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ECA's Privacy Policy

Homeworker Code Committee Inc. (A0041549R) is a not-for-profit incorporated association trading as Ethical Clothing Australia (we will refer to the organisation as ECA). ECA is committed to the protection of your personal information in accordance with the Information Privacy Principles and National Privacy Principles set out in the Privacy
Act 1988 (Cth).

This Privacy Policy describes the manner in which ECA collects, holds, and uses personal information. If you wish to make any inquiries regarding this Privacy Policy, you should contact the ECA by email at the following address: info@ethicalclothingaustralia.org.au.

Unless you contact ECA to object, we are entitled to assume that if you provide personal information to ECA, you agree to it being handled in accordance with this Privacy Policy.

ECA may, from time to time, review and update this Privacy Policy to take account of new laws and technology. All personal information collected, held and disclosed by ECA will be governed by its most recent policy, posted on our website. Amendments to the Privacy Policy will come into effect immediately when posted. Because of this, you should access the website and read the latest Privacy Policy prior to disclosing personal information to us.

  1. What is “personal information”
  • 1.1 “Personal information” is any information or opinion about a person, whether true or not, from which that person may be identified. Personal information only refers to information about an individual, not a company. We might collect personal information from or about individuals such as sole traders, partnerships, and in some cases, employees or directors of companies. It is this information to which this policy is directed.
  1. Why ECA collects personal information about you
    • 2.1 ECA’s primary purpose is to assist businesses to achieve and maintain accreditation under Ethical Clothing Australia’s Code of Practice, incorporating Homeworkers (the Code), to promote the Code and accredited businesses (Primary Purpose). ECA collects personal information about you which is necessary for our functions and activities to achieve our Primary Purpose including the following:
      • to accept, review and process accreditation applications in order to grant accreditation status to applicants and for the purpose of reaccreditation;
      • to recommend your business as an accredited business if it has been granted accreditation;
      • to verify your business’s accreditation status to government agencies for government procurement contracts;
      • to refer requests for contact details from third party manufacturers, designers, retailers, or other similar parties, to accredited businesses and Award compliant manufacturers (in Accredited companies’ supply chains);
      • to market ECA and related products and services and promote accreditation status in order to create an ethical image for the industry;
      • to communicate with you;
      • to provide you with ongoing information about ECA and its services or products in which ECA believes you may be interested;
      • to give you the opportunity from time to time to receive e-mail and other updates from ECA; and
      • to ensure other personal information provided voluntarily by you is used to better understand ECA’s participants and to help improve and promote its services.
  • 2.2 If you choose not to provide your personal information to ECA for the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy, the consequence for you will be that we will not be able to process your accreditation application.

3. What personal information do we collect and how do we collect it?

  • 3.1 ECA collects personal information in a variety of ways, including from accredited businesses or applicants for accreditation and reaccreditation. ECA may collect personal information such as your name and contact details when you visit our website and input the information, complete an accreditation application form/apply for accreditation, register to receive updates on our activities and events, etc. or contact us by telephone or email.
  • 3.2 We will not collect sensitive information such as your race, political affiliation, membership of a political association, membership of a trade union, sexual preference or health information without your consent or unless required or permitted by law
  • 3.3 We will collect information from you directly where it is reasonable and practical to do so. However, ECA may also collect business information from third parties (such as manufacturers, retailers and the Textile, Clothing and Footwear Association of Australia) which may contain personal information about you for the purpose of verifying your business’s accreditation status in order to maintain the integrity of the accreditation process under the Code. If we do this, we will manage and protect this information in accordance with this Policy.

4. Information collected via our website

    • 4.1 ECA will not collect any personal information about you when you use our website except when you knowingly provide it or as otherwise described below. For example, ECA will collect personal information from users to our website when they subscribe to the e-newsletter or request to download an Award Guide.
    • Click Stream Data
    • 4.2 When you visit and browse our website, ECA’s website host will collect your email location and IP address for statistical, reporting and maintenance purposes
    • 4.3 This information will not be used to identify you and may include:
      • the number of users visiting this website and the number of pages viewed;
      • the date, time and duration of a visit; or
      • the path taken through this website.
  • 4.4 ECA’s website host uses this information to administer and improve the overall performance of the Website which is necessary to assist us to achieve our Primary Purpose.

Cookies

  • 4.5 “Cookies” are small text files that are transferred to a user’s computer hard drive by a website for the purpose of storing information about a user’s identity, browser type or website visiting patterns.
  • 4.6 If you access our website, a cookie is downloaded onto your computer’s hard drive when you first log onto the website. Cookies expire after 1 year of inactivity. Third parties will not be able to access your personal information through our use of cookies. ECA has no intent to infringe on your privacy when you use our website. You can set your browser to notify you when you receive a cookie and this will allow you to accept or reject the cookie.
  • Web Beacons
  • 4.7 Web beacons are images that originate from a third party site to track visitor activities. ECA does currently use web beacons to track the visiting patterns of individuals accessing our website. We do this to research our effectiveness.

5. Who we disclose your personal information to

  • 5.1 ECA may disclose your personal information to related entities of ECA. These may include designated members of the ECA Committee for the purpose of accreditation (e.g. accreditation sub-committee).
  • 5.2 ECA may also disclose your personal information without your further consent to third parties that provide services to ECA to carry out its purpose, in circumstances where the disclosure is directly related to the Primary Purpose for which we collected the information, as set out in paragraph 2.1, and you would reasonably expect us to use
    or disclose the information in the circumstances. For example, we are required to disclose information collected from accreditation applications to the Textile, Clothing and Footwear (TCF) Union for the purpose of processing your business’s application for accreditation under the Code.
  • 5.3 Disclosure may also include:
    • referrals to retailers, designers or other persons who are looking for accredited manufacturers; and
    • to government entities to verify your accreditation status if you seek government procurement contracts, because it directly relates to your accreditation.
    • 5.4 Otherwise, ECA will not disclose any of your personal information to any other organisation unless the disclosure is required by law or is otherwise permitted by the Information Privacy Principles.

6. Promoting ECA to accredited businesses

  • 6.1 ECA will not provide you with marketing materials unless they are directly related to our Primary Purpose. We will never disclose or sell your personal information to direct marketers. ECA may use your personal information to provide you with promotional material about ECA, or the services and events offered by ECA. If you do not wish to receive promotional information, you can contact us by emailing: info@ethicalclothingaustralia.org.au at any stage in the future so that your name can be removed from our marketing lists.

7. Finding out what personal information ECA holds about you

  • 7.1 You are entitled to find out what personal information ECA holds about you. If you request access to your personal information, we will grant your request unless providing you with access would unreasonably impact upon the privacy of others or is not otherwise permitted under a law of the Commonwealth.
  • 7.2 A request for access can be done in any of the following ways:
    Email: info@ethicalclothingaustralia.org.au
    Write to: P.O Box 2087, Fitzroy, VIC 3065

8. Updating, storage and security of personal information held by ECA

  • 8.1 ECA aims to keep your personal information secure and up to date. Any personal information that is collected via our website or which is held on ECA’s computer systems is protected by technical safeguards including SSL encryptions, anti-virus software and firewalls.
  • 8.2 Unfortunately, no data transmission over the internet or wireless technology can be guaranteed to be absolutely secure. We strive to protect your personal information by implementing these security precautions, but we cannot warrant its security and accept no liability for the information you transmit to us via our website.
  • 8.3 Personal information that is held by ECA in hard copy is stored securely on its premises and is only disclosed or used for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy.
  • 8.4 You can update your contact and profile information at any time by contacting our office on the number provided below. ECA welcomes any changes to your details so as to keep our records up to date.
  • 8.5 If we find that we have no further need for your personal information we will remove it from our system and destroy all record of it.

9. What to do if you have a question, problem or complaint about ECA’s use of your personal information

  • 9.1 If you feel that your privacy has not been respected or that ECA has conducted itself inconsistently with this Privacy Policy in respect of your personal information, please contact our Privacy Officer in any of the following ways:
    • Email: info@ethicalclothingaustralia.org.au
    • Write to: P.O Box 2087, Fitzroy, VIC 3065
  • 9.2 You are also entitled to make a complaint to the Privacy Commissioner, who has the power to investigate your complaint and award you compensation in some circumstances.