Privacy Policy
PROTECTION OF PERSONAL INFORMATION ACT, 4 of 2013
OUR PRIVACY STATEMENT:
We recognise the importance of client privacy and the sensitivity of the personal information that we may have on file concerning any individual.
As legal practitioners we have a professional and ethical obligation to keep all information we receive within our professional environment confidential, subject to the client’s instructions to provide legal services. Further, we are committed to safeguarding the personal information we have or control concerning any individual, and this includes our employee, clients, service providers and anyone who is protected under the Protection of Personal Information Act (“POPIA”), save where we are obliged to disclose such personal information required in terms of law.
Bill Tolken Hendrikse Inc is registered as an incorporated company, regulated and authorised to practice as a legal services provider in the Western Cape in the Republic of South Africa.
YOUR PRIVACY RIGHTS:
Bill Tolken Hendrikse Inc manages your personal information in compliance with POPIA and will comply with any other laws of the Republic of South Africa, that promote the security and protection of personal information, as required.
We will only collect, disclose, collate, process and store (‘use’) your personal information with your express written permission, unless legally required to do so, and will only use such information for the lawful purpose for which it is required.
We will disclose in writing, the specific purpose for which we use, request and store your
personal information. We will also keep a record of that personal information and the specific
purpose for which we collect it.
WHY DO WE NEED TO COLLECT PERSONAL INFORMATION:
We collect personal information for the purposes of serving the legal and related needs of our clients, as well as in compliance with other legislation of the Republic of South Africa, such as the Financial Intelligence Centre Act (“FICA”).
We require information to understand, access and assist our clients with their ongoing legal needs, to ensure information is accurate and updated, to collect information through legal means in relation to other individuals for the purposes of providing legal services to clients, to maintain employee personal information in compliance with labour legislation and to represent our clients for legal reasons.
We furthermore need to collect information if so instructed by Regulatory authorities, industry ombudsmen, government departments, and local and international tax authorities.
WHAT TYPE OF INFORMATION DO WE COLLECT:
Personal information refers to any information that identifies you as an individual or specifically relates to you.
We follow reasonable and secure business practices to collect, use and disclose your personal information for the purpose of providing legal services as well as:
- when you visit our website, we may collect and store certain information about you;
- when you apply for a job with us;
- when you sign up for newsletters or other marketing communications.
We may collect information about you from third parties:
- through search services;
- when you interact with us on social media;
- when information is publicly available.
We will only collect special personal information (which includes information about your religion or philosophical beliefs, race or ethnic origin, trade union membership, political persuasion, health or sex life, biometric information, or criminal behaviour) where necessary and only if we are legally permitted to do so. We will take extra measures to protect your special personal information, save when we are obliged to disclose such information as part of a legal process.
HOW IS YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION COLLECTED:
We collect information only by lawful means. When we make directed individual requests for relevant sensitive personal information from a particular organisation or business, we will obtain written consent from you. Wherever possible we collect personal information directly from the owner. We may ask you for consent, before or during the first consultation or during the course of a matter. Consent may be in writing, verbal or implied as necessary to further a client’s legal needs and/or the course of business. Our privacy policy is a notice of the purposes for which we collect, use or disclose your personal information or business contact information.
Dependent on the legal services provided, with consent, we may obtain this relevant information from clients, employees & service providers, public registries such the Deeds Office or the Master’s Office, financial institutions, employers, motor vehicle and driver licensing authorities, law enforcement, investigators, the discovery process, documents provided to us to represent you or assist you in or with your matter.
HOW LONG DO WE KEEP YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION:
We will only keep your personal information for as long as necessary to fulfil the purpose for which it was collected or processed. Currently, we are required to keep all records for 7 (seven) years in terms of the Legal Practice Act, 28 of 2014. We may be required to keep your personal information for some time after your matter has been finalised. This may be so that we can fulfil certain legal, accounting, reporting, or other requirements.
Your personal information is stored by us on secure servers and physical filing systems on our premises.
CONSENT TO PROCESS YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION:
Our practice is to request either written or express oral consent, which may be given in person or over the telephone if the owner’s identity is authenticated. If the owner volunteers to provide relevant personal information verbally or in writing, we assume that you are consenting to the collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as described in our Privacy Policy, or when you initiate contact with us, we may determine that consent has been implied for us to collect, use, and disclose personal information in a reasonable manner.
In some situations, we will require express consent in writing, by the provision of a letter, application form, electronic signature, or other document authorising certain activities.
There are certain circumstances where we are required or permitted by law, to collect, use and disclose personal information without consent. We will handle all personal information confidentially and will substantiate the legal authority to collect, use and disclose personal information in these circumstances.
WHEN CAN PERSONAL INFORMATION BE DISCLOSED WITHOUT YOUR CONSENT:
We can only disclose your personal information when we are required or authorised to do so by law, for example for the purpose of FICA requirements, when the use of the information is necessary to respond to an emergency that threatens the life, health or security of an individual or the public, when it is necessary to establish or collect our fees or disbursements incurred on your behalf; or where information is already publicly known.
USE OF PERSONAL INFORMATION:
We use personal information to provide legal advice and services to clients and to administer our legal practice incidental to providing legal services. With the owner’s permission, we may send you information about our other legal services, or about new developments in the law. An owner may, at any time, withdraw his/her consent by notifying us, and we will not send you any such information. We do not disclose or sell personal information or business contact information to any third party to enable them to market their products and services.
Who do we release information to?
When we release information about the owner, it is done to serve specific needs, while providing legal services. With the owner’s consent, we may provide information to our staff and agents who use the information for the reasonable purpose of providing legal services, to a third party we contract with to provide administrative services to the law firm (like computer back-up services or archival file storage) and the third party agrees to comply with our privacy policy and privacy laws, to professionals working with us such as investigators, paralegals, and experts, as well as financial institutions.
Accuracy of information.
The owners of the personal information have the right to request a correction of the personal information that we hold about them. We rely on the owner to provide us with accurate and up-to-date personal and business contact information for the purposes of providing legal services and to maintain contact with them. If, during the course of our professional relationship, any information changes, the client/employee/service provider must inform us so that we can make any necessary changes.
How do we protect your personal information?
In order to protect your personal information, we will not collect, use or disclose personal information for any purpose, other than that which we require to identify clients/ employees/ service providers, or which is required in the course of litigation or other legal processes. We will only disclose personal information to those persons who have a need to know, for the purposes stated in this Privacy Policy.
We will only keep personal information for as long as needed to fulfil the stated purpose or as required by law. We will further maintain personal information in as accurate, complete and updated form as possible and keep personal information physically secure in locked or secure offices, rooms and/or filing cabinets. We will always maintain technological safeguards such as passwords or encryption for sensitive personal information.
Access to personal information.
A client/employee or service provider may request access to the personal information we have about them. The request must be in writing and directed to the director directly responsible for the matter. We will charge a reasonable fee for retrieval and copying of personal information. If the retrieval or copying of your request is extensive, we will notify the client of the fee prior to retrieval and copying.
Processing Information of a child.
Bill Tolken Hendrikse Inc takes the privacy of children very seriously. Children under the age of 18 years should obtain their guardian’s consent before providing or submitting any personal information about themselves. We will not require children under this age to provide any personal information other than that which is reasonably necessary. If we determine that a client is under the age of 18, we will not use or maintain his/her personal information without the guardian’s consent.
We will only process the personal information of children if the law permits us to do so and if any one or more of following applies:
- A person with the ability to sign legal agreements has consented to the processing, being the parent or guardian of the child.
- The processing is needed to create, use or protect a right or obligation in law, such as where the child is an heir in a will, a beneficiary of a trust, if required to give effect to the trust deed.
- The child’s personal information was made public by the child, with the consent of a person
who can sign legal agreements. - The processing is for statistical or research purposes and all legal conditions are met.
- Where the child is an heir in a will, if required to give effect to the will.
- Where the child is legally old enough to sign a document as a witness without assistance
from their parent or guardian.
Processing Information about Persons Related to a Juristic Person.
If you are a juristic person, such as a company or close corporation, we may collect and use personal information relating to the juristic person’s directors, officers, employees, beneficial owners, partners, shareholders, members, authorised signatories, representatives, agents, payers, payees, customers, guarantors, spouses of guarantors, sureties, spouses of sureties, other security providers and other persons related to the juristic person. These are related persons.
If you provide the personal information of a related person to us, you warrant that the related person is aware that you are sharing their personal information with us, and that the related person has consented thereto. We will process the personal information of related persons as stated in this Privacy Policy, thus references to “you” or “your” in this Privacy Policy will include related persons with the necessary amendments.
Denial of access, by a client/employee/service provider, to their personal information?
There are exceptions to rights of access to personal information. By law, we must deny access when the file contains personal information on a third party and the information cannot be removed to maintain the privacy of the third-party information. Where we are required or authorised by law (for example, when a record containing personal information about you is subject to a claim of legal professional privilege by one of our clients) we are also obliged to deny access to such information.
We have the right to deny access to information and may deny access when the information relates to existing or anticipated legal proceedings against a client/employee or service provider.
Should we deny a request for access to information or refuse a request to correct information it must be explained. We will however attempt to mediate a resolution if possible.
Your Rights.
You have rights to access, amend, delete or destroy personal information pertaining to you that is in possession of Bill Tolken Hendrikse Inc. In certain circumstances, Bill Tolken Hendrikse Inc may select to, or be required to, refuse or decline requests to exercise these rights.
You have the right to object, on reasonable grounds to the processing of your personal information and to file a complaint with the Information Regulator. Unless your consent is obtained, you have the right to not have your personal information processed for direct marketing. To exercise any other rights, please contact our Information Officer.
USE OF COOKIES
What are cookies?
A cookie is a small text file stored on your device by the website you are visiting. It helps the website to remember information about your device and how you use the website. We use this information to make your visit to our site as easy and useful as possible.
What happens if you disable your cookie functionality?
Clearing or disabling cookies may limit your website functionality, and your functionality once you’ve logged in. You can limit the collection of your information by disabling cookies on your browser. You may also be able to modify your browser settings to require your permission each time a site attempts to set a cookie. However, our website(s) (and many other websites) rely on cookies to enable certain functionality. If you choose to disable cookies, some of the services available on our website may not work properly.
Types of cookies we use?
There are two main types of cookies:
- Session cookies – When you close your browser, some cookies are deleted. These are called session cookies.
- Persistent cookies – Other cookies are stored on your device until they expire, or you choose to delete them. They are called persistent cookies. These cookies are sent back to us each time you visit our site.
What we use cookies for?
We use cookies for session management, user device identification and classification, traffic
routing, and analytics.
Is your personal information at risk?
No, we will never save any personal information, including login details or other personal
information on your computer. If you prefer, you can usually adjust your browser settings to remove or reject browser cookies. Please note that removing or rejecting cookies could affect the availability and functionality of our services.
CHANGES TO OUR PRIVACY POLICY
We may review and change our Privacy Policy from time to time in order to update our privacy commitment to you in keeping with current privacy laws. If amended, our amended policy will be disclosed on our website- www.billtolken.co.za. Unless otherwise stated the current version will apply each time you access our website.
CONTACTING US
If you have any questions about our Privacy Policy, or want to exercise the rights set out herein, please contact:
The Information Officer: Annerie de Waal
Bill Tolken Hendrikse Inc.
1 Sarel Cilliers Street
Bellville
7530
Telephone: 021 944 3000
e-mail: accountant1@billtolken.co.za
