Walshs Privacy Policy & Collection Statement - July 2025

Walshs Financial Planning Pty Ltd, Walshs Wealth Management Pty Ltd, Walshs Finance Pty Ltd, and Walshs Accounting & Taxation Pty Ltd (referred to as ‘Walshs’, ‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’) is bound by the Privacy Act 1988 (‘the Privacy Act’), including the Australian Privacy Principles (‘APPs’), and recognises the importance of ensuring the confidentiality and security of your personal information.

What is the purpose of this policy?

This policy provides you with information about:

The personal information that Walshs collects about you
How we handle your information, including how we use, disclose and keep it secure, and
How you can access your personal information or make a complaint about our handling of your information.

As a business operating in Australia, we are required to adhere to the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) contained in the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (the Privacy Act), which regulate the collection, storage, use, and disclosure of personal and sensitive information. In addition, they also give individuals the right to access and correct any personal information that we have collected about them.

In this Privacy Policy:

Credit eligibility information means credit reporting information disclosed by a credit reporting body (CRB) to us relating to your dealings with credit providers, and information we derive from the disclosed information.
Credit information means personal information about you that relates to your credit history, including (but not limited to) information which relates to your repayment history, consumer credit liabilities, default information, court proceedings and insolvency information.
Credit reporting information means credit information or information derived by a CRB from credit information about you held by the CRB that has a bearing on your credit worthiness and can be used to establish your eligibility for consumer credit.
Disclosure of information means providing information to persons at Walshs, and outside of Walshs.
Personal information means information or an opinion relating to an individual, which can be used to identify that individual.
Privacy Officer means our contact person for your questions or complaints regarding our handling of personal information.
Sensitive information is personal information that includes information relating to a person's racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religion, trade union or other professional or trade association membership, sexual preferences and criminal record, and includes health information.
Use of information means use of information within Walshs.

What information do we collect and hold?

To provide services personalised to meet your needs, Walshs will ask you a range of personal, financial and lifestyle questions. You have the right not to divulge information about your individual objectives, financial situation and needs; however, your adviser will warn you that this may mean the advice you receive is not appropriate for your needs.

The type of information we may require includes

name
date of birth
residential and postal addresses
phone numbers
email addresses
residency status
dependents
employment, occupation and/or company officeholder information
marital status
banking or credit card details required for processing payment
property title, ownership and transfer details
details about your driver’s licence and other identification documents
financial information, including details of:
- credit information
- credit reporting information
- credit eligibility information
- shareholdings
- financial history
- your investments
- your other assets
- your loans and other liabilities
- your cashflows, income and expenses
- insurance information
- taxation information
- superannuation information
details of your financial needs and objectives
details of your current financial circumstances
assets, liabilities, income and expenditure
insurance cover and superannuation
information about your Centrelink eligibility
details about your health or your family health which may impact upon our recommendations

How do we collect your personal information?

We will not collect any personal information about you except when you have knowingly provided that information to us or authorised a third party to provide information to us. Where we have not been provided with the information or do not have access to obtain this directly, we generally collect personal information directly from you. This may take place in several ways, such as when you:

request the provision of financial services from us and we collect information in the course of providing those services to you.
subscribe to our newsletters or other updates
complete a contact form on our website
comment or interact with our social media accounts
provide us with requested documents
provide us with payment details
do business with us
provide us with feedback or submit a complaint
apply for a job with us, or
call us or send us correspondence

If the personal information we request is not provided by you, we may not be able to provide you with the benefit of our services or meet your needs appropriately. For example, we will be unable to arrange finance for you if you do not provide accurate and complete information to enable us to undertake our responsible lending assessment.

Third Party Suppliers

We may also collect personal information about you from a third party, such as your broker, electronic verification services, referrers and marketing agencies. Our clients might also provide us with your personal information. For example, borrowers may provide us with the contact details of their accountant or solicitor. We may also source publicly available information from third parties including real estate listing portals, government departments or agencies, local councils and authorities. All third parties (including clients, suppliers, sub-contractors, or agents) that have access to or use personal information collected and held by us must abide by this Privacy Policy and Collection Statement (Privacy Policy). We make this Privacy Policy available free of charge at https://walshs.com.au/privacy-policy/

Sensitive Information

We will not collect sensitive information about you without your explicit consent, unless an exemption in the APPs applies. These exceptions include if the collection is required or authorised by law, or necessary to take appropriate action in relation to suspected unlawful activity or serious misconduct.

Use of Pseudonyms

We do not give you the option of dealing with us anonymously, or under a pseudonym. This is because it is impractical, and, in some circumstances, illegal for us to deal with individuals who are not identified.

Unsolicited Personal Information

We may receive unsolicited personal information about you. We destroy or de-identify all unsolicited personal information we receive, unless it is relevant to our purposes for collecting personal information. We may retain additional information we receive about you if it is combined with other information we are required or entitled to collect. If we do this, we will retain the information in the same way we hold your other personal information.

Why do we collect and hold personal information?

We may use and disclose the information we collect about you for the following purposes:

provide clients with our services
set up and update your user profile on our website
verify your identity
obtain your credit report from a CRB
complete document verification and other due diligence checks
review and meet your ongoing needs
provide you with information we believe may be relevant or of interest to you
let you know about other products or services offered by us or our commercial partners, send you information about special offers or invite you to events
enable our commercial partners to contact you about their products or services
consider any concerns or complaints you may have
comply with relevant laws, regulations and other legal obligations
help us improve the products and services offered to our customers and enhance our overall business.

We may use and disclose your personal information for any of these purposes. We may also use and disclose your personal information for secondary purposes which are related to the primary purposes set out above, or in other circumstances authorised by the Privacy Act. Sensitive information will be used and disclosed only for the purpose for which it was provided (or a directly related secondary purpose), unless you agree otherwise, or an exemption in the Privacy Act applies.

If a lender requires us to verify your identity for the purposes of the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006 (Cth), you may ask us to provide an alternative means of identity verification by contacting our office at 3221 5677, or enquiries@walshs.com.au.

What will you do with that information you have on file?

We will not use or disclose personal information collected for any purpose other than for which it was provided or where you have consented to disclose information on your behalf. Where we are obliged to disclose information by law, for example, under Court Orders or Statutory Notices we will do so.

In the normal course of providing you with financial services, advice, and assistance your information may be provided to:

support staff
superannuation fund trustees, insurance providers, and product issuers for the purpose of giving effect to your financial plan and the recommendations made by us
to the trustees or managers of Master Trusts and Wrap Accounts who services we may recommend
to organisations to whom we may outsource certain functions from time to time
to another Walshs financial planner during periods when your original financial planner is unavailable so that you can be assured of receiving a continued service
a related entity or other member of our corporate group
anybody who represents you, such as financial consultants, accountants, lawyers, finance brokers and advisers
referrers who introduce you to us
lenders, including (where necessary) related bodies corporate and service providers of lenders
brokers, solicitors, accountants or other service providers that are (or may be) involved in arranging and securing finance for our clients
a CRB or credit provider to obtain your credit report
an associate, agent, contractor or service provider we engage to carry out our functions and activities, such as our lawyers, accountants, debt collectors or other advisers
our customer relationship management (CRM) software provider, and add-on applications that are used with this software
organisations involved in a transfer or sale of all or part of our assets or business
organisations involved in managing payments, including payment merchants and other financial institutions such as banks
regulatory bodies, government agencies, law enforcement bodies and courts, or
other persons or bodies as required by law.

If we disclose your personal information to service providers that perform business activities for us, they may only use your personal information for the specific purpose for which we supply it. We may also disclose personal information where you have expressly authorised the disclosure. For example, if you consent to us disclosing your personal information to our commercial partners so they can let you know about their products and services.

We may use the personal information collected from you for the purpose of providing you with direct marketing material such as articles that may be of interest to you, however if you do not wish to receive marketing material, please notify our office. We will seek to ensure that the personal information collected and held by us is protected from misuse, loss, unauthorised access, modification or disclosure. Your personal information is treated as confidential.

Will my information be disclosed overseas?

We will not send personal information to recipients outside of Australia unless:

we have taken reasonable steps to ensure that the recipient does not breach the Act and the APPs
the recipient is subject to an information privacy scheme similar to the Privacy Act, or
the individual has consented to the disclosure

If you consent to your personal information being disclosed to an overseas recipient, and the recipient breaches the APPs, we will not be accountable for that breach under the Privacy Act, and you will not be able to seek redress under the Privacy Act.

Some of the entities we share information with may be located in, or have operations in, other countries. The current list of countries to which your personal information could be sent is set out below:

Administration, research and other financial services and specialist advice: Canada, India, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, United States of America
Sending or receiving superannuation benefits overseas: England, New Zealand.

Any overseas disclosure does not affect our commitment to safeguarding personal information we collect, and we will take reasonable steps to ensure overseas recipients comply with the Australian Privacy Principles.

Management of Personal Information

We recognise the importance of securing the personal information of our clients and other people whose personal information we hold. We maintain high data security standards to reduce the risk of unauthorised access to your information. However, should a data breach occur, we will contact you to notify you of the information that was compromised. In certain data breach situations, we will also be required to report to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.

Your personal information is stored in our computer database, including our cloud storage databases. Any paper files are stored in secure areas. In relation to information that is held on our computer database, we apply the following guidelines:

strong passwords are required to access the system via a secure password portal
data ownership is clearly defined
employees and contractors are required to comply with our standard operating procedures and policies for securing personal information and to attend regular training on data protection
employees and contractors have restricted access to certain sections of the system
the system automatically logs and reviews all unauthorised access attempts
all computers which contain personal information are secured both physically and electronically, and are subject to vigorous cyber protection protocols
data is encrypted during transmission over the network, and
printing of documents containing personal information is limited

How do we keep personal information accurate and up to date?

We are committed to ensuring that the personal information we collect, use and disclose is relevant, accurate, complete and up to date. Please note that if we have collected your personal information as part of the loan application process (for example, in a loan application form), we rely on you to ensure that this information is accurate.

We encourage you to contact us to correct or update any personal information we hold about you, including by updating your account information on our website or contacting us directly if any information provided during the loan application process has changed. If we correct information that has previously been disclosed to another entity, we will notify the other entity within a reasonable period of the correction. Where we are satisfied information is inaccurate, we will take reasonable steps to correct the information within 30 days, unless you agree otherwise. We do not charge you for correcting the information. If we do not agree with your corrections, we may refuse to update the personal information, in which case we will provide you with a written explanation as to why.

The Privacy Act allows you to seek access to your personal information. To request access, please contact our General Manager, Annabelle Clare, on 3221 5677, or at annabelle@walshs.com.au. There are certain circumstances however when we may not be required to provide access to this information, in which case a written explanation will be provided.

Making a complaint

We have an effective complaint handling process in place to manage privacy risks and issues. To find out more please view our complaints policy via our website by clicking here. Should you be unsatisfied with the resolution provided by our office, you may contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner by submitting a complaint through their online form.

Download Privacy Policy