Experian General Privacy Policy Statement


Scope of Experian’s Privacy Policy Statement

This Privacy Policy Statement seeks to provide You with information on how personal and consumer credit information is defined, collected, maintained, used, and retained as per the National Credit Act 34 of 2005 ("NCA").

Definitions

In this privacy policy Experian makes use of the following terms:
"Experian" means Experian South Africa (Proprietary) Limited, registration number 2006/010440/07, a private company registered in accordance with the laws of the Republic of South Africa;

"Consumer Credit Information" means information concerning—

  1. a person’s credit history, including applications for credit, credit agreements to which the person is or has been a party, pattern of payment or default under any such credit agreements, debt re-arrangement in terms of this Act, incidence of enforcement actions with respect to any such credit agreement, the circumstances of termination of any such credit agreement, and related matters;
  2. a person’s financial history, including the person’s past and current income, assets and debts, and other matters within the scope of that person’s financial means, prospects and obligations, as defined in section 78(3) NCA and related matters;
  3. a person’s education, employment, career, professional or business history, including the circumstances of termination of any employment, career, professional or business relationship, and related matters; or
  4. a person’s identity, including the person’s name, date of birth, identity number, marital status and family relationships, past and current addresses and other contact details, and related matters.

"Personal information" means any information about an identifiable person and includes Consumer Credit Information.

General

This General Privacy Policy Statement is incorporated into and is subject to the terms and conditions of the Experian website terms and agreement found on www.experian.co.za

We comply with the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013, the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act 25 of 2002 and the Promotion of Access to Information Act 2 of 2000

Changes

We may amend the terms of this policy at any time by posting a revised policy here. If you do not agree with the change you must stop using the website.

Information Incorporated in a consumer’s and business’ Credit Report

The following information is included in a consumer’s credit report:

  • identifying information such as your name, surname, identity number, physical and postal address, contact numbers, marital status, spouse details, and current employer and occupation;
  • account history/payment profile which is a record of all your accounts with credit/service providers and a history of how you pay these;
  • a list of credit/service providers that you authorized or permitted in terms of the NCA to receive your credit report;
  • information that is publicly available as permitted by law such as judgments, sequestrations, and rehabilitation;
  • records of any defaults recorded on your credit profile when you fail to make the payment of money owed. Default data is submitted by the credit/service providers to the credit bureaus such as Experian;
  • debt restructuring orders;
  • and any other information not included in the category above.

Information not incorporated in a consumer’s Credit Report

The following information is not incorporated in your credit record:

Race, political affiliation, medical status or history, religion or thought, belief or opinion, sexual orientation except to the extent that such information is self-evident from the record of the consumer’s marital status and list of family members, membership of a trade union except to the extent that such information is self-evident from the record of the consumer’s employment information.

Information Incorporated in a business’ Credit Report

  • identifying information like company name, registration number, physical address, postal address, tax number;
  • information that is publicly available as permitted by law such as judgments, sequestrations, and rehabilitation;
  • account history/payment profile which is a record of all your accounts with credit/service providers and a history of how you pay these;
  • active and non-active directors’ details; principal bureau data (including credit score);
  • properties owned; previous enquiries;
  • and any other information not included in the category above.

Sources of Information

Experian limits the collection of personal information to include only what is permitted in terms of the NCA and which is necessary to our clients for credit/service application to enable them to make meaningful and accurate decisions. Furthermore, we ensure that our data retention policies are in compliance with the NCA. The original sources of information are:

  • an organ of State, a court or judicial officer;
  • any person who supplies goods, services or utilities to consumers, whether for cash or on credit;
  • a person providing long term and short term insurance;
  • entities involved in fraud investigation;
  • educational institutions;
  • debt collectors to whom book debt was ceded or sold by a credit provider;
  • other registered credit bureaux.

We encourage You to assist us in maintaining the accuracy of personal information by notifying us of any changes or disputes logged. We cannot alter the information reported by our Subscribers unless the information is determined to be wrong or inaccurate. If You do not agree with the accuracy of information that Experian has on file, we have procedures to ensure that such information is verified, and, where appropriate, amended or corrected.

We will try to keep the personal information we collect as accurate, complete and up to date as is necessary for the purposes explicitly defined in this policy. From time to time we may request you to update your personal information on the website. You are able to review or update any personal information that we hold on you by accessing your account online, by emailing us, or by phoning us. Please note that in order to better protect you and safeguard your personal information, we take steps to verify your identity before granting you access to your account or making any corrections to your Personal Information.

Use and Disclosure of Your Personal Information

Experian is a registered credit bureau in terms of the NCA and it conducts its business in accordance with South African legislation affecting its business including the consumer code for Credit Bureaus Association and the South African Credit Risk Reporting Association. Experian considers it imperative to protect the privacy interests of consumers.

Experian is obliged to comply with Section 68 of the NCA pursuant to which we use a consumer or a prospective consumer’s information only for the purpose permitted in terms of the NCA or other applicable legislation.

Experian will report or release that information only to the consumer, prospective consumer or to another person:

  • to the extent permitted or required by the NCA or other applicable legislation;
  • as directed by the instructions of the consumer or prospective consumer; or
  • an order of a court or tribunal.

By accepting these terms and conditions, you are deemed to have read, understood accepted to be bound by the all its provisions, you expressly acknowledge, agree and consent to Experian using your confidential information, for the following purposes, which specifically includes, but is not limited to:

  • recording, processing and continuously maintaining and updating your consumer credit information;
  • producing a new credit record;
  • monitoring and subsequently updating the current and future credit activity on your records;
  • creating new and maintaining or revising existing products (e.g. scoring, statistical analysis and other statistical models);
  • verifying, at Experian’s discretion, information on your credit record against any relevant source;
  • making your credit record available to our customers/subscribers, upon request, where the customer/subscriber fulfils the legal requirements, justifying such disclosure;
  • entities using the Experian websites to obtain personal information for permitted lawful purposes. Such entities confirm that the information will be kept confidential as per the applicable South African legislation.
  • by accessing our website, you hereby consent to us contacting you or your organization for the marketing of Experian products and services. You may opt out of this provision by indicating in writing to unsubscribesouthafrica@experian.com
  • disclosing aggregate statistics (information about the customer population in general terms) about the personal information to advertisers or business partners. In certain circumstances, and where we have got your permission, we will provide your contact details to advertisers or business partners;
  • an investigation into fraud, corruption or theft, provided that the South African Police or any other statutory enforcement agency conducts such an investigation;
  • fraud detection and fraud prevention services;
  • considering a candidate for employment in a position that requires trust and honesty and that entails the handling of cash or finances;
  • setting a limit of service provision in respect of the supply of goods, services or utilities;
  • assessing an application for insurance;
  • verifying educational qualifications and employment;
  • obtaining consumer information to distribute unclaimed funds, including pension funds and insurance claims;
  • tracing a consumer by a credit provider in respect of a credit agreement entered into between the consumer and the credit provider;
  • developing a credit scoring system by a credit provider or credit bureau
  • share your Personal Information with:
    • We may share your personal information with:
    • other divisions or companies within the group of companies to which we belong so as to provide joint content and services like registration, for transactions and customer support, to help detect and prevent potentially illegal acts and violations of our policies, and to guide decisions about our products, services, and communications (they will only use this information to send you marketing communications if you have requested their goods or services);
    • an affiliate, in which case we will seek to require the affiliates to honour this privacy policy;
    • our service providers under contract who help supply certain goods or help with parts of our business operations, including fraud prevention, bill collection, marketing, technology services (our contracts dictate that these goods suppliers or service providers only use your information in connection with the goods they supply or services they perform for us and not for their own benefit); • credit bureaus to report account information, as permitted by law; and
    • banking partners as required by credit card association rules for inclusion on their list of terminated merchants (in the event that you utilise the services to receive payments and you meet their criteria).

Where required by the NCA, Experian will only release Consumer Credit Information upon receipt of the consumer’s consent. Consumers often provide such consent directly to our Subscribers. We make our Subscribers aware of the importance of obtaining consumer consent in prescribed cases where such consent is required by the NCA. Consent should be obtained prior to providing Experian with the consumers’ personal information, and prior to accessing the personal information obtained in our credit reports.

Maintenance of Consumer Credit Information

Experian endeavors to maintain all Consumer Credit Information by:

  • collecting, processing and distributing the information in a manner that ensures that the record remains confidential and secure;
  • protecting against accidental, unlawful destruction, wrongful alteration, unlawful intrusion, unauthorized disclosure, loss and or access by any unauthorized person;
  • identifying the consumer by their initials or full names, surname and South African identity number or, where no South African identity number is available, by the consumer’s passport number and date of birth, as well as contact and employment details.

Data providers such as credit providers as defined in the NCA (collectively "Subscribers") who submit data to credit bureaus like Experian must take reasonable steps to ensure that the information reported to credit bureaus is relevant, up to date and not duplicated.

Security of Your Personal Information

We endeavor to take all reasonable steps to protect your personal information. All the data collected by us is stored on a secure server. The communication between your workstation and our servicer is encrypted with a secure socket layer tunnel.

Experian has a security policy and risk management policy which regulates the Company’s approach to security and risk. We have internal controls in place to ensure that only staff who requires access to your information, is granted access and also that access is monitored by our internal audit department on an annual basis

Retention of Your Personal Information

Experian retains your personal information in our credit information database in accordance with the data retention periods prescribed by the NCA.

Links to Other Websites

The Experian Privacy Policy Statement only applies to personal information collected at Experian websites which include www.experian.co.za and www.kreditweb.co.za. You should be aware that operators of linked websites may also collect your personal information when you link to their websites. Experian is not responsible for the privacy policies and practices of any of these websites. It is important to familiarize yourself with their privacy policies before providing them with your personal information.

Contacting Experian

Consumers’ are welcome to contact Experian should they require more information or have any questions. We can be contacted as follows:

Consumer Relations: 0861 10 5665

Subscribers: 0861 63 6070

Email: africalegal@experian.com

Website: www.experian.co.za

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