Our Policies and Disclosures

Copyright Notice

Third-party trademarks, logos, product names, and company names which appear on this site are the property of their respective owners.
Otherwise, all content is © 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 Neil McPherson. Reproduction and/or unauthorised use are prohibited.

Values

We respect and value your privacy.

We believe in treating folk fairly, openly and honestly.

We work hard at analysing options to result in our opinions which we share. We respect the fact that others' opinions may differ from ours.

Travel is fun, rewarding, broadens our horizons and leads to self-development. It is a privilege that not everyone can share in. We look for ways to support folk who are less fortunate than ourselves.

Cookies Disclosure

Many, although not all links on this site pay us a small fee which does not affect the price you pay, but does help to offset the costs of keeping the site running. A separate page has a complete list of our advertisers.

There is no obligation to use them, although we appreciate it when you do.

Terms Of Use

If you follow a link to an external site, we cannot control the content there and you will be subject to their policies, terms and conditions applying to that site while using it.

"Do not sell my personal information" Statement

No need to opt-out. We do not and will not sell or re-distribute any information collected about you. We don't like it done to us, so we don't do it to others. All information is stored securely.

Privacy Statement

We will only collect as much information about you as necessary to make your experience a great one. Unless obvious, we will explain why we seek particular information and you can assess whether or not to provide it.

pointsNplaces.com is committed to protecting and respecting your privacy and takes its obligations under the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) seriously.

As a result, pointsNplaces.com has implemented practices, procedures and systems to:

protect your privacy;
maintain the confidentiality and security of personal information it collects and holds; and
manage its systems, practices and procedures in an open and transparent way.

By “personal information”, we mean information or an opinion about an identified individual or about an individual who is reasonably identifiable from the information.

This Policy sets out how we handle personal information we collect and hold.

1) What personal information does pointsNplaces.com collect and hold?

The kinds of personal information we may collect and hold are:

your name and contact details (usually, an email address);
gender;
age or age-range;
information on the credit cards you may hold or apply for (but only by type, never any specific credit card account numbers). As some cards have travel benefits as part of their features, this helps us to identify areas of interest to our readers;
personal information in answers to security log-in questions and survey questions;
details of your visits to our site (including traffic and location information, which pages you visit, weblogs and other communication information, the previous page visited and the type of browser you are using).

Also, when you visit our site, we may collect information about your computer (including your IP address, operating system and browser type) and the date and time of your visit.

The information we collect depends on the scope of your relationship with us (including the extent to which you use this website and interact with us), and we do not keep all of the above information for all people who contact us, or with whom we deal. In many cases, we may have only one or two pieces of data relating to any particular person.

2) Why do pointsNplaces.com collect and hold personal information?

We collect and hold personal information for a variety of purposes – and different kinds of personal information are used for different purposes.

In each case, however, the personal information we collect and hold is reasonably necessary for our functions and activities, including to provide you with services you would expect from us. These purposes are:

to provide you with news and information, products or services that you request from us or which we believe may interest you;
for purposes necessary or incidental to providing you with products and services that you have ordered or requested from us;
to personalise and customise your experience when using our site (including so that our site is presented in the most effective manner for you and for your computer);
to communicate with you (including by email, mail or telephone, and including in relation to changes to our products and services);
to manage and enhance our products and services;
to facilitate any payment you have agreed to make for our products or services;
for system administration;
for research purposes;
for network analysis and security;
to allow you to participate in interactive features of our site that may be available;
to investigate any complaints about or made by you, or if we have reason to suspect that you are in breach of any of our terms and conditions or that you are, have been or may be engaged in any unlawful activity; and
as required or permitted by any law (including privacy legislation).

Sometimes, when collecting information from you, we may also ask you to “opt-in” to consent to us using or disclosing your personal information other than in accordance with this Privacy Policy or any applicable law. As part of our commitment to protecting your privacy, however, you will also be given the opportunity to “opt out” from receiving communications from us or from third parties that send communications to you in accordance with this Policy or in accordance with any additional consent you give, and we will comply with your decision. (You will be able to “opt out”, for example, by clicking on an “unsubscribe” link at the end of an email, or by contacting our Privacy Officer.)

3) How do pointsNplaces.com get the personal information they collect and hold?

pointsNplaces.com only collects personal information by fair and lawful means, including when people:

register as a member of the pointsNplaces.com community;
volunteer information or apply for a credit card through the site;
purchase or download products or services from us, from our site or from our commercial partners after being referred from pointsNplaces.com;
respond to surveys;
fill in contact, registration and order forms on our site (including for our newsletter or other notifications);
browse our site (we use cookies to ensure you have the best experience when browsing);
post material to our site or to social media that we may from time to time use (such as Facebook and Twitter);
contact us for assistance or with questions, or report problems with our site or with an issue, product or services; and
contact us directly, other than through our site or social media (for example, by post or email).

We prefer to obtain any personal information we collect directly from you. In some cases, however, it may be unreasonable or impracticable to obtain personal information directly, and we may obtain that information from someone else.

If you are concerned about what personal information we may hold about you, please see below for information on how you can access and (if necessary) correct that information.

4) Cookies

Cookies are small pieces of data that websites store on your computer. These are used by many sites and for a range of purposes. Depending on how you have configured your browser, you probably already have a great many already stored on your hard drive.

Cookies are required to be able fully to use this website, as we use a cookie to track whether you are logged in and to store your log-in details. These are then used to enhance your experience of the site.

5) Can I interact with pointsNplaces.com anonymously or under a pseudonym?

When browsing our website, you can do so anonymously by blocking cookies and other tracking software using your browser. However in many cases, you may need to provide your real name when interacting with us.

Wherever lawful and practicable, however, you may use a pseudonym (or simply not identify yourself) when dealing with us. For example, if you have a complaint or concern about our site, or a general question about us, you are welcome to contact us without identifying yourself. In some cases, however, if you do not provide us with information, we may not be able to provide you with services, or respond adequately to you.

For clarification on when you must identify yourself, please contact our Privacy Officer. (You may use a pseudonym – or simply not identify yourself – when making such an enquiry.)

6) Who has access to my personal information?

Generally, only our staff will access your personal information, and then only on a “need to know” basis.

We may, however, also disclose your personal information:

to third parties who provide booking services;
to people who work for or with us or for suppliers, who may be engaged in, among other things, processing payments, marketing, research and providing support services;
to enforce or apply our terms of use or where you have otherwise been engaged in (or threatened) any unlawful activity, and we reasonably believe that disclosure is necessary to the police, any relevant authority or enforcement body, your internet service provider, your employer or supervisor or network administrator;
to protect the rights, property, health or safety of pointsNplaces.com or its staff, customers or others (including exchanging information with other companies and organisations to protect against fraud and to reduce credit risk);
to our agents, business affiliates, joint venture entities and other partners;
to anyone else that you specifically authorise us to receive information held by us; and/or
as otherwise required or permitted by law (including under privacy legislation).

While we try to link only to websites that share our high standards and respect for privacy, we are not responsible for the privacy policy of any other web site to which you provide personal information.

7) How can I access (and, if necessary, correct) personal information that pointsNplaces.com collects and holds about me?

If you want to review (and, if necessary, correct) personal information that pointsNplaces.com may have collected and holds on you, please contact our Privacy Officer.

We will respond to your requests to access and to correct your personal information as soon as possible (but in any case within a reasonable period).

8) How can I complain about pointsNplaces.com if it breaches any applicable privacy principles or any registered code that binds it?

Contact our Privacy Officer if you have any complaints about breaches by pointsNplaces.com of any applicable privacy principles or of any registered code that binds it.

9) How will pointsNplaces.com deal with complaints I might have about breaches of applicable privacy legislation or any relevant registered code?

We will treat any complaint about a breach of privacy legislation or any relevant registered code seriously and will investigate any breach of which we become aware – including how it occurred and how best to prevent such a breach occurring again.

10) What steps does pointsNplaces.com take to secure personal information?

We take all reasonable steps to ensure that your personal information is treated securely and in accordance with this Policy and is not subject to misuse, interference or loss, or unauthorised access, modification or disclosure. For example, apart from using secure servers (with application-level security and restricted logins), we implement firewalls. Where relevant, we also impose limits on who can access personal information.

Please note, however, that the transmission of information (including over the Internet) is never completely secure. Although we will do our best to protect your personal information, we cannot guarantee the security of your information – particularly while it is being transmitted to us – so any transmission is at your own risk and we cannot accept responsibility for misuse or loss of, or unauthorised access to, your personal information where the security of information is not within our control.

If you suspect any misuse or loss of, or unauthorised access to, your personal information, please let us know immediately.

If we have given you (or where you have chosen) a password which enables you to access our services or parts of our site, you are responsible for keeping this password confidential. We ask you not to share your password with anyone.

11) Does pointsNplaces.com disclose personal information to people or organisations outside Australia?

pointsNplaces.com hold personal information securely on servers operated by our suppliers located overseas, including in Singapore and the United States.

12) Does pointsNplaces.com ever change their Privacy Policy?

We review our Privacy Policy from time to time, to ensure it is in line with best practice and up-to-date with any legislative changes. Any changes to our privacy policy will be incorporated into a new version and made available online. Our use of your personal information will be governed by our most recent policy.

Please contact our Privacy Officer if you have any questions, comments or requests in relation to this Privacy Policy.

13) Who do I contact at pointsNplaces.com about privacy issues?

Contact our Privacy Officer at flyingscotsman@pointsNplaces.com if you have any concerns about privacy issues, including in relation to how pointsNplaces.com is dealing with your personal information or how it is being held.

Please also contact our Privacy Officer if you want to review and/or correct any personal information we hold about you, or if you receive communications purporting to be connected with pointsNplaces.com or our services that you believe have been sent other than in accordance with this Policy or in breach of any law.

For example, pointsNplaces.com will not ask you for your address or any bank account details. So if you receive such a request, please:
(i) do not reply
(ii) inform us using the above email, so we can take appropriate action.