronically.
• Data is encrypted during transmission over the network.
• Print reporting of data containing personal information is limited.
• Fundency has created procedures for the disposal of personal information.
• Personal information is overwritten to the extent possible when the information is no longer required. Where we no longer require personal information we will take reasonable steps to destroy or de-identify it.

Fundency does not use your personal information for the purposes of direct marketing, unless:

• The personal information does not include Sensitive Information.
• You would reasonably expect us to use or disclose the information for the purpose of direct marketing.
• We provide you with a simple way of opting out of direct marketing.
• You have not requested to opt out from receiving direct marketing from us. If you would not reasonably expect us to use or disclose the information for the purpose of direct marketing, we may only use or disclose that information for direct marketing if you have consented to the use or disclosure of the information for direct marketing or it is impracticable to obtain that consent. Individuals can opt out of direct marketing by contacting us, and we will give effect to the request within a reasonable period of time.
• Fundency will provide you with the source of its information about you on request free of charge within a reasonable period of time. We will not use or disclose credit information for the purposes of direct marketing. Fundency may only use or disclose Sensitive Information about you for the purpose of direct marketing with your consent.

We will not use identifiers assigned by the Government, such as a tax file number, Medicare number or provider number, for our own file recording purposes, unless one of the exemptions in the Privacy Act applies.  We may use government identifiers (as required or permitted by law) to verify your identity when you deal with us.

Fundency takes reasonable steps to ensure that the personal information, including credit information, it collects, uses and discloses is relevant, accurate, complete and up-to-date. We encourage you to contact us in order to update any personal information we hold about you. If we correct information that has previously been disclosed to another entity, we will notify the other entity within a reasonable period of the correction. If we are satisfied that personal information we hold is inaccurate, we will take reasonable steps to correct the information within 30 days, unless you agree otherwise. We do not charge you for correcting your information.

Subject to the exceptions set out in the Privacy Act, you may gain access to the personal information, including credit information, which Fundency holds about you by contacting the Fundency Privacy Officer. We will provide access within 30 days of the individual’s request. If we refuse to provide access, we will provide reasons for the refusal. You can look at your personal information at the offices of Fundency. We will require you to verify your identity and specify what information is required. An administrative fee for search and photocopying costs may be charged for providing access.

This Policy will be reviewed from time to time to take account of new laws and technology, changes to our operations and the business environment. You will be notified if that happens.

If you have any questions about our privacy procedures, or if you wish to make a complaint about how we have handled your personal information (including credit information) you may lodge a complaint by:

1. Telephoning us on 1300 560 942
2. Writing to us: The Privacy Officer, Fundency, VIC 3810  Australia
3. Emailing: customercare@fundency.com.au
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If you are not satisfied with the response to your complaint you can contact the following:
1. Australian Financial Complaints Authority (“AFCA”) by calling 1300 56 55 62 or visiting AFCA’s website at https://www.afca.org.au
2. Office of the Australian Information Commissioner by calling 1300 363 992, emailing enquiries@oaic.gov.au, or writing to Director of Complaints, Office of the Australian Information Commissioner, GPO Box 5218, SYDNEY NSW 2001.

This Policy was updated on: 31 May, 2018
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