Privacy
Your privacy is important to us, and we are committed to the highest standards of privacy when we collect, store, use or disclose your personal information.
Steps we take to protect your privacy
Comcare is covered by national privacy legislation—Privacy Act 1988.
The Privacy Act gives you rights including:
- to be told why your personal information is being collected and whether it can be given to anyone else
- to see what information is held about you and have it corrected
- to have your personal information stored securely
- if you believe your privacy has been infringed, you can make a complaint.
Privacy Policy and actions
To protect your privacy, we act to:
- ensure the personal information we collect, use, store or disclose is accurate, up to date and complete
- meet the requirements of the Privacy Act 1988, including the Australian Privacy Principles and Privacy (Australian Government Agencies) APP Code 2017
- keep our privacy policy current
- ensure our staff understand and comply with their privacy responsibilities
- respond to complaints quickly and honestly
- continue working effectively with the Privacy Commissioner.
Our Privacy Policy (PDF, 273.6 KB) describes how we handle personal information and what types of personal information we generally hold. You can contact us to ask for the policy in another format.
Privacy Impact Assessment Register
A Privacy Impact Assessment is a tool to assist an agency understand and evaluate compliance with privacy principles.
Comcare must maintain a register of all Privacy Impact Assessments completed, in accordance with s15(1) of the Australian Government Agencies Privacy Code.
View the Comcare Privacy impacts assessment register.
Personal information explained
Some common examples of personal information are:
- names, addresses, phone numbers or email addresses
- medical certificates, clinical notes or medical reports
- pay slips or bank statements
- witness statements.
The Privacy Act 1988 defines personal information as:
’Information or an opinion about an identified individual, or an individual who is reasonably identifiable:
- whether the information or opinion is true or not, and
- whether the information or opinion is recorded in a material form or not.
Access or correct your personal information
You can ask to access, amend or annotate the personal information we hold about you under the Privacy Act 1988. We aim to respond to your request within 30 days.
- email privacy@comcare.gov.au
- call us at 1300 366 979.
The Freedom of Information Act also supports personal information being amended if it is incorrect, incomplete, out of date or misleading.
- email foi@comcare.gov.au
- call us at 1300 366 979.
How to make a complaint about privacy
You can make a complaint to us if you believe we have interfered with your privacy or breached our obligations under the Privacy Act 1988:
- email privacy@comcare.gov.au
- call us on 1300 366 979.
Our Privacy Policy (PDF, 273.6 KB) provides more information on how to make a complaint and how we will respond.
If you are not happy with our response or have a question about the Privacy Act or Australian Privacy Principles, contact the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.
Privacy statements
Comcare eNews privacy statement
Subscribing to Comcare eNews service is voluntary. You can update your subscription or unsubscribe from Comcare eNews at any time.
Your privacy is important to us. We will only collect, use or disclose your personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988 (Privacy Act).
Comcare is the Commonwealth agency authorised by the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 1988 (SRC Act) to do all things necessary or convenient to be done for, or in connection with, the performance of its functions under the SRC Act, Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Regulations 2019 and other legislation. Any personal information collected from this subscription will be used for those purposes and we will not share your personal information or disclose it overseas.
For more information about how Comcare manages personal information, see our Privacy Policy (PDF, 273.6 KB), contact us on 1300 366 979 or email privacy@comcare.gov.au. Comcare’s Privacy Policy contains information including how people may access their personal information held by Comcare, how to seek correction of information, how to make a privacy complaint and how Comcare deals with complaints.
Social media privacy statement
We use social media channels, including LinkedIn and YouTube, to communicate with the public about our work.
When you communicate with us through these channels, we may collect your personal information, but we only use it to help us to communicate with you and the public.
The social media services will also handle your personal information for its own purposes. These services have their own privacy policies. You can access the privacy policy for LinkedIn and the privacy guidelines for Youtube on their websites.
You can find out more information about how Comcare uses social media.
Web user feedback survey privacy statement
Comcare is conducting a survey to assess the usefulness of the content on our website.
The survey is anonymous and any responses will be visible only to Comcare.
Please do not provide personal information about you or anyone else when responding to the survey questions.
Any personal information that is collected by Comcare, solicited or otherwise, will be handled in accordance with its Privacy Policy and obligations under the Privacy Act.
For more information about how we handle personal information, see our Privacy Policy (PDF, 273.6 KB).
Comcare's Learning Management System privacy statement
Collection notices
Call recording
When you provide information to us during a call, we will collect and use this to assist with your query, and for training and quality assurance purposes.
This call will be recorded, unless you request the Comcare agent on the call to stop the audio recording. They will stop the recording but will keep records of information that you give us after the recording has been stopped. We will also collect information about this call itself, such as the duration of the call and the number used to make or receive the call.
We may need to terminate a call if consent to call recording is declined.
Purpose for call recording
We may also use or disclose these records where authorised by law or for:
- claim management
- work health and safety
- fraud investigation
- security management
- in response to an access request
- complaint management
- dispute resolution
- research
- legal proceedings, or to comply with a statutory notice, or
- law enforcement related activities.
Use of artificial intelligence
We may use artificial intelligence software to transcribe calls. No automated decisions are made with that information, and we have procedures in place to monitor the accuracy and quality of the information generated.
Use of third-party providers
We use some third-party providers to provide us with essential services, including for the technology used for this call. We take steps to ensure that all our service providers are required to comply with our privacy, security and confidentiality obligations.
Further information
Our Privacy Policy (PDF, 273.6 KB) includes more information about how we handle personal information, and how you can access or correct information that we hold about you or make a privacy complaint.
Event registration collection notice
Comcare is authorised to collect, use and disclose personal information under the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 1988 and the Work, Health and Safety Act 2011.
Any personal information you provide is collected by Comcare for the purpose of facilitating your participation in, seeking your feedback in relation to, and communicating about the event. Comcare needs to collect your personal information, otherwise Comcare may not be able to ensure your participation in the event.
You may also be required to provide financial information, including credit card details, if you make a payment for an event. This may be through one of our providers and Comcare may receive your personal information including whether payment for an event has been made. Where this occurs, Comcare does not receive your financial information.
Comcare will only collect, use, or disclose your personal information in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988.
Comcare uses personal information for research, business, and policy development and for internal administrative purposes. We may also use personal information for analytics including to operate and improve our services including associated applications.
While unlikely, Comcare may need to disclose personal information outside Australia if circumstances require that we do so. If disclosure of personal information is made to someone overseas, Comcare will follow the Australian Privacy Principles that relate to disclosure to overseas entities.
