PRIVACY NOTICE
1. Introduction
1.1 ACS Distance Education (ACS) acknowledges that the privacy of your personal information, and the security of your transactions with us is of paramount importance to us. ACS has data protection policies to ensure your privacy and data security. The ACS Privacy Policy sets out the rules we will abide by when dealing with personal information we collect from individuals during the course of our business. This policy is based on Australian Privacy Legislation and also complies with the European GDPR (General Data Processing Regulations).
1.2 In order to ensure that we meet and maintain our Privacy standards, we have appointed a Privacy Officer. Should you wish to contact us in relation to Privacy, please complete our online contact form.
1.3 We may occasionally make alterations or additions to our Privacy Policy. Should we do so, we will update the policy on our website. We require that all our customers agree to abide by our Privacy Policy as part of our terms of trade. This policy also applies to users of our website who are not customers of ACS.
1.4 Please note that we cannot and do not assume any responsibility for the privacy or security practices of any other websites which you may be able to access through our site.
2. What Information Do We Collect?
ACS collects a range of information about you at different times. There are four broad categories of information that we collect from you:
2.1 Information we require to supply our services.
(a) When you first sign up or contract with ACS for our products or services, or when you make an inquiry about our services, we request information such as your name, address, telephone number, domain name, email, and type of industry you are in. We may also ask for your age and gender. The student is offered the opportunity to provide extra personal information relevant to the subject they are studying, as background information to inform ACS staff in a way that can improve the support provided to the student. ACS will make every effort to explain the pros and cons of providing such additional info, the fact that such information must be volunteered, and the fact that access to such information is only given to employees of ACS in line with laws which ACS is obliged to follow.
(b) We may also monitor and/or record telephone conversations with you from time to time in order to train staff and to improve our service to you.
2.2 Non-personally identifying information.
(a) In addition to the information you specifically provide above, ACS operates statistics gathering software on its website to collect information about the number of visitors coming to the site. No identifying information is collected by this software. The software records the IP address of the visitor only. We use this information to improve our own technical structure and performance, and to determine which areas of our web site are most popular.
(b) We may use 'cookies'. Cookies are pieces of information that a website can transfer to an individual's computer in order to allow that website to store information about user preferences. We use cookies which expire once the visitor leaves our website. Cookies are used to collect session IDs. It is possible to adjust your internet browser to refuse cookies, but you may find this reduces the functionality of this site.
2.3 Other demographic information.
If you respond voluntarily to our surveys or other interactive communications, we collect the responses and use the information to improve the quality and range of ACS' products and services.
2.4 Personal information stored on a website hosted by ACS.
ACS will have personal information stored on our servers due to the fact that we host websites of other organisations. Any information that is submitted to or collected by these organisations will be physically located on an ACS and/or an ACS server and/or workstation. This information, whether voluntarily provided or not, will not be used or released by ACS in any manner to any third party, and it will be kept strictly confidential, unless we are required to release the information by law.
3. How Do We Use Personal Information We Have Collected?
3.1 We collect and use your personal information to operate our website and deliver our services to you. We will use your personal information to provide you with:
o technical support
o billing and credit control
o sales support
o product upgrades and
o information
o online products and services
3.2 You may stop the delivery of future promotional emails from ACS by following the specific instructions in the email you receive. These instructions will tell you how to remove your name from our promotional email list. These instructions will appear at the BOTTOM of your email. If you experience technical difficulties with removing yourself from a list, you may email us at admin@acs.edu.au and request removal from a list and/or future mailing.
3.3 We may use your personal information to:
(a) contact you in relation to upgrading your use of our services, special offers (from us, or on behalf of third parties), with newsletters, surveys, and individual service audits. We may give extracts of our customer lists containing personal information to third parties specifically to contact you on our behalf. We require third parties to agree to the same privacy conditions that we abide by.
(b) identify the source of new customers to ACS;
(c) monitor and address complaints, other feedback, and to resolve disputes;
(e) in the case of ABNs, to verify your identity;
(g) maintain a technical and account history of your dealings with us, and to re-establish your account with us where you re-join as a customer within six months after having terminated your account;
(h) monitor your compliance with our 'Terms and Conditions' Policy and other terms and conditions of supply;
(i) comply with our reporting and other obligations to third party licensors (such as reporting to software suppliers the number and identity of software licenses we have issued as part of our products).
3.4 We will treat all information we collect from you as strictly confidential. ACS does not rent or lease its customer lists to third parties. We will not reveal, disclose, sell, distribute, rent, licence, share or pass onto any third party (other than those who are contracted or supply services to ACS) any personal information that you may have provided to us unless we have your express consent to do so, other than in the circumstances set out in the next paragraph.
3.5 We will disclose your personal information, without notice or your consent, only if:
(a) we are required to do so by law or in the good faith belief that such action is necessary to conform with the laws, applicable code of conduct or legal process served on us in relation to our business or website;
(b) to protect and defend the rights or property of ACS;
(c) if we consider it necessary to do so in order to enforce or apply the terms of any of our agreements with you;
(d) if we sell our business or part of it; and
(e) in extreme circumstances, to protect the personal safety of users of ACS services, its website, our staff or the public.
4. Security
4.1 ACS has implemented security features in our database to protect your personal information from unauthorised access. We maintain our servers in a controlled, secured environment. Only staff who need to have access to your personal information in order to perform their job function are authorised to access the database. Constant changes to the internet and technology mean that we cannot guarantee that data transmission will be 100% secure, or safe from attack by unauthorised intruders.
5. Other Disclosure By You
5.1 You might provide personal information through your participation in chat sessions, message boards, email exchanges or newsgroups accessed via ACS, or another service provided by ACS. This information is public and immediately available to anyone who has access to such a site; it is not private. ACS urges you to enter only information that you are comfortable to share with the public at large in this public domain. This Privacy Policy does not apply to such information.
5.2 You should never reveal your password to third parties. If you lose control of your password, you may lose control over your personal information and may be liable for actions taken on your behalf by third parties using your password and/or personal information. Therefore, if your password has been compromised for any reason, you should immediately change it.
5.3 If you collect personal information which you keep on servers provided by ACS as part of our service to you (including email), you alone are responsible for compliance with the Privacy Act 1988 in respect of that information. We take no responsibility for your dealings with personal information you collect.
6. How To Access & Correct Your Personal Information
6.1 From time to time you may need to update your personal information. You may do so by phone, mail or email. You may be required to supply your username and password to authorise the update of information.
6.2 If you contact us via telephone, you may need to answer a few security questions before any personal information is revealed or amended.
7. Children's Privacy
ACS does not knowingly collect, use or promote products any information to children. Potential students must be over 18 and agree before submitting our online forms.
8. Complaints
If you have a complaint about any aspect of our Privacy procedures, please contact our Privacy Officer on admin@acs.edu.au . We will deal promptly with your complaint. If we cannot resolve the complaint to your satisfaction within a reasonable time, you or we may refer the complaint to the Privacy Commissioner.
9. Data Retention
In order to best protect the rights of our students and their personal data against cyber-attack, hacking and unlawful accessing of sensitive and confidential student records, IT IS HEREBY AGREED that all such records shall be confidentially destroyed within a period of one month to twelve months of cessation of student enrolment and to remove any doubt, ACS is irrevocably authorised to do so within such time frame.
To comply with Australian and European law, we will maintain student records for the period of course enrolment.
If you would like ACS Distance Education to delete your information at any time (whether you are a customer or a prospective customer), please contact our privacy officer and we will process this ( admin@acs.edu.au ).
By agreeing to the privacy policy, you are indicating that you are 18 years or over and that you authorise ACS Distance Education to contact you via email regarding news and promotions. You may unsubscribe from our newsletters at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link at the bottom of the newsletters.