Privacy

How we protect your privacy on our websites

On this page:

Why should you read this privacy statement?

In using these websites you may be required to, or may choose to, provide us with personal and contact details.

This privacy statement sets out what information we’ll ask you for, when we’ll collect it, and what we’ll do with it.

It’s our commitment to keeping your personal information safe and secure, and explains your rights, and our responsibilities.

What information is collected when you use these websites?

Where an online services account is necessary to access our services, you’ll be asked to provide your name, email address, telephone number, physical address and postal address.

As a website user, you may also choose to provide personal information voluntarily, for example, when contacting us by email, or sending us feedback. While you are not obliged to provide this information, not doing so may affect the services we can offer you.

Where you subscribe to one of our alerts or newsletters, the details you provide will be stored in a secure third-party database. Should you choose to unsubscribe, these details will be deleted from the database.

Statistical information about your use of these websites may also be collected, but will not identify you personally.

Who holds your information?

The Companies Office is part of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE). When you submit personal information, it is held by MBIE. Where appropriate, however, information may be stored or accessed by authorised third parties who are providing services to MBIE (such as IT contractors). We’ll keep your personal details secure in accordance with the Privacy Act 2020 and any authorised third parties will be subject to our information security and privacy requirements.

How will we use your personal information?

The information we collect about you enables us to:

  • manage your online services account with us
  • provide you with important news and updates
  • alert you to any serious outages
  • communicate with you on matters relating to your use of the websites
  • determine how the websites are used, so we can deliver, evaluate and improve our services to you.

We’ll generally only use personal information obtained through the websites for the purposes for which it was collected. However, we may use or share your personal information for some other directly related purpose, as otherwise permitted by the Privacy Act 2020 , or as required by some other legislation.

We may also be required to share personal information under the Official Information Act 1982, or to a Parliamentary Select Committee or Parliament, in response to a parliamentary question.

Who has access to your personal information?

The personal details you provide will be viewable by MBIE staff (where appropriate) and sometimes third-party contractors and suppliers authorised to administer or work on our websites.

How long will your personal information be held?

Where your personal information constitutes a public record, it will be retained as required by the Public Records Act 2005 .

How is your information kept safe?

We’re obliged by the Privacy Act 2020 to keep your personal information secure, and any authorised third-party will be subject to our own security and privacy requirements.

Our websites have security measures in place to prevent the loss, misuse and alteration of the information we hold. To maintain the effectiveness of our systems, they undergo regular monitoring, including activity logging, analysis and auditing.

Information about your use of the websites and other IT systems may be used to prevent unauthorised access or attacks on these systems, or to resolve such events – even if you’re not involved in such activity yourself.

We may also use third-party services to monitor or maintain the cyber security of our systems and information. These third-party suppliers have access to monitoring and logging information as well as information processed on MBIE websites and other IT systems.

When you phone us, why are the calls recorded?

As part of our commitment to providing the best possible service to our customers, we record all telephone calls answered by our contact centre.

Recording your calls helps us to:

  • simplify and improve our customer service to you, by using call information to train our contact centre staff
  • have an accurate record of your call, which may be needed to support any transactions that take place over the phone and/or if there’s a dispute.

We store the recordings securely for a maximum of 2 years, after which time they are deleted.

Unless we have lawful reason for withholding the information, you can obtain a transcript of a telephone call by writing to the Privacy Officer at the following address:

Privacy Officer
Companies Office
Private Bag 92061
Victoria Street West
Auckland 1142

What are your rights when it comes to your own information?

You have the right to know whether we hold personal information about you, to access that information, and to request changes to information if you believe it to be incorrect.

If you want to check personal information that we hold, please write to:

Privacy Officer
Companies Office
Private Bag 92061
Victoria Street West
Auckland 1142

If we have a good reason for refusing a request to correct information, you’re entitled to ask that a statement be attached to the information to show that a correction was sought, but not made.

For more information on the privacy laws in New Zealand, and contact details for the Office of the Privacy Commissioner, visit the website for the Office of the Privacy Commissioner .

What are cookies, and what do they do?

Browser cookies are small text files sent by a website and stored on your computer’s hard drive. They are generally used to improve your experience of a website, for example, by remembering the preferences you have set.

MBIE uses cookies to collect statistical information, such as trends in how these websites are used, and to enable your browser to maintain a session with us.

We don’t use cookies to gather any information that will identify you personally.

You can read Google’s privacy statement and access a Google Analytics opt-out tool on Google’s website.

What statistical information is collected when you use this website?

 We may collect statistical information about your visit, to help us improve our websites. This information won’t identify you personally, and includes:

  • the search terms you used
  • the pages you accessed on and the links you clicked on
  • the date and time you visited
  • the referring site (if any) from which you navigated to our website
  • the device you used
  • your operating system (for example, Windows 10, Mac OSX)
  • the type of web browser you use (for example, Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox)
  • other things like screen resolution, the release of your installed Flash version and the language setting of your browser.

The statistical information referred to above can be viewed by certain MBIE staff. It may also be shared with other government agencies.

What details are kept when you use our Constitution Builder tool?

The Incorporated Societies Register’s Constitution Builder tool requires that you send your completed draft constitution to a secure email address. You’ll also be asked for an email address if you start a constitution and intend to finish it later. This information is stored temporarily within the tool.

Incorporated Societies Register

Stored email addresses are inaccessible to MBIE and the Constitution Builder service provider, and are not used for marketing purposes unless you opt in to receiving marketing emails.

Any draft constitution that has not been reopened within 90 days will be deleted, along with the email addresses, and any other information you have provided.

Once you’ve completed your constitution and it has been sent to your nominated address, all information will be permanently deleted from the tool and companiesoffice.govt.nz.

MBIE may collect statistical information about the use of the Constitution Builder tool. This information is anonymous and cannot be traced back to an email address used when creating the draft.

Last updated 1 December 2020