Elderly Care Privacy Policy
Your privacy is important to us, and we want you to understand how we handle your Personal Information at Elderly Care Limited ACN 666 996 167. The Australian Privacy Principles govern how personal data is collected and outline regulations on collecting, storing, and releasing this information.
“Personal Information” is information that identifies a person or from which a person can reasonably be identified. It includes information such as your name, address, date of birth, contact details and emergency contacts. If you receive aged care services, it may also include “sensitive information” such as your care records, medical history, treatment, advice you have been given by health professionals, and other information relevant to your care or the services we provide.
Elderly Care collects Personal Information from and about:
- prospective and current residents of aged care facilities;
- people who receive community aged care services from us;
- current employees;
- prospective employees; and
- other individuals who Elderly Care has contact with.
- Why do we collect personal information?
The purposes for which we collect and hold Personal Information include:
- if you are a prospective resident, resident or receive aged care services;
- to provide you with appropriate ongoing accommodation or care services;
- to comply with the Aged Care Act 1997 (Cth) or other state based legislation;
- to determine your eligibility to entitlements under the Aged Care Act 1997 (Cth);
- to liaise with your authorised representative and contact nominated individuals (such as family members) if requested or needed;
- to comply with obligations to give financial and asset information to the Commonwealth Government to determine funding entitlements and to set your fees;
- to enter contract arrangements for an accommodation unit within a retirement community; and/or
- to meet any other regulatory, legislative or care requirement.
If you are an employee:
- for the purposes of timekeeping;
- to comply with taxation and employment laws; and
- to contact you in relation to work-related matters or concerns.
If you are a prospective employee:
- to enable us to properly assess the quality of your employment application; and
- to enable us to contact you if you have been previously unsuccessful and an appropriate position becomes available.
For other individuals with whom we have contact:
- to enable us to contact you; and
- to enable us to fulfil any obligation or undertaking relevant to your relationship with Elderly Care.
2. What type of personal information can Elderly Care collect and hold?
If you are a prospective resident, a resident or a person who receives aged care services, we may collect and hold information in connection to:
- your health and care needs, your lifestyle choices and your health care preferences and wishes;
- you that was provided to the Aged Care Assessment Team;
- you that was provided to the Commonwealth Department of Health.
- your financial status;
- your Social Security status;
- your appointed attorneys (including their contact details) and/or other alternative decision-makers;
- contact details for your family members; and
- our requirements as a serviced provider in accordance with the Aged Care Act 1997 (Cth), which includes sensitive information relating to your health, health care services and religion.
If you are a prospective employee, we may collect and hold:
- your resume and any other information provided with your application;
- information gathered during the assessment of your application for employment; and
- health information directly related to your ability to perform the inherent requirements of the position that we have collected with your consent.
For other individuals with whom we have contact, we may collect and hold:
- personal contact details; and
- information in connection to your relationship with us.
- How does Elderly Care collect your personal information?
Wherever possible we collect information directly from you. However, we may collect “Personal Information” in any of the following ways:
If you are a prospective resident, resident or receive aged care services:
- from you or your authorised representative;
- when completing an enquiry form;
- during meetings with you;
- from your Residential Care Agreement;
- from a Commonwealth Government agency, including Centrelink, Medicare, or an Aged Care Assessment Team;
- from your medical practitioner(s) or other health care professional(s);
- from other aged care facilities where you have stayed; and/or
- from your authorised representative or family members.
If you are an employee:
- via facial recognition hardware or software;
- through site-based video surveillance; and/or
- provided from you or gathered indirectly in connection with our requirements under relevant taxation and employment legislation.
If you are a prospective employee:
- from you;
- from your referees; and/or
- from previous employers.
For other individuals with whom we have contact:
- by mail, internet, phone, or face to face; and/or
- through site-based video surveillance.
4. How does Elderly Care use and disclose your personal information?
If you are a prospective resident, resident or receive aged care services, we use and disclose your Personal Information to:
- to provide appropriate ongoing care and services;
- communicating with your nominated health professionals;
- to comply with the provisions of the Aged Care Act 1997 (Cth) and state based legislation;
- to determine your eligibility to entitlements provided by the Aged Care Act 1997 (Cth);
- to comply with obligations to provide relevant financial and asset information to the Commonwealth Government to determine funding entitlements and to set your fees;
- to liaise with your nominated representative and contact your family members if you have consented and this is requested or needed.
If you are an employee:
- the use of your facial image for time recording purposes and staff profile;
- we use your Personal Information to assess your performance in your role(s); and/or
- we use your Personal Information in connection with our obligations (and our client’s obligations) to comply with legislation including “suitability matter” (as defined in the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission Act 2018 (Cth) and industry standards.
If you are a prospective employee, we use and disclose your Personal Information to:
- to enable us to properly assess your application for employment, including by contacting referees and previous employers; and/or
- to enable us to contact you if an appropriate position becomes available.
For other individuals with whom we have contact, we use your Personal Information:
- to enable us to contact you;
- to respond to any inquiries; and/or
- to enable us to meet any undertaking or obligation arising from our relationship with you.
We may also disclose your Personal Information if we are required to by any law or in response to a subpoena or order of a court or tribunal.
5. How does Elderly Care store your personal information?
We may store Personal Information electronically, on our computer databases, in cloud based applications or hard copy documents at the locations we undertake work.
We may also store archived Personal Information at a secure offsite records storage and archive management facility. The Personal Information will be destroyed in line with the relevant legislative requirements.
We take reasonable steps to ensure the security of Personal Information that we collect and hold, including by storing paper records, by limiting access to them and use passwords for securing electronic files.
We maintain policies regarding who has the authority to access your Personal Information. All our staff are bound by a formal Code of Conduct and our Confidentiality Policy. We educate and supervise our staff to ensure Personal Information is handled in accordance with this Privacy Policy and privacy laws.
6.0 How can you access, correct, and update your personal information?
You (or your authorised representative) are generally entitled to access Personal Information we hold about you, except where access can or must be denied or limited by the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth).
Access to your personal information may be requested by writing to Elderly Care’s Privacy Officer at PO Box 439, Mt Gravatt Qld, 4122 or by email at privacy@elderlycare.au
Requests for access should include:
- if the person requesting information is an authorised representative, proof that the person requesting access is lawfully authorised to do so (such as a copy of the Enduring Power of Attorney appointing the person or an advanced health directive as well as a copy of the person’s drivers’ licence or passport);
- specific details of the information sought to identify what Personal Information is being requested; and
- the form in which the information is requested (for example, a copy of the information or a request to view the information contained in a resident’s records).
Release of information held by Elderly Care regarding deceased residents will be determined on a case-by-case basis and will be at Elderly Care’s absolute discretion (except by order of a court or tribunal). Elderly Care is at liberty to request an order from a court or tribunal, or other form of authority prior to disclosing the information.
You do not need to provide a reason for requesting access to your Personal Information. We may charge for providing access to the requested Personal Information. Charges will generally be consistent with fees imposed by the Australian Government for access to documentation under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth). We will not charge a fee for lodging a request for access.
We will generally provide access to Personal Information in the form requested unless this is unreasonable or impractical, in which case we may provide the information in another way. For example, if providing information may have an unreasonable impact on the privacy of other individuals, we may provide only some of the information.
If you (or your authorised representative) believe the Personal Information we hold is inaccurate, incomplete, not up to date or misleading, you (or your authorised representative) may request that the information be amended, and we must take reasonable steps to correct the information. If we do not agree that the information is not accurate, complete, or up to date, we may include a statement noting that you do not agree that the information is accurate, up to date, complete, relevant, or not misleading.
If we decide not to grant access to Personal Information or refuse to correct Personal Information, we will provide you with written reasons for our decision, the mechanisms available to complain and any other matters that we may be required to tell you under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) or regulations.
7. Notifiable Data Breach
If Elderly Care suspects a data breach has occurred, the Privacy Officer will assess the situation to decide whether a data breach has been experienced that may require a notification.
If Elderly Care experiences a data breach that is likely to result in serious harm, the Privacy Officer will notify the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (“OAIC”) and all affected individuals in relation to that data breach.
8. Complaints
If you are not satisfied with our handling of your Personal Information or believe we have breached our privacy obligations, you can complain in writing to the Privacy Officer listed below.
8.2 If you are not satisfied with our handling of or response to your complaint you may also make a complaint to the OAIC via the online form on the OAIC website, www.oaic.gov.au, or by contacting the OAIC at GPO Box 5218, Sydney NSW 2001 or by phone 1300 363 992 or by fax (02) 9284 9666.
9. How to contact us
Our Privacy Officer can be contacted at: Elderly Care Privacy Officer PO Box 439 Mount Gravatt QLD 4122
P: 07 3360 9039 E: privacy@elderlycare.au
