Did you know that the Office of the Privacy Commissioner (OPC) has a compliance monitoring programme that ensures property managers and agencies are acting in accordance with the Privacy Act?
Through the compliance monitoring programme, OPC will carry out regular checks of rental sector agencies, as well as an annual survey to audit application forms, contract forms and privacy policies of letting agencies, property managers and third-party service providers.
Tenants and prospective Tenants need to have confidence in the way their personal information has been collected, used, stored and disclosed by their Landlord or Property Manager. For this reason, OPC has also established an anonymous tip line to enable Tenants or prospective Tenants to report concerns about the handling of their personal information.
Property Managers, Landlords, and Tenants’ advocates were consulted throughout the development process. OPC has also come out strongly against ‘Bad Tenant’ groups online, working with administrators to close these down.
Consequences for non-compliance include:
• Warning letters
• Access directions
• Compliance notices
• Referral to the Human Rights Review Tribunal
• Public Interest Inquiry
• Public naming of agency
The penalty for failure to comply with a Compliance Notice is a fine of up to $10,000.