Privacy Policy
This privacy policy explains how we may collect, store, use, and disclose any personal information that you provide to us when using greatsouth.nz (“this Website”). Your continued use of this Website provides your unconditional consent to us collecting, storing, using, and disclosing your personal information in the manner set out below.
General
In this privacy policy ‘we’, ‘us’, and ‘our’ refers to the Southland Regional Development Agency.
Collection of your personal information
We may collect personal information, including (without limitation) your e-mail address, name, home or work address or telephone number. You may decide not to provide your personal information to us. However, if you do not provide it, we may not be able to provide you with access to certain information or services.
We also collect anonymous demographic information, such as your postal code, age, gender, preferences and interests.
Automated collection
When you visit this Website, we may use automated technology (such as usage monitoring software, cookies, and sessions) to collect and store certain information about your visit including, without limitation, your search queries, IP address, browser type, domain names, access times and referring website addresses. We also collect device specific information, such as whether you were accessing this Website using a mobile device, device model, network and IP address. This information is captured by Google Analytics and other trusted third party service providers. Please also see the “Cookies and Google Analytics” section of this privacy policy for further information. We use this information for the operation of the Website and associated services, to maintain quality of those services, and to provide general statistics regarding use of the Website.
Third party websites
This Website may contain hyperlinks to third party websites. When visiting a third party website from hyperlinks displayed on this Website (“third party websites”), we encourage you to review the privacy statements of those websites so that you can understand how the personal information you provide will be collected, used and shared. We are not responsible for the privacy statements or other content of third party websites or for the manner in which those websites collect, hold, use, and distribute any personal information you provide.
Links to social networking services
We do use social networking services such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube to communicate with the public about our services. When you communicate with us using these services, the social networking service may collect your personal information for its own purposes.
These services may track your use of our website on those pages where their links are displayed. If you are logged in to those services (including any Google service) while using our site, their tracking will be associated with your profile with them. See the “Cookies and Google Analytics” section of this privacy policy for further information.
These services have their own privacy policies which are independent of ours, and we encourage you to review these.
Use and disclosure
We will not use or disclose your personal information except in accordance with the Privacy Act 2020.
We may use your personal information to:
- operate the Website and deliver the services you have requested.
- verify your identity and to assist you if you forget your username or password for any of the services we provide to you via the internet;
- improve the content of this Website and to customise this Website (including advertising) to your preferences;
- respond to you, if you lodge a complaint, make a comment, or give feedback through the Website;
- analyse usage of this Website; and
If you have opted in to:
- inform you (including by periodic newsletters) of other content, products or services available from us and/or the Website;
- contact you via surveys to conduct research about your opinion of our current services or of potential new services that we may offer;
- provide you with further information, news, and promotional material;
- send you direct marketing. This may include communications by post, telephone or email, about our content, products and services, events and special offers; and
- provide you with advertising and information about the products and services of carefully selected third parties (for example, tourism operators, community organisations and event promoters) that may be of interest to you.
We will not disclose, sell, rent, or lease your personal information to third parties, unless you have opted in to third party communications, in which case we may share some of your details with carefully selected third parties (for example, tourism operators, community organisations and event promoters) so that they can provide you with advertising and information about products, services and events that may be of interest to you. We may, from time to time, contact you on behalf of third parties about a particular offering. In those cases, your unique personally identifiable information (e-mail, name, address, telephone number) is not transferred to the third party.
Your personal information will be made available internally for the above purposes and in addition, we may share your personal information with third parties, who have agreed to treat your personal information in accordance with this privacy policy, for similar purposes (including, without limitation, to help us perform statistical analysis, send you email or postal mail, provide customer support, or arrange for deliveries.) By providing us with your personal information, you consent to our using and disclosing your personal information in the manner set out above.
We may also share information that does not personally identify anyone with the public or other businesses like publishers, advertisers or web-developers. For example, we may share information publicly to show trends about the general use of our services.
We will only use or disclose your personal information that you have provided to us, or which we have obtained about you:
- for the above-mentioned purposes;
- if we are authorised, required or permitted by law to disclose the information;
- if we believe that the use or disclosure is reasonably necessary to enforce any legal rights we may have, or is reasonably necessary to protect the rights, property and safety of us, or customers, or others;
- if we believe that the use or disclosure is reasonably necessary to assist a law enforcement agency or an agency responsible for national security in the performance of their functions.
Cookies and Google Analytics
Cookies are small text files that are placed in your browser by the websites you visit. They are widely used to help users navigate websites efficiently, to perform certain functions on the sites, and/or to provide site owners with information about how their sites are used.
We use cookies on the Website where they are required for particular features to work – for example, if you are a logged in user, to allow you to remain logged in whilst you complete certain tasks.
You have the ability to accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can usually modify your browser setting to decline cookies if you prefer. If you choose to decline cookies, you may not be able to fully experience the interactive features of the Website.
We are not responsible for the use of cookies by other third party sites.
Google Analytics Demographics and Interest Reporting have been enabled on the Website and as a result non-identifiable personal information about users such as age, gender and interests may be collected. This data is aggregated and cannot personally identify you. Such information will only be used or disclosed for the purpose of better understanding our users and identify how experience and interaction can be improved. It will not be used or disclosed for any other purpose without consent. You can choose to opt-out from Google Analytics, information on how to do this can be found here.
Storage and security
Personal information collected on this Website is collected and held by Great South. We will take reasonable steps to secure personal information that is held by us from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, alteration, or destruction. When personal information (such as a credit card number) is transmitted to other websites, it is protected through the use of Secure Socket Layer (SSL) encryption.
Right to access and correct
You have the right to ask for a copy of any personal information we hold about you, and to ask for it to be corrected if you think it is wrong. If you’d like to ask for a copy of your information, or to have it corrected, please contact us at support@greatsouth.nz. You may at any time ask us to update or remove your contact details from our database.
Changes to our privacy policy
We reserve the right, at our discretion, to update revise this privacy policy at any time. Changes to this privacy policy will take effect immediately once published on this Website. We encourage you to periodically review this privacy policy regularly for modifications and updates. If you continue to use this website or if you provide any personal information after we post changes to this privacy policy, this will indicate your acceptance of any such changes.
Complaints
If you believe your privacy has been breached, please contact us at support@greatsouth.nz so that we can put this right. You can call the Privacy Commissioner's privacy hotline: 0800 803 909.
Last updated: January 2021