Lovehound Privacy Policy

The following is the privacy policy of Lovehound. Please read it carefully so you understand how we use and why we collect the personal information we ask you to submit.

Information collection and use

When you purchase from Lovehound, you need to supply personal information such as:

• your name, address and contact details
• email details
• username and password if a membership account is created
• credit card details
• information obtained as a result of credit checks which you authorise us to carry out
• records of communications between you and Lovehound relating to products and /or services provided by Lovehound to you
• "promotion codes" if participating in any given competition or promotional offers

This information is your personal information and Lovehound will not disclose or sell this information to any other organisation under any circumstances, without prior permission, unless they are contracted to Lovehound to keep the information confidential or are required to comply with all relevant laws including the Privacy Act. Lovehound allows you full access to your personal information if requested. We require this information to help us process and manage payments, shipping and customer accounts.

Other ways we collect and use your personal information are:

• for credit verification purposes, transactions, fraud, credit worthiness
• for billing purposes
• for debt collection
• to maintain your account
• to notify you about other or new services or promotions from time to time
• to provide customer support
• to provide you with the products, services or information you have requested
• for administration and notification of any Lovehound hosted/run promotions
• to develop and improve the products, benefits and services we offer to our customers and website users
• to contact customers directly who communicate directly with Lovehound
• to distribute information about other services and other organizations that Lovehound deems relevant to our customers
• to help us constantly improve our service, in order to maintain a consistent level of customer satisfaction
• if required by law or to enforce, protect or apply rights, we may release such information as required

We may also disclose to business associates certain generalised customer information for use in marketing goods or services to our customers, in such a way that will not reveal the identity of any individual member or customer to those business associates.

Site content

The Lovehound website is frequently trawled and indexed by search engines such as Google. Please note that website content written and submitted by a customer, for example a product review, will often be indexed and will therefore be listed within these search engine directories. This type of website content may contain the name of the member who submitted the review, if this constitutes part of the website content. The indexing and retrieval of such site content within search engines such as Google is beyond the control of Lovehound.

Mail (electronic and postal)

Customers from time to time will receive postal mail and/or emails from Lovehound that contain information relating to the products sold and services provided by Lovehound that may be of interest to you, including but not limited to offers or promotions, website changes, product additions, news and current updates concerning the industry, website and account, product availability and the status of deliveries and/or returned items.

If you do not wish to receive this mail and/or emails you can unsubscribe, please contact us.

Links to external sites

Lovehound does not take any responsibility for outgoing links or any other part of its website that is not under direct or total control of Lovehound. We advise that users read the privacy policies of external sites before submitting personal information.

Cookies

Lovehound stores cookies on your computer's hard drive. Cookies are small pieces of data that are sent to your browser from a Web server and stored on your hard drive. Cookies are used to streamline the sign-in process so you don't need to retype the sign-in information each time you visit our site. Cookies are also used for security purposes and allow us to gather usage information which we use to administer and enhance our service and the website. If your browser is set to not accept cookies, you will not be able to use the Lovehound site or service.

Data security

Lovehound will take reasonable steps to ensure that all information we collect, use or disclose is accurate, complete, up-to-date and stored in a secure environment accessed only by authorised persons. Lovehound also takes reasonable steps to protect personal information it holds from misuse and loss and from unauthorised access, modification and disclosure.

Where credit card details are transmitted, we use 128-bit encryption through Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology. The common name of encryption certificate may be that of Lovehound's official hosting partner. This encryption process ensures that the information you give us is protected against unauthorised access.

We have implemented technology and security features, as well as strict internal guidelines to safeguard the privacy of your personal information from unauthorised access. We will continue to enhance these features as technology changes and becomes available. Whilst we make every effort to ensure that your information is secure on our system, no data transmission over the internet can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. As a result, we cannot guarantee the security of any information you transmit to us, and you do so at your own risk.

Furthermore Lovehound takes reasonable steps to destroy or permanently de-identify personal information if it is no longer needed for any purpose.

Surveys

We do not collect personally identifiable information about you in our surveys except when you specifically provide this information on a voluntary basis. Information is stored and used in anonymous non-traceable form. Lovehound reserves the right to perform statistical analysis of customer behaviour and characteristics.

Changes to our privacy policy

LOVEHOUND reserves the right from time to time to change this policy at its sole discretion. We will notify you of any updates by email. The most current version of the privacy policy will supersede all previous versions and can be reviewed by clicking on the "Privacy policy" hyperlink located at the bottom of the pages of the LOVEHOUND website.

Contact

If you have any questions, comments or complaints concerning this policy, please contact us.

More information on Australian privacy legislation is available from the Office of the Federal Privacy Commissioner at www.privacy.gov.au.