Mindwealth Psychology ABN 65 690 123 497, (“we” “our” or “us”）respects your privacy. We are committed to the protection of personal privacy within the scope of applicable law. This Privacy Policy covers our treatment of personal information and sensitive information that we collect, use and disclose.
Personal information is information that identifies you directly or from which your identity can be reasonably ascertained.
Sensitive information is a particular type of personal information. For example, information about racial or ethnic origin, religious beliefs, sexual orientation or practices, a criminal record and the like. Most relevantly for our practice, medical and psychological information about you is sensitive information.
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. The most current version will be located on our website, and is also available by contacting our Privacy Officer by email or at the address detailed below.
By the use of our website, or by providing any personal or sensitive information to us, you consent to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal and sensitive information as set out in this Privacy Policy.
We are not responsible for the privacy practices of sites that are linked to our website via hyperlinks, banner advertising or otherwise. Please take care to check the privacy policies of the sites you visit before you provide your personal or sensitive information.
Types of personal and sensitive information collected
The information that we collect may include any of the following:
- name, address(es) telephone number(s), email address(es) and other contact details;
- date of birth;
- occupation;
- your referring health professional or other referrer;
- details about your private health insurance, your Department of Veteran Affairs details or your workers compensation claim details;
- medical and psychological information provided by your referring health professional or collected during a consultation with one of our psychologists;
- payment information (such as credit card or bank details); and
- other personal or sensitive information required to provide psychological services.
If you provide us personal or sensitive information of a third party (for example, if you are assisting a child to seek treatment) it is your responsibility to ensure the third party is aware of this Privacy Policy, understands it and agrees to accept it.
You do not have to provide us with any personal or sensitive information, however if you don’t we may not be able to provide psychological services to your benefit.
Disclosure of personal information
Your personal information will remain confidential except when:
- it is subpoenaed by a court, or disclosure is otherwise required or authorised by law; or
- failure to disclose the information would in the reasonable belief of Mindwealth Psychology place a client or another person at serious risk to life, health or safety; or
- the client’s prior approval has been obtained to: a) provide a written report to another agency or professional, e.g., a GP or a lawyer; or b) discuss the material with another person, e.g. a parent, employer, health provider, or third party funder; or c) disclose the information in another way; or d) disclose to another professional or agency (e.g. your GP) and disclosure of your personal information to that third party is for a purpose which is directly related to the primary purpose for which your personal information was collected.
How we collect personal information
Generally, we collect personal and sensitive information directly from you, such as when:
- you provide us with registration details upon first consulting with us;
- one of our psychologists takes a history from you and observes your symptoms during a consultation;
- you call us on the telephone or skype with such information or send us an email, fax, note, letter or similar communication;
- you send information to us via our website; or
- a parent, guardian or carer provides such information to us on your behalf.
We also collect personal and sensitive information about you when a health professional sends us a referral letter about you or your condition.
If we collect personal or sensitive information about you from someone else in circumstances where you may not be aware that we have collected such information, where reasonably practicable we will notify you as soon as possible that the collection has occurred and the circumstances of that collection
Why we collect, use and disclose personal information
We will use the personal and sensitive information we collect as set out in this Privacy Policy. Primarily, that will be to assist our psychologists in consulting and treating you. Outside of the terms of this Privacy Policy we will not use your personal or sensitive information without first seeking your consent unless required or compelled to do so by law.
We will collect personal information for the following purposes:
- to establish and maintain your relationship with us;
- to facilitate the provision of psychological services you are seeking from us;
- to facilitate payment for the services you receive, and to assist you to claim any applicable rebates for those services;
- to answer any inquiry you make; and
- to communicate with you about our services and events.
We may also disclose your personal and sensitive information to third parties who work for or closely with our business to deliver the services you have requested. For example, some of our psychologists may be contractors rather than our direct employees. We will always ensure that these third parties are obliged to keep your personal and sensitive information confidential in the same way that we would.
Direct marketing
From time to time, we may use your personal information to send direct marketing to you. However we will not disclose your personal information to any third party for marketing purposes.
We will not use or disclose your sensitive information at all in any of our marketing activities.
How we store and protect personal information
We mainly store personal and sensitive information in secure computer storage facilities located in Australia (and provided by a third party that has contractual obligations to us). As much as possible, we seek to collect and store the information gathered by the practice in electronic formats. It is still necessary, however, to have some paper- based files and other records in our practice. In so doing, we have taken numerous steps to protect your personal information from misuse, interference and loss, and unauthorised access, modification or disclosure.
Additionally, we take reasonable steps to destroy or permanently de-identify personal and sensitive information when we no longer need it.
Please note that internet is not a secure method of transmitting information. We cannot and do not accept responsibility for the security of information you send to, or receive from us, over the internet, or for any unauthorised access or use of that information.
Do we send personal information overseas?
We will not transfer your personal and sensitive information outside Australia.
How you can access your personal information
We will take reasonable steps to make sure that the personal and sensitive information we collect, use or disclose is accurate, complete and up to date. If your personal details change, such as your address or phone number, please contact us to update those details.
At your request, we will provide you, within a reasonable period after your request, with a copy of any personal and sensitive information that we hold about you, unless an exception under the Privacy Act 1988 applies. We may charge a fee for retrieving this information, in which case we will inform you of the fee and obtain your agreement to that fee before providing the information. We will require you to provide us with some proof of identity before we provide you with a copy of the personal or sensitive information we hold. If we believe that we are not able to provide you with access to personal or sensitive information, we will give you a notice of our reasons and advise you of the complaint mechanisms that exist under the Privacy Act 1988.
We will promptly acknowledge and investigate any complaint about the way we manage personal and sensitive information.
Cookies
Our website uses cookies to track user traffic patterns and to better serve you when you revisit a website. A cookie is a small data file that a website may write to your hard drive when you visit it. A cookie file can contain information, such as a user ID which the website uses to track the pages you have visited. You can refuse all cookies by turning them off in your browser. However, full functionality for our website may require the use of cookies.
For further information about cookies and internet privacy, please refer to: http://www.youronlinechoices.com.au.
Information is also generated whenever a page is accessed on our website that records information such as the time, date and specific page. We may collect such information for statistical and maintenance purposes that enables us to continually evaluate our website performance.
How to contact us or make a complaint
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, if you wish to update information we hold about you or if you wish to make a complaint about our collection, use or disclosure of your personal and sensitive information under this Privacy Policy, please contact:
The Privacy Officer
Mindwealth Psychology
78C Charles Street
Putney NSW 2112
Email: info@mindwealthpsychology.com.au
We will take reasonable steps to remedy any issues that you raise with us resulting from any failure to comply with our privacy obligations. You may communicate with us anonymously or using a pseudonym. We will not seek to match your pseudonym to other information we have collected from you, but we may need you to identify yourself to us at some stage to properly assist you.
More information about Australia’s privacy laws and the Australian Privacy Principles is available from the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner at www.oaic.gov.au. You can contact that Office if we cannot resolve any privacy issue that you raise with us by phone on 1300 363 992, online at https://www.oaic.gov.au/privacy/making-a-privacy-complaint or by post to: Office of the Australian Information Commissioner, GPO Box 5218, Sydney, NSW 2001.
End of policy.
Last updated: 3 September 2018. Future updates will appear on this page.