Conveyancer licences – privacy collection notice

Who we are

Personal information is being collected by the Department of Customer Service (the Department) on behalf of the Commissioner for NSW Fair Trading. NSW Fair Trading gives priority to protecting the privacy of personal information, in accordance with the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act 1998 (PPIP Act) and Health Records and Information Privacy Act 2002 (HRIP Act).

If you have any questions about this document, or how we handle your personal information, you can contact our Privacy team using the contact details at the end of this notice.

Why we collect your personal information

• NSW Fair Trading is collecting personal information for the purpose of assessing your application to apply for, update, renew, restore, replace or surrender a conveyancer’s licence or withdraw a conveyancer's licence application in accordance with the Conveyancers Licensing Act 2003 and the Licensing and Registration (Uniform Procedures) Act 2002. This includes to assess your or your corporation's ongoing eligibilty to hold a licence.
• Where applicable, we collect personal information for the purpose of assessing your application for recognition of your occupation in New South Wales in accordance with the Conveyancers Licensing Act 2003, Part 2 of the Licensing and Registration (Uniform Procedures) Act 2002, the Trans-Tasman Mutual Recognition (New South Wales) Act 1996 and the Mutual Recognition (New South Wales) Act 1992.
• NSW Fair Trading is also collecting changed contact details for the purpose of keeping your or your corporation's conveyancer’s licence up-to-date.

The kinds of information we collect

This application may be submitted for an individual or for a corporation, meaning we may collect the following information:

• Full names, dates of birth, driver’s licence number, contact details (address, email, and phone number) and any previous names or aliases (including evidence of such).
• Proof of identity information, which may include your photo identity documents, like a passport or driver licence, Medicare card details and/or other proof of identity.
• Third-party information
• Nationwide criminal offence information, including spent convictions, for individual licence holders and each director of a corporation. This information will be collected via NSW Police.  
• Qualification details, employment history and referee contact details.
• Details of relevant civil or disciplinary proceedings.
• Details of relevant disqualifications or suspensions.
• Some financial information, including information about bankruptcy, insolvency and debts.
• Details of mental incapacity, where applicable*.
• Bank details (where a refund needs to be provided of a licence fee)
• Details of other licences held, including those you hold in other Australian states (including territories) or in New Zealand
• Additional personal information if it is required to satisfy the eligibility requirements for the licence.

* This information is ‘health information’ and attracts a higher level of protection under the Health Records and Information Privacy Act 2002 (HRIP Act). We note as part of the application process, if an individual selects yes to being a “mentally incapacitated person”, they may be asked to provide medical evidence from a medical practitioner. This will assist NSW Fair Trading in determining whether an applicant is able to be issued with a licence under the Conveyancers Licensing Act 2003.

Failure to provide information

Personal information is provided voluntarily however if you do not provide information, we may not be able to assess the application.

How we may use this information

We may use the information we collect in the following ways:

• To assess or process your application in accordance with the Conveyancers Licensing Act 2003 and Part 2 of the Licensing and Registration (Uniform Procedures) Act 2002. This includes to assess your or your corporations ongoing eligibility to hold a licence.
• For initial licence applications, renewals and change of director forms, to coordinate a National Police Check (NPC) for individual applicants and each director of a corporation. Applicants will be prompted to a complete an NPC via a secure link from NSW Police following Fair Trading’s receipt of an application. Once completed, a certificate will be issued, and NSW Police will send a copy of the certificate to both the applicant and NSW Fair Trading
• Where applicable, to determine an application for recognition of your occupation in New South Wales in accordance with the Conveyancers Licensing Act 2003, Part 2 of the Licensing and Registration (Uniform Procedures) Act 2002, the Trans-Tasman Mutual Recognition (New South Wales) Act 1996 and the Mutual Recognition (New South Wales) Act 1992.
• Internal administrative purposes, including liaising with you or your corporation in relation to your application, and in relation to compliance, investigations, and enforcement of the Conveyancers Licensing Act 2003 or Fair Trading Act 1987.
• To administer and update a licence, including to send you or your corporation information that we consider important such as reminders to renew licences and to confirm your details if you or your corporation make any subsequent applications in relation to any licence or authority issued by the Department on behalf of the Commissioner for NSW Fair Trading.
• To support more informed policy making, program management, evaluation, research, and service planning as it can facilitate more efficient service delivery for residents and business in NSW.
• To verify your proof of identity documents with the Document Verification Service.
• To record information on a public register which is published online (as required by section 162 of the Conveyancers Licensing Act 2003 and section 34 of the Conveyancers Licensing Regulation 2021. This will include the licence holder's name, suburb, licence type and number, role, licence status and expiry date, licence conditions, the date the licence was first issued, primary and additional premises addresses, associated parties, timeline of updates of the licence and compliance information.
• Other directly related purposes.

Who we may share your information with

If required, we may make enquiries and exchange information with other NSW Government agencies, or other States, Territories and/or the Commonwealth for the purposes of assessing your application and for compliance purposes. This includes sharing information with NSW Police to have a link sent to you or each director of a corporation to complete a National Police Check and for Fair Trading to assess whether you or your corporation is fit and proper to hold a licence. 

We will also make enquiries to verify work experience or qualifications. 

We may also share personal information with third-party providers, CGI Inc. and Calytera as part of their technical support functions. We may disclose personal information to such bodies for these purposes.

We will not disclose personal information to anybody else unless we are authorised or permitted to do so by law or where the individual has given consent. Our Privacy Statement describes when this may occur.

Service NSW

Service NSW collects and uses your personal information where this form is lodged at a Service NSW Service Centre or if you lodge it online using your MyServiceNSW account.

Service NSW may collect and use your information for the following purposes:

• Initiate the application using your MyServiceNSW account.
• To verify your proof of identity documents with the Document Verification Service.
• Share details with NSW Fair Trading.

Service NSW also maintains and uses your personal information for internal administrative purposes, including for the purposes of our interactions with you.

Other information you provide through the application process will be collected and stored by NSW Fair Trading only.

For more information about how Service NSW handles personal information, please visit the Service NSW Privacy Statement.

Digital NSW

NSW Fair Trading is partnered with Digital NSW (part of the Department of Customer Service) who assist us with our business operations by providing software and storing data on our behalf. Digital NSW have a Privacy Statement which outlines their contact details and information about how they look after this data.

Digital NSW also provide us with access to the Document Verification Service so that we can check your identity documents and verify your identity. The Digital NSW Proof of Identity Privacy Collection Notice outlines how Digital NSW handle your data on our behalf when you grant us your consent to process an identity document check.

Protecting personal information

We will store and manage personal information and health information in accordance with the provisions under the PPIP and HRIP Acts.  We have measures in place to help protect personal information from loss, unauthorised access, use, modification, disclosure, or other misuse.

We will only keep information for as long as we need it to fulfil the purposes we collected it for. After which, the information will be disposed of securely in accordance with the State Records Act 1998 and any other applicable legislation.

See our Privacy Management Plan for more information about how we handle personal information.

Your rights

Subject to certain conditions, individuals have the following rights in relation to their personal information:

• The right to request access to their personal information
• The right to request correction of their personal information

If you wish to invoke any of the above rights, please contact us using the details below.