Privacy Policy

Kāhui Legal is a specialist law firm working at the forefront of Māori development with unparalleled experience and expertise in legal issues that affect Māori and the interface between iwi and Māori organisations and the Crown, local government and other entities.

In this policy, unless the context provides otherwise:

• “personal information” is information about an identifiable individual, or by which the identity of an individual can reasonably be obtained.
• “services” means the services that we provide as well as anything that we do for you, including providing you access to our website;
• “we”, “us” and” our” means Kāhui Legal, with offices in Wellington (Intilecta Centre, Level 11, 15 Murphy Street, Wellington) and Rotorua (GHA Building, Level 1, 1108 Fenton Street Rotorua);
• “website” means our website accessible at www.kahuilegal.co.nz; and
• “you” means you, the persons/s requesting or using our services, providing us with personal information or visiting our website.

The purpose of this policy is to ensure that personal information collected, used and disclosed by Kāhui Legal is protected consistent with privacy law in New Zealand.

Scope

This policy applies to all of our legal, management and administrative staff.

Policy

Kāhui Legal complies with the New Zealand Privacy Act 2020 (the Act) when dealing with personal information.

This policy sets out how we will collect, use, disclose and protect your personal information. This policy does not limit or exclude any of your rights under the Act. If you wish to seek further information on the Act, please contact our privacy officer by emailing info@kahuilegal.co.nz, or see www.privacy.org.nz.

What kind of personal information do we collect?

We will collect personal information directly from you or any person you have authorised to provide information to us, and will hold that information. This may include:

• names, dates of birth, addresses, email addresses, and contact telephone numbers;
• information to enable us to comply with our obligations under anti-money laundering and counter financing of terrorism laws, including verifying your identification and that of other relevant persons in your organisation;
  your job title and employer;
• any interactions you have with us (for example time and date of contact, relevant emails and documents);
• other personal information required from or about you in order to provide services.

Additionally, we may also keep record of any information that you acquire from us.

If you provide personal information about someone else, it may be necessary to make sure that person is aware that, in the course of providing services for you, we will be collecting, using and disclosing personal information about them. Please ensure that you comply with your privacy obligations relating to the personal information of other that you provide to us. We can discuss this with you if such a matter arises.

Who do we collect personal information about?

We collect and hold personal information including (but not limited to):

• clients and their associates including employees, contractors, owners and directors;
• individuals that we deal with in the course of providing services;
• suppliers and their employees and contractors;
• prospective employees, employees and contractors;
• any person that applies for a position of employment at Kāhui Legal; and
• any other person that we may come into contact with in general.

How do we collect personal information about you?

We collect personal information about you:

• directly;
• indirectly (through emails, forms, meetings, interviews, business cards, telephone conversations and through the use of services such as social media);
• via publicly available websites; and
• via a third party (see AML/CFT section below).

How might we use your personal information?

In general, we may use your personal information:

• to verify your identity;
• to provide services to you;
• to market our services to you, including contacting you electronically (e.g. by email for this purpose);
• to engage third parties on your behalf;
• to check for and manage commercial or legal conflicts of interest;
• to undertake research to improve the services that we provide to you;
• to undertake credit checks of you (if necessary);
• to comply with our legal obligations;
• to recruit staff;
• to bill you and to collect money that you may owe us;
• any specific purpose which we may notify you of at the time the personal information is collected;
• for recruitment purposes, including assessing a candidate’s suitability for a position with us;
• for health and safety purposes; and
• to do all other things that are necessary, or incidental, to conducting our business;

Why do we collect personal information?

We collect personal information in order to provide effective services to our clients, to meet our legal obligations as a law firm including (but not limited to) our obligation to comply with our Anti-money laundering/Countering Financing of Terrorism requirements.

If we do not receive the personal information that we require then it may have an impact on our ability to provide relevant and quality services to our clients. Additionally, it may also prevent us from meeting our obligations.

To whom may we disclose your personal information?

We may disclose your personal information to:

• other members of the Kāhui Legal staff;
• any third party that supports our provision of the services, including (but not limited to):

IT systems or service providers;
data management, processing and storage service providers;
auditors;
banks and other financial services providers;
third parties engaged in the course of providing our services (for example barristers, mediators, arbitrators, witnesses, accountants, consultants and subject-matter experts); and
service providers that assist with client insight analytics;

• a credit reference agency for the purpose of credit checks;
• a person who can require us to supply your personal information (e.g. courts, tribunals, regulatory authorities);
• parties involved in a matter for which you (or your employer) have engaged our services;
• Courts or tribunals, or government or regulatory agencies if required to do so by law;
• any other person authorised by the Act or another law (e.g. a law enforcement agency);
• any other person authorised by you; and
• where we are required to do so by law.

Protecting your personal information

The security of your personal information is very important to us. Therefore we take all reasonable steps to keep your personal information safe from loss, unauthorised activity, modification, disclosure and other misuse.

We ensure the protection of your personal information through internal and external premises security as well as restricting access to electronic records of information.

If we no longer require your personal information then we will either destroy it seven years following the closing of the matter or we will continue to ensure its protection and privacy.

Responsibility for personal information collected through linked third party websites

Our website, news updates or other communications to you, may contain links to third party websites. Unless expressly stated otherwise, these websites have not been developed by and are not controlled by us. They are provided for your convenience only, and do not imply that we check, endorse, approve or agree with the privacy practices of the third party websites linked to.

We encourage you to be aware when you leave our website and to read the privacy statements of each and every website that you visit.

Accessing and correcting your personal information

We aim to ensure that all the personal information that we have is up-to-date, correct and complete. You have the right to access your personal information that we hold and to request a correction. If you want to exercise either of the above rights, please email us at info@kahuilegal.co.nz and address your concerns to our privacy officer.

How can you make a privacy complaint?

If you have any concerns, complaints or questions about how we have handled your personal information then please do hesitate to contact us at: PO Box 1654, Thorndon, Wellington 6011, phone 04-495 9999, email info@kahuilegal.co.nz.

If you are not satisfied with how we have addressed your concerns, complaints or questions about how we handle your personal information, you can contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner at: PO Box 10-094, Wellington Central, Wellington 6011, phone 0800 803 909, www.privacy.org.nz.

Internet use

While we take reasonable steps to maintain secure internet connections, if you provide us with personal information over the internet, the provision of that information is at your own risk.

ID Verification for AML/CFT purposes

We use a third party for the purposes of verifying identification to comply with the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act 2009. We may be required to disclose and discuss your personal information with that third party for the purposes of meeting the requirements under that Act.

Changes to this policy

We may change this policy by uploading a revised policy onto our website. The change will apply from the date that we upload the revised policy. This policy was last updated on 6 February 2021.