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Our privacy commitment

EnergyWatch is committed to protecting the privacy of your personal information. This policy explains how EnergyWatch manages the personal information that we collect, use and disclose and how to contact us if you have any further queries about our management of your personal information. This policy does not cover personal information collected or held by EnergyWatch or any of its related bodies corporate (as applicable) about its employees.

EnergyWatch is bound by the Australian Privacy Principles in the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (and applicable State and Territory health privacy legislation), which regulate how we may collect, use, disclose and store personal information, and how individuals may access and correct personal information held about them. EnergyWatch is also required to comply with the Spam Act 2003 (Cth) and the Do Not Call Register Act 2006 (Cth).

EnergyWatch is a fully owned subsidiary of iSelect Ltd (iSelect).

In this policy 'we', 'us', 'our' and 'EnergyWatch' refers to (and this policy applies to), the following EnergyWatch and iSelect businesses:

  • General Brokerage Services Pty Ltd (trading as Budget Connect);
  • Procure Power Pty Ltd;
  • EnergyWatch Trading Pty Ltd;
  • EnergyWatch Services Pty Ltd;
  • EnergyWatch Services Limited (New Zealand);
  • iSelect Ltd;
  • iSelect Health Pty Ltd;
  • iSelect Life Pty Ltd;
  • iSelect General Pty Ltd;
  • iSelect Media Pty Ltd;
  • iSelect Mortgages Pty Ltd;
  • iSelect International Pty Ltd;
  • iSelect Services Pty Ltd;

If you have any questions regarding EnergyWatch's Privacy Policy or would like us to send you a copy of this policy, please contact our Privacy Officer using the details provided below.

Our Privacy Policy may be amended from time to time. The current version will be posted on our website.

What is personal information?

Personal information is any information or an opinion, in any form and whether true or not, about an identified individual or an individual who is reasonably identifiable. Examples include an individual's name, address, contact number and email address.

Sensitive information is a special category of personal information. Sensitive information includes health information and information about a person’s race, ethnic origin, political opinions, membership of political, professional or trade associations, religious or philosophical beliefs, sexual preferences and criminal history.

How does EnergyWatch collect and hold your personal information?

EnergyWatch will only collect personal information about you by lawful and fair means.

EnergyWatch has partnered with CIMET Sales Pty Ltd ABN 72 620 395 726 (CIMET) to help you compare a range of energy plans and providers (Comparison Service). CIMET provide product comparison services in the energy, broadband, and mobile sector, including by building product comparison tools and integrating them into their white label partners’ websites and providing white-labelled support and sales services to their customers. To review the CIMET privacy policy please visit www.cimet.com.au/privacy-policy/

It is EnergyWatch’s usual practice to collect personal information directly from you (or your authorised representative). Energy Watch collects your personal information in a variety of ways, which may include the following.:

  • When you provide personal information for the purpose of using the Comparison Service; When you apply for or purchase a product made available via the Comparison Service;
  • you contact us by telephone, mail, or email;
  • we supply any other products or services to you; or
  • you enter into any trade promotions, competitions, specials or other offers with Energy Watch or its partners.

We may collect personal information:

  • from other companies, such as other companies or partners that provide comparison services;
  • from marketing and similar lists we obtain from third parties;
  • from third parties to enhance the quality of the personal information that we hold.

If we collect personal information about you from a third party, we will only do so using fair and lawful means and if we or the third party have received your consent to the disclosure. Any personal information received from a third party will be protected in accordance with this Privacy Policy. If you provide us with personal information about another person (such as a family member), please make sure that you have their consent to do so and that you tell them about this policy.

What kinds of personal information does EnergyWatch collect and hold?

The kinds of personal information that we collect and hold about you will depend on the circumstances of collection, including whether we collect the information from you as a customer, partner, contractor, supplier, job applicant or in some other capacity.

For example, if you request a quote via the Comparison Service your name, address, email address, telephone number, date of birth and any other information required to provide you with the quote may be collected. If you deal with us in some other capacity (for example, as a partner, a supplier or a stakeholder), we may collect your name, contact details and any other information you choose to provide to us. Where it is lawful and practicable to do so, we will allow you to remain anonymous or use a pseudonym.

Any personal information that you provide via the EnergyWatch website or contact centre (for example to utilise the Comparison Service or make an enquiry relating to an energy plan you have purchased) is collected and may be stored by EnergyWatch.

If you provide your personal information to a third party via EnergyWatch (for example, to purchase products or services on a third party website which is linked to EnergyWatch) that information may also be collected and managed by those third parties. You should familiarise yourself with their privacy policy prior to deciding whether you wish to provide your information.

We may record and monitor calls that you make to us in certain circumstances. For example, calls to our contact centre are recorded and monitored for training and customer service purposes and to meet our regulatory obligations.

If we are not able to collect your personal information, we may not be able to provide you with the Comparison Service, fully address your enquiries, or do business with you or the organisation with which you are connected.

How does EnergyWatch use your personal information?

We use personal information for a variety of reasons including to:

  • provide the Comparison Service;
  • answer your inquiries and deliver customer service;
  • tell our customers and prospective customers about other products, services or promotional offers that we think may be of interest to them, including products, services or promotional offers of our related bodies corporate (for example, iSelect);
  • maintain and improve our customer service;
  • meet our regulatory and legal obligations;
  • manage and resolve any legal or commercial complaints and issues;
  • consider job applicants for current and future employment;
  • manage our relationships with our partners, suppliers and stakeholders;
  • carry out internal functions, including training; and
  • conduct marketing research and analysis.

We may also use your information for other purposes required or authorised by or under law, including purposes for which you have provided your consent. That consent may be written, verbal or implied from your conduct.

By using our services, including the Comparison Service, you consent to us collecting, holding and using your personal information in this way.

In what circumstances will EnergyWatch disclose your personal information?

In the course of conducting our business and providing products and services to you, we may disclose your personal information. In particular, your personal information may be shared between the EnergyWatch and iSelect businesses for the purposes outlined in this policy. To review the iSelect privacy policy please visit www.iselect.com.au/privacy.

We may also disclose your personal information to, where appropriate:

  • if you are a customer or prospective customer, to iSelect, for the purposes of them informing you about their products and services, or where circumstances require, providing operational support to the EnergyWatch business. Please note your consent to receiving mail, telephone, email, SMS or social media communications from iSelect about their products and services will have been given if you do not opt out of receiving such communication. Your consent will remain current for an indefinite period of time unless and until you advise iSelect otherwise.
  • professional advisers (such as lawyers or auditors);
  • our contracted service providers, including:
    • information technology service providers;
    • payment systems operators and financial institutions;
    • organisations authorised by Energy Watch to conduct sales, promotional, research or marketing activities;
  • law enforcement agencies or government authorities; and
  • any persons acting on your behalf including those persons nominated by you, executors, trustees and legal representatives.

We may disclose your personal information to third parties for other purposes required or authorised by or under law, including purposes for which you have provided your consent. That consent may be written, verbal or implied from your conduct. In all circumstances where your personal information is disclosed, we will take all steps reasonable to ensure that these third parties undertake to protect your privacy.

Direct marketing

If you are a customer or a potential customer, including if you’ve used the Comparison Service, we may contact you with information about products and services offered by EnergyWatch and our related bodies corporate (for example, iSelect), as well as our business partners, which we think may be of interest to you. When we contact you it may be by mail, telephone, email, SMS or social media. We will generally give you the opportunity to express a wish not to receive direct marketing communications. Your consent to receive direct marketing communications in the above ways will have been given if you do not opt out of receiving direct marketing communications from us, and will remain current for an indefinite period of time unless and until you advise us otherwise. You can opt out of receiving direct marketing at any time (see below).

If you want to know how we obtained your personal information, please contact our Privacy Officer using the details provided below and we will let you know unless it is impracticable or unreasonable to do so.

How can you opt out of receiving direct marketing?

You can contact us at any time to let us know if you do not want the personal information we hold about you to be used or disclosed for direct marketing purposes, or you do not wish to be contacted in any of the above ways. In some circumstances we may need to contact you to obtain additional information, such as to verify your identity or to clarify your request.

If you wish to unsubscribe from future marketing and promotional material, please email "Unsubscribe" to enquiries@energywatch.com.au

Does EnergyWatch disclose your personal information to overseas recipients?

Some of our service providers are located overseas. As a result, EnergyWatch may disclose your personal information to overseas recipients, including recipients located in New Zealand, the Philippines, the Netherlands, Ireland, Fiji, Japan, India and the United States of America. For example, sometimes we use third party platforms to deliver or store information. These are sites hosted and managed by organisations other than ourselves, and some of these sites are located overseas.

The email platform used by EnergyWatch is maintained overseas by Amazon Web Services Inc. which has its principal place of business in the United States of America. Amazon's privacy policy is available at http://aws.amazon.com/privacy/?nc1=f_pr.

Your personal information may be stored in a secure and encrypted form overseas (e.g. in data storage and cloud computing facilities operated by us or by third parties on EnergyWatch's behalf).

Use of Government Identifiers

EnergyWatch will not use Australian Commonwealth government-related identifiers, such as Medicare numbers, or a driver's licence number, as its own identifier of individuals.

Sensitive Information

Any sensitive information, as defined in this privacy policy, collected from you will only be used for the purposes of the Comparison Service and energy plan application as requested by you.

Data quality and Security

We may store your information in hardcopy and/or in electronic form. We will take reasonable steps to ensure that your personal information is protected from misuse, interference and loss and from unauthorised access, modification or disclosure.

This may include a range of systems and communication security measures, as well as the secure storage of hard copy documents. In addition, access to your personal information will be restricted to those properly authorised to have access.

We rely on the personal information we hold in conducting our business. Therefore, it is very important that the information we hold is accurate, complete and up-to-date. If you believe that your personal information is inaccurate, incomplete, out of date, irrelevant or misleading, please contact our Privacy Officer using the details provided below and we will take reasonable steps to correct that information.

Website usage

You should be aware that there is always an inherent risk in transmitting your personal information via the Internet.

Cookies are pieces of information that a website transfers to your computer for record-keeping purposes. The information collected may be used to improve and customise your experience on the EnergyWatch website. In addition, aggregated non-personally identifiable data may be collected from the EnergyWatch website to help maintain and improve delivery of the Energy Watch online service and marketing. This aggregated information may assists in improving content and website navigation.

When you visit any of the EnergyWatch online resources, the system may collect certain information about your visit for statistical purposes, including:

  • server address;
  • top level domain name (for example .com, .gov, .au, etc.);
  • the date and time of your visit to the site;
  • the pages you accessed and documents downloaded during your visit;
  • the previous site you visited;
  • whether you've visited the EnergyWatch site before; and
  • the type of browser used.

This data may be recorded to maintain the site servers and improve our services. There are several methods and packages that may be used to collect visitor behaviours on each of EnergyWatch’s online platforms. Like for a number of commercial website operators, tools to measure and analyse internet usage across the sites may be used. This enables tracking the number of unique browsers to the EnergyWatch sites.

Links to third party sites

Whilst links to third party websites may be provided on our website, we are not responsible for the content or practices of these third party websites.

These links are provided for your convenience and do not represent EnergyWatch's endorsement of any linked third party website. We recommend that you check the privacy policies of these third parties prior to providing them with your personal information.

How you can access or correct your personal information

You can request access to the personal information we hold about you by contacting our Privacy Officer using the details provided below. We will generally provide you with access, subject to some exceptions permitted by law.

Access to personal information may be refused in a number of circumstances, such as where:

  • providing access would have an unreasonable impact on the privacy of others;
  • the request is frivolous or vexatious;
  • the information relates to existing or anticipated legal proceedings and would not normally be accessible as part of those proceedings;
  • providing access would be unlawful;
  • denying access is required by law;
  • providing access would be likely to prejudice enforcement related activities conducted by an enforcement body;
  • giving access would reveal evaluative information in connection with a commercially sensitive decision-making process; or
  • giving access would pose a threat to the life, health or safety of any individual or to public health or safety.

If we deny or restrict access to the information you have requested, we will give you written reasons for this decision when we respond to your request. We may charge a fee to cover our costs of providing access to you and will advise you of any fee payable before we provide you with access.

How you can make a privacy complaint

Please contact our Privacy Officer using the details provided below if you have any concerns or complaints about the manner in which we have collected or handled your personal information. We will investigate your complaint and respond to you in writing within 30 days.

If you consider your privacy concerns have not been resolved satisfactorily by us, or you wish to obtain more information on privacy requirements, you can contact the Australian Information Commissioner on 1300 363 992 or visit their website at http://www.oaic.gov.au.

How to contact us

If you:

  • have queries, concerns or complaints about the manner in which your personal information has been collected or handled by EnergyWatch;
  • would like to request a hard copy of this privacy policy or discuss any issues relating to this policy or privacy matters generally; or
  • would like to request access to or correction of the personal information we hold about you;

please contact our Privacy Officer:

  • by telephone on 03 9276 8000
  • by mail to Level 11, Tower 1, Collins Square, 727 Collins Street, Docklands VIC 3008
  • by email to privacy@energywatch.com.au.

Updated December 2022