INTRODUCTION

 We highly value our clients’ trust and confidence in us and want to assure them that their personal information is treated as confidential and stored safely and securely. As an Accounting firm, we adhere to the highest level of professional standards and ethical behaviour and take responsibility for protecting the confidentiality of client information.

Where we refer to “personal information”, it means “personal information” as defined in the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 (POPIA) and “personal data” as per the General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 (the GDPR). Personal information includes any information about a person (natural or juristic) that can be used to identify a person directly or indirectly.

This privacy policy describes how and why we collect and use personal data and provides information about our clients’ rights in relation to personal data. It applies to personal data provided to us, both by individuals themselves and/or by others. We may use personal data provided to us for any of the purposes described in this privacy policy or as otherwise stated at the point of collection.

This Privacy Policy further summarises what information we collect, the limited times when we may share it with others, and how we protect our client’s privacy.

PERSONAL INFORMATION WE COLLECT

In order to meet our clients’ needs during tax preparation, or business setups, we collect various types of personal information about our clients from the following sources:

  • During meetings (in person or digital) with our clients,  our clients provide information by mail, email, or web upload, for use in preparing our client’s tax returns or in providing other services to our clients. Such information may include, for example, name, address, date of birth, income and investment sources and amounts, and other tax and financial attributes.

  • Information about our client’s transactions with us, our affiliates, or others. Such information may include, for example, investment allocations and performance, investment objectives, parties to transactions, account balances and payment history.

  • Information we receive directly from our clients or send to our clients, at the client’s request, if contacted online. We will retain the information provided to us to deliver email messages to our clients. We may retain the content of clients’ email messages, email addresses, and our subsequent responses to the client

CONTACT INFORMATION

Cookies

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USE OF PERSONAL INFORMATION

We may use client personal information for any legitimate business purposes relating to our professional services and/or business activities. The purposes of collecting and processing clients’ personal information may include:
• responding to client queries posted on our website or emailed to us;
• onboarding a client and verifying their identity (as required by law);
• providing the client with professional services;
• referring the client to other service providers with the clients’ consent;
• improving our website and services by analysing certain information collected, including cookies and other related information;
• sending clients information (in the form of our newsletter) and inviting clients to events; and/or
• complying with our regulatory or other obligations.

 

PROTECTING THE CONFIDENTIALITY AND SECURITY OF YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION

 Keeping your information confidential and secure is of utmost importance to us. We maintain physical, electronic and procedural safeguards to guard your personal information. In doing so, we restrict your personal information to team members who need access to that information to provide services to you and our support service companies. Those companies are, in turn, legally and contractually bound to maintain the privacy of any information shared with them. Our team members are bound by internal confidentiality policies and are subject to disciplinary action for any policy violations.

We have implemented generally accepted standards of technology and operational security in order to protect personal information from loss, misuse, alteration or destruction. 

Implementation includes:
Website SSL Certification – Online security data protection of uploaded files and payment transactions ( SSL Stands for secure sockets layer. Protocol for web browsers and servers that allows for the authentication, encryption, and decryption of data sent over the Internet.)

Active VPN  Computer Data protection.  VPN stands for “Virtual Private Network” and describes the opportunity to establish a protected network connection when using public networks. VPNs encrypt your internet traffic and disguise your online identity. VPN protects your connection by keeping your browsing private. This makes it more difficult for third parties to track your activities online and steal data.

• Active Webroot Antivirus Software: Cybersecurity & Threat Intelligence Services that protect our devices from hackers

Although we use appropriate security measures upon collection of your personal data, the transmission of data over the internet (including by email) is never completely secure. We endeavor to protect personal data, but we cannot guarantee the security of data transmitted to or by us.

Should your status become inactive or should our relationship end, we will continue to protect the confidentiality and security of your personal information in accordance with this privacy policy.VPN protects your connection by keeping your browsing private.

 

CLIENTS’ LEGAL RIGHTS IN RELATION TO PERSONAL DATA

As a client, you have a legal right to:

Obtain confirmation as to whether we process your personal data, receive a copy of your personal data and obtain certain other information about how and why we process your personal data.

The right to request that your personal data be amended or rectified where it is inaccurate and to have incomplete personal data completed.

The right to have your personal data deleted in the following cases: the personal data is no longer necessary in relation to the purpose for which it was collected and processed;

our legal basis for processing your personal information is based upon your consent given to us, and if you withdraw consent, there will no longer be a legal basis for us to process your personal information, subject to any other legislation to the contrary

our legal ground for processing is that the processing is necessary for legitimate interests pursued by a third party or us, you object to the processing, and we do not have overriding legitimate grounds;

you object to processing for direct marketing purposes;

your data has been unlawfully processed; or

your personal data must be erased to comply with a legal obligation to which we are subject.

The right to restrict personal data processing in the following cases:

for a period enabling us to verify the accuracy of personal data where you contested the accuracy of the personal data;

your personal data have been unlawfully processed, and you request the restriction of processing instead of deletion;

your personal data is no longer necessary in relation to the purpose for which it was collected and processed, but the personal data is required by us to establish, exercise or defend legal claims; or

for a period enabling us to verify whether the legitimate grounds relied on by us override their interests where you have objected to processing based on it being necessary for the pursuit of a legitimate interest identified by us.

The right to object to the processing of your personal data in the following cases:

our legal ground for processing is that the processing is necessary for a legitimate interest pursued by a third party or us; or

our processing is for direct marketing purposes.

The right to data portability

The right to receive your data provided to us and the right to send the data to another organization (or ask us to do so if technically feasible) where our lawful basis for processing the personal data is consent or necessity for the performance of our contract with you and the processing is carried out by automated means.

The right to withdraw consent

Where we process personal data based on consent, individuals have a right to withdraw consent at any time. However, doing so could result in us no longer being able to render professional services to you.

MARKETING
When you become a client, you are added to our mailing list. We use this mailing list to send you essential information about our business, our services, developments, and news.

You can unsubscribe from our mailing list at any time, which will result in us no longer sending you communications. We include a link in every mailing communication, which allows you to unsubscribe. You can also request us to remove you from our mailing list via email.