1. Introduction
At Mercedes-Benz Alexandria, a proud member of the LSH Auto (Sydney) Pty Ltd ACN 604 103 915 group, we are deeply committed to safeguarding your privacy. We understand the importance of your personal information and are dedicated to collecting, storing, using, and disclosing it responsibly and in accordance with the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (Privacy Act), which includes the Australian Privacy Principles. This comprehensive privacy policy (“Privacy Policy”) outlines our practices concerning your personal information, which is defined under the Privacy Act as information or opinions about you as an identified or reasonably identifiable individual.
This Privacy Policy provides a clear overview of our approach to handling your personal information at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria. It details how we manage the collection, storage, utilization, and disclosure of your personal information. Should you have any questions or concerns about our management of your personal information, we provide clear contact information within this policy.
While this Privacy Policy aims to be comprehensive and cover most personal information we handle at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria, it is not exhaustive. In specific instances when we collect personal information from you, we may inform you of a particular purpose for that collection. In such cases, we will manage your personal information according to that specified purpose. Furthermore, your interaction with our websites, social media platforms, products, and services may also be subject to additional policies and terms of use implemented by us from time to time. These specific policies or terms may, in certain situations, take precedence over this general Privacy Policy. For any clarifications or further details regarding our handling of your personal information, please do not hesitate to contact us.
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria, as part of LSH Auto, operates as an “APP Entity” under the Privacy Act and is fully compliant with the Australian Privacy Principles. No general exemptions under the Privacy Act are applicable to our operations or practices.
By using the Mercedes-Benz Alexandria website (including any domains or subdomains owned by us, such as www.mbsydney.com.au and www.amgsydney.com.au), our social media platforms, and our services (collectively referred to as “Services”), you acknowledge and agree to the terms outlined in this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree with these terms, you must immediately discontinue use of our Websites and Services.
2. Collection, Holding, and Use of Your Personal Information
INFORMATION WE COLLECT
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria is committed to collecting your personal information directly from you, unless it is impractical or unreasonable to do so. We will always limit the personal information we collect to what is reasonably necessary for our functions and activities in serving you at our Alexandria dealership.
To effectively provide you with our Services at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria, we collect a range of personal information, including:
- Information You Provide Directly: When you interact with our Services, you voluntarily provide us with certain personal information. This includes, but is not limited to:
- Your name, email address, telephone number, occupation, vehicle registration details, driver’s license details, financial information, and details about your current and past vehicles. The specific information we request depends on the nature of your interaction with Mercedes-Benz Alexandria. We typically collect some or all of this information when you access or use our Services, participate in our promotions or competitions, visit our Alexandria dealership for test drives, vehicle purchases, service appointments, or repairs, or when you apply for employment with us.
- Your credit card details, bank account information, and/or billing information, if required to process transactions when you purchase products or services from Mercedes-Benz Alexandria. Importantly, we do not store credit card details in any form on our internal or external databases accessible to us.
- Any other information you choose to share with us. For instance, when you contact us via telephone, email, or SMS, we collect your contact details and any other information you voluntarily provide in your communication.
- Website Usage Information: We also collect information automatically when you use or access our Website. This collection and use are detailed further in the section below entitled “Website Usage, Tracking Information, and Cookies.”
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria generally does not collect or retain any “sensitive information” about you, as defined by the Privacy Act. Should sensitive information be required for a specific purpose, we will obtain your explicit consent and handle it with the utmost care and in accordance with the Privacy Act.
When collecting your personal information, Mercedes-Benz Alexandria will take reasonable steps to ensure you are aware of: the purposes for which we are collecting the information; the types of organizations to which we may disclose it; whether disclosure to overseas recipients is likely (and if so, the countries involved, if practicable); any laws or court/tribunal orders authorizing or requiring the collection; and the primary consequences if you choose not to provide the information. This Privacy Policy serves to provide these details in most situations; however, specific details may vary based on our particular interaction with you. Unless we explicitly notify you of different details, the information in this Privacy Policy applies.
Failure to provide requested personal information may impact our ability to fully provide our Services to you. For example, we may be unable to respond to your inquiries or provide specific services you have requested from Mercedes-Benz Alexandria. It is also important to note that there are generally no Australian laws or court/tribunal orders that mandate you to provide your personal information to us.
In certain circumstances, Mercedes-Benz Alexandria may collect personal information about you from third-party sources. In such cases, we will take reasonable steps to inform you about the information collected and the circumstances surrounding its collection. These third-party sources may include:
- Other LSH Auto Entities: We may collect personal information from other entities within the LSH Auto corporate group, as permitted under the Privacy Act for related bodies corporate.
- Customers and Other Individuals: We may receive information about you from our customers or other individuals, such as joint vehicle owners, family members, or referees, particularly in sales or service contexts at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Third-Party Suppliers: We may collect information from third-party suppliers, such as roadside assistance providers, who assist in delivering services related to your Mercedes-Benz vehicle.
- Publicly Available Sources: We may gather information from publicly accessible sources, including data aggregators, public databases, commercial providers, and information you or others post online, such as on social media platforms. This might include your name, demographics, interests, and other publicly available data. Mercedes-Benz Alexandria or our service providers may combine this information with data collected directly from you. We may also link information about your use of our digital services over time with your personal information, especially when you log in, follow email links, or when we can otherwise identify you.
- Austroads Ltd’s National Exchange of Vehicle and Driver Information System: We may access this system when conducting vehicle recalls to ensure safety and compliance for Mercedes-Benz vehicles.
- Government Bodies: We may receive information from government bodies, including law enforcement or regulatory authorities, as required or permitted by law.
When you provide personal information to Mercedes-Benz Alexandria about other individuals (e.g., joint owners, family members, or referees), it is your responsibility to inform these individuals that you are providing their information to us, provide them with our contact details, and direct them to this Privacy Policy for further information. We will proceed on the understanding that you have obtained the necessary consent and provided this information.
3. Use of Your Information
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria will generally use your personal information only for the purpose for which it was collected, and for related purposes that you would reasonably expect. These purposes may include:
- Providing Services and Responding to Enquiries: To deliver the products and services you request from Mercedes-Benz Alexandria, respond to your inquiries, provide requested information, and fulfill the purpose for which you provided the information.
- Facilitating Sales and Services: To facilitate the sale of our products and services, as well as the products and services of third parties, related to Mercedes-Benz vehicles and offerings at Alexandria.
- Customer Account Management: To set up and manage customer accounts, and to identify our customers, potential customers, and individuals acting on their behalf at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Maintaining User Details and Profiles: To record and maintain user details and profile information for effective customer relationship management at our Alexandria dealership.
- Event Invitations and Service Updates: To contact you with invitations to events (such as new vehicle launches or programs at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria) or to inform you about new Services we offer.
- Marketing and Promotional Activities: To send you marketing materials about new Services and offers that we believe may interest you, and to conduct market research, marketing, or promotional activities related to Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Service Improvement: To improve our Services, for example, by conducting customer satisfaction surveys after you purchase a vehicle or receive service from Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Customer Support: To provide customer support, address your concerns, and resolve any disputes that may arise in connection with Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Administrative and Statistical Purposes: To use information for internal administrative purposes, such as generating statistical reports (typically de-identified) to help us plan for the future of Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Information Verification: To compare the information you provide for accuracy and to verify it with third parties as needed.
- Legal Compliance: To engage in other activities as required or permitted by law.
If Mercedes-Benz Alexandria intends to use your personal information for any purpose other than those outlined above, we will generally seek your explicit consent, unless we are legally required or permitted to do so without seeking consent.
4. Storage and Security of Your Information
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria takes reasonable steps to ensure the security of your personal information and to protect it from misuse, interference, loss, unauthorized access, modification, or disclosure.
Information stored by us is protected through robust security access policies and procedures. For instance, personal information collected and stored on our computer network is housed on secure servers and is accessible only to authorized personnel who require access to perform their business functions at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria. We also maintain physical security measures to protect tangible (hard-copy) records containing personal information.
We regularly monitor our practices, procedures, and systems to ensure the effectiveness of our security policies and to identify and implement improvements as necessary. However, it is important to acknowledge that no method of data transmission or electronic storage is entirely impenetrable. We cannot guarantee the absolute security of data, particularly when transmitted over the Internet or through third-party platforms like email or social media. You provide your personal information to Mercedes-Benz Alexandria at your own risk.
When we disclose your information to third-party service providers, we typically establish contractual arrangements that require them to maintain the security of your information.
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria will endeavor to destroy or de-identify your personal information as soon as it is no longer required by us (where legally permissible). When disposing of personal information, we take care to ensure it is securely destroyed or permanently de-identified.
5. Disclosure of Your Personal Information
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria generally discloses your personal information only for the purpose for which it was collected, and for related purposes that you would reasonably expect.
We may disclose your personal information to various parties, including but not limited to:
- LSH Auto Corporate Group Entities: We may share personal information with other members of the LSH Auto corporate group, as permitted by the Privacy Act for related bodies corporate.
- Third-Party Suppliers: We may disclose information to third-party suppliers, such as the vehicle manufacturer, Mercedes-Benz Australia/Pacific Pty Ltd, when necessary to provide you with products and for related purposes like administering your vehicle’s manufacturer warranty, and ensuring service quality at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Financial and Credit Service Providers: We may disclose information to third-party providers of financial and credit services, such as Mercedes-Benz Financial Services Australia Pty Ltd, if you apply for finance in connection with purchasing a vehicle from Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Service Providers Contracted by Us: We may share information with service providers contracted by Mercedes-Benz Alexandria, including IT service providers, marketing material printers and distributors, creditors, banks, financiers, credit providers, insurers, and external business advisors (such as auditors and lawyers).
- Fraud Prevention and Rights Protection: We may disclose information to third parties as necessary to detect and prevent fraud and to protect the rights, property, and safety of our business, you, and others associated with Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
- Policy and Agreement Enforcement: We may disclose information to third parties as necessary to enforce our policies and agreements.
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria may disclose your personal information to overseas recipients if required to fulfill the purpose for which it was collected. In such cases, we take reasonable steps to ensure that the overseas recipient adheres to the Australian Privacy Principles. However, we are not generally likely to disclose personal information to overseas recipients other than our parent company located in Hong Kong SAR for reporting and other corporate obligations.
6. Website Usage, Tracking Information, and Cookies
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria collects limited information about users of our Services to track resource utilization, maintain and improve our Services, and understand user navigation and usage patterns. We do not use these technologies to track your activity across other websites or services. The information we collect may include:
- Device and Connection Information: Details about your device and connection, such as your IP address, top-level domain names, location or device information, and any data provided by your mobile device if you access our Website via a mobile device or application. You may be able to disable location tracking through your device settings if you prefer not to share this information.
- Integrated Plugins Data: Data collected through integrated plugins on our Website. If this data is collected by a third party (which we will generally inform you about), please refer to the third party’s privacy statement for their data handling practices, as these are outside our control.
- Cookies and Tracking Technologies: Data related to the use of cookies and similar tracking technologies on our website. We use both first-party and third-party cookies. A cookie is a small data file stored on your device that collects information like your IP address or details about your website usage. More information about this is provided below.
- Website Usage Data: Data concerning your use of our Website, which may include your IP address, date and time of access, pages viewed, documents downloaded, referring URLs, and other information about your activities on our Website.
- User Interactions: Search terms, interactions with other users, and other activities conducted on our Website.
(Collectively, “Usage Information”).
To collect Usage Information, Mercedes-Benz Alexandria may use software embedded in our Websites (like JavaScript) and place cookies on your computer or device. We also utilize third-party services such as Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel, and Adobe Analytics (discussed below) to track Usage Information related to our products and services.
Unless you have registered for an account with us, we do not link Usage Information to your personal information like your username. If you register for an account, Usage Information may be associated with your registration data. For unregistered users, Usage Information is aggregated and not linked to any identifiable individual.
You can decline cookies through your browser settings or browser add-ons, but this may affect your experience and functionality on our Websites and Services. Refer to your browser or application documentation for instructions on managing cookies.
GOOGLE ANALYTICS
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria utilizes Google Analytics Advertising Features, including remarketing, Demographics and Interests reporting, and Google Display Network Impression Reporting. These features employ cookies, similar technologies, analytics, and other identifiers to collect website traffic data. Google Analytics, as we understand it, does not collect your personal information or associate your IP address with other Google-held data. For more details about Google Analytics and its data handling practices, please visit: https://analytics.google.com/analytics/web/provision/#/provision.
These Google Analytics features enable us to tailor advertisements to your interests and allow third-party vendors (like Google) to display our ads to you on websites across the Google Display Network. They also help us understand your interactions with these ads. For instance, third-party vendors use cookies to select ads based on your browsing history, including previous visits to our website. Our use of Google Ads features such as remarketing, affinity audiences, custom affinity audiences, in-market audiences, similar audiences, and demographic and location targeting helps us deliver targeted marketing to our customers and potential customers at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria.
By using our websites, you consent to the storage and access of cookies or other information on your device for Google Analytics purposes, unless you have opted out. You can opt out by installing the Google Analytics Opt-out Browser Add-on. You may also opt out of Google Analytics Advertising Features, such as interest-based advertising served by Google, through Google Ads Settings or other available methods like the Network Advertising Initiative opt-out. Note that opting out may not stop all advertising; Google may still display non-interest-based ads, and you may still receive interest-based advertising not served by Google.
FACEBOOK PIXEL
Our websites may use the Facebook Pixel, a feature that allows us to receive data on user activity on our website from users who have been directed to our site via Facebook advertisements. This helps us measure the effectiveness of our Facebook ads for statistical and market research purposes at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria. The Pixel does not collect personal information about individual users. Data collected by the Pixel is stored and processed by Facebook, which controls the information gathered. Facebook may link Pixel data to your Facebook account and use it for its own promotional purposes in accordance with Facebook’s Data Usage Policy: https://www.facebook.com/about/privacy/. You may be able to opt out of our use of the Pixel through your Facebook Account settings. By using our website, you consent to our use of the Pixel unless you have opted out.
ADOBE ANALYTICS
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria websites may use Adobe Analytics tools, including Analytics Workspace. These tools collect information about website visitors and their website experiences. We use this data to optimize our website design and usability to better serve our website visitors and customers at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria. Adobe Analytics may collect information such as your IP address, referring webpage, search terms used to find our website, and your general website usage patterns. We understand that this information is collected and stored on Adobe’s data collection servers, and we may access it for marketing and other purposes. We understand that Adobe Analytics does not collect your personal information. For more information about Adobe Analytics and its data processing, please visit: https://docs.adobe.com/content/help/en/analytics/analyze/reports-analytics/reporting-interface/overview-data-collection.html.
You may be able to limit the information collected by Adobe Analytics by managing your browser’s cookie settings.
7. Third-Party Links
Our Services may contain links to external websites with privacy practices that may differ from ours at Mercedes-Benz Alexandria. If you provide personal information to any of these linked sites, your information will be governed by their respective privacy policies. We encourage you to review the privacy policies of any third-party websites you visit.
8. Policy Updates and Changes
Mercedes-Benz Alexandria reserves the right to modify this Privacy Policy at any time. The most current version of our Privacy Policy is always published on our website. You can access it there or request a copy by contacting us. We recommend checking this page periodically for the latest updates on our privacy practices.
The “Last Updated” date at the top of this page indicates when this Privacy Policy was last revised.
9. Complaints Regarding Privacy
If you believe that a breach of your privacy has occurred, we encourage you to contact us immediately to discuss your concerns. Our contact details are provided below.
Your complaint will be reviewed and handled by the LSH Auto Australia Group Privacy Officer. The Privacy Officer may escalate the complaint internally if it is serious or requires further investigation to resolve. We will treat your complaint with confidentiality and, after investigating, will contact you to discuss potential resolutions.
Please allow a reasonable timeframe for us to respond to your complaint. If you are dissatisfied with our proposed resolution, you have the option to lodge a complaint with the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC). Their contact details can be found at: www.oaic.gov.au.
10. Contact Information for Further Enquiries
For any further information about how Mercedes-Benz Alexandria manages your personal information, please contact us:
Igor Kogan Group Privacy Officer
LSH Auto Australia Level 1, 135 Kings Way South Melbourne Victoria 3205 Tel: (+61) 3 9133 2216 E-mail: [email protected]
© LSH Auto (Sydney) Pty Ltd
