Privacy Policy

Principles

The Queensland Conservation Council is committed to protecting the privacy of personal information which the organisation collects, holds and administers. Personal information is information which directly or indirectly identifies a person.

This Policy sets out the type of personal information that QCC collects, how it is collected and held, and how QCC intends to use it. It also sets out how an individual can access their personal information held by QCC and amend it, and also how to go about making a complaint regarding the misuse of personal information.

This Policy applies to all personal information collected by QCC through the course of the organisation’s activities.

Privacy of personal information is an issue to both individuals and organisations, particularly with the growth of business databases holding detailed information, and the potential to use this information for purposes other than those for which it was gathered.

Definitions

Supporter

An individual member of the public becomes a supporter of QCC in the following ways;

If you donate to QCC;
If you sign a petition that QCC has generated; and
If you sign up to receive information from our regular newsletters, or about any of our campaigns

Member

A QCC Member is a group or organisation that has had their membership application approved by the Board; as either an Ordinary Member or Associate Member and pays annual membership fees.

Responsibilities

QCC Executive Committee

Ensure that appropriate controls are in place for protection of personal information and prevention of misuse.

Operations Manager

Receive requests for access to and amendment of personal information, and complaints regarding misuse of personal information. Report to the Executive Committee on complaints received.

Chairperson

Ensure investigation and resolution of complaints regarding misuse of personal information.

Procedures

1. The personal information that we collect

When you become a supporter of QCC we collect information from you about your name, gender, address (including email address), contact telephone numbers, social media addresses, and your interests. Collection of your date of birth is optional.

When making a tax-deductible donation or paying a membership fee through QCC’s website, your payment details are recorded through a third-party financial infrastructure platform called Stripe. Your details are encrypted and stored securely in their platform. QCC does not have access to those details.

When making a tax-deductible donation by post, QCC uses your payment details to make the donation on your behalf through our website or bank and disposes of your details by shredding the donation form. We do not hold onto your credit card details.

When making a tax-deductible donation over the phone, QCC enters your payment details directly into our website donation form on your behalf, these details are stored in Stripe (as above). QCC does not record these details anywhere else.

If you ask to be on one of our mailing lists, or participate in an activity (as a participant or volunteer), QCC will collect information from you about your name, gender, email address and in some instances contact telephone number/s.

If you nominate to participate in an activity, training or workshop, QCC may collect information from you about your name, address (including , email address), whether you are over 18 years of age, telephone, emergency contact name and their telephone number, and any medical conditions that QCC needs to be aware of.

If you are a QCC volunteer, we collect information from you about your name, address (including email address), contact telephone numbers, telephone, emergency contact name and telephone number, and any medical conditions that QCC needs to be aware of. If you claim reimbursement of approved expenses we will ask for your bank account details.

QCC staff, for specific projects, also collect and use information. They may contact you to invite you to be involved in project work, or to participate in events or information networks.

2. How we collect personal information

QCC collects information whenever a member, supporter, employee or volunteer supplies us with personal details either in person, by phone, online or using physical forms.

3. How we hold personal information

QCC’s Constitution requires that we collect names and residential addresses of members and keep them in a Register. The Association’s Rules require that the Register be open for inspection by any member who applies to inspect the Register.

Information that QCC collects is held as long as it is needed to provide members, supporters, staff or volunteers with the service or information required, or until our legal obligation to hold information ends. QCC is legally required to keep records of all transactions that involve payment to us for seven years.

QCC makes reasonable endeavours to store such transaction records securely in a secure data management system, both on the QCC computer network, and cloud based technology where we store our data which is owned and operated by third parties.This includes service providers that are based outside Australia. These both may be accessed only by authorised staff and specifically trained volunteers.

Access to our member and supporter databases is restricted to relevant staff and specifically trained volunteers. In some cases volunteers are granted access to data in relation to the carriage of their tasks. All volunteers are briefed on confidentiality upon induction into QCC and where required to work with data additional training is provided.

4. How we use personal information

QCC publishes a regular e-newsletter in electronic form, as well as conservation campaign and fundraising mailers (both electronic and by direct mail). You may choose to have your name and address/es removed from the distribution of one, several or all of these publications.

QCC is required to provide members of QCC with formal notification of Annual General Meetings and Special General Meetings QCC must send these notifications to you either electronically or by post.

If a supporter or member attends a QCC meeting, workshop or training, their details will be placed on lists for the purpose of conducting the activity safely. For example, in the event of a fire it is necessary to know who is in attendance to ensure that they are accounted for. Such lists would be disposed of after the event, and relevant details entered into our supporter database.

Any member who applies to inspect the Register of members is supervised and is not allowed to use any information that they obtain for advertising, political, religious, charitable, or commercial purposes. They are not allowed to disclose any information obtained to someone else. QCC may withhold information about a member if we have reasonable grounds for believing that the disclosure of the information would put a member at risk of harm.

QCC may need to disclose your personal information to others in order to carry out our activities. This may include:

QCC will sometimes use third party service providers to conduct services on behalf of QCC. These include mailing houses, printers and telemarketing agencies.
QCC conducts a due diligence process before entering into any agreement with these service providers and will take all reasonable steps to ensure that your information is not used in a manner inconsistent with the Australian Privacy Principles.

The QCC website may include links to other websites. QCC includes these as a service. This does not mean that we endorse all content that appears on linked sites. Linked websites are not covered by this Privacy Policy. You will need to refer to linked sites for information about their Privacy Policies.

QCC will follow Queensland and Australian law as it relates to privacy and personal data.

5. How you may access your personal information and seek to correct it

You may access your personal information held by QCC by writing to:

Post: Operations Manager, Queensland Conservation Council
1/377 Montague Rd, West End, 4101,QLD.
Phone: (07) 3846 7833
Email: [email protected]

If you believe that there is an error in the information that QCC holds about you, you can apply to the Operations Manager at the above addresses asking for the information to be corrected.
Complete removal from the QCC database can be requested by phoning the QCC office directly with your request on (07) 3846 7833 or emailing the Operations Manager on [email protected]. Alternatively a message can be sent through our website through the "Contact Us" portal at https://www.queenslandconservation.org.au/contact_us. Once the removal request is received, the supporter contact details will be deleted from the QCC database as soon as possible or within 48 hours.
In either case, the Operations Manager will reply to you within a maximum of 14 days with the outcome of your request.

6. How you can make a complaint if you think your personal information has been misused

If you believe that your personal information that is held by QCC has been misused, you should immediately contact the Operations Manager outlining the circumstances. The contact details are: