Privacy policy
What we collect, why we collect it, who we have to give it to and how you get it back. In plain English, because a policy nobody can read protects nobody.
Last updated 21 September 2026
The short version
What this policy covers
Wise Step Conveyancing is a small licensed conveyancing practice working from one office, at Office 4, Level 1, 105A High Street, Cranbourne VIC 3977. We are bound by the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles, and this page sets out how we handle personal information.
It covers this website, any enquiry you send through it, and the information we handle while acting for you in Victoria or South Australia. We do not sell personal information, and we do not hand your details to anyone so they can market to you.
You can ask us a general question on the phone without giving your name. We cannot run a property matter anonymously, because of the identity checks the titles offices require.
What we collect
The information we hold about you
It depends on how far along you are. Reading this page leaves almost nothing behind. Settling a house leaves a file.
When you send an enquiry
The form asks five things, and you can see all of them before you type anything.
- What you need help with, and when you need us
- Your name, your mobile number and your email address
- On some pages, the state and suburb, the type of property, and whether there is an owners corporation
- Whatever you choose to write in the message box
When we act for you
A matter needs more than an enquiry does. We collect what the transaction actually requires.
- The property address, the contract, and the vendor statement or Form 1
- Your postal address, and lender or broker details where a mortgage is involved
- Rates, water and owners corporation account details
- Your identity documents. The titles offices require us to sight a passport, driver licence or similar before a transfer or mortgage can be lodged, and to record that we did
When you just read the site
Opening a page leaves a trace on the server, the same as it does on any website.
- Your IP address, your browser and device type, and which pages you open
- If you arrive from a Google ad, the click identifier that comes with it, stored in a cookie on your device for up to 90 days
- If you submit a form, your IP address and browser are saved with it, which is how we keep automated spam out
Some of what we hold comes from other people rather than from you: your agent, your lender, the conveyancer on the other side, and the authorities that issue certificates. We do not go looking for sensitive information such as health details, and would only collect it if a matter genuinely required it and you agreed to give it to us.
Why we collect it
Every field on the form does a job
If we cannot see a reason to ask for something, we do not ask for it.
Would rather not give us something? Say so, and usually we can still help. The exception is identity verification, where the requirement comes from the titles office rather than from us.
- To answer your enquiry and work out a quote
- To act for you on a purchase, sale, transfer or subdivision, and run the searches and lodgements that involves
- To verify your identity, which the titles offices require before a dealing can be registered
- To meet the record keeping obligations of a licensed conveyancing practice
- To keep the website working, keep spam out, and see which pages and ads bring people to us
Cookies and tracking
Google Analytics and Google Ads
This site uses Google Analytics 4 to count visits and see which pages people read, and Google Ads to work out whether an ad led to an enquiry. Both set cookies in your browser and send Google the pages you open, how you got here, and your IP address, which Google uses to estimate a location.
What comes back to us is counts and patterns, not names. Advertising is the one place the two meet. A click on a Google ad carries an identifier that sits in a cookie on your device, and if you later send an enquiry it is saved with that enquiry. It tells us which ad worked, and nothing else about you.
When you arrive, this site tells Google that ad storage and ad personalisation are not permitted. Measurement runs, profile building does not, and that only changes if you consent.
If you do consent to ad personalisation, Google Analytics can add your browser to an audience list that we use to show our ads to you again on Google Search, YouTube and other sites Google sells ads on. This is called remarketing. The list is built from pages you opened here, never from anything you told us about a transaction, and we do not give Google your email address or phone number to build one. Decline ad personalisation and no list is built at all.
Turning it off
- Block or delete cookies for this site in your browser. Nothing here needs a cookie to work, so you lose nothing.
- Install the Google Analytics opt-out browser add-on, which stops Analytics collecting from you on any site.
- Change what Google does with your data in your own Google account settings.
Google is a separate company, and its own privacy policy governs what it does with what it collects. The same goes for any website you reach from a link here.
Disclosure
Who else sees your information
Conveyancing does not happen in private. Getting to settlement means dealing with other people, so some of your details have to travel. We pass on what the step needs and stop there.
The conveyancer or solicitor on the other side
Your name, contact details and settlement instructions.
Your bank, lender or broker
Settlement figures, dates and payout details, where a loan is involved.
The real estate agent
Deposit and key release arrangements, and confirmation once settlement is done.
Councils, water authorities and certificate issuers
The address and owner details needed to obtain rates, land information and planning certificates.
The State Revenue Office, or RevenueSA
Duty is assessed digitally and a transfer cannot proceed without a return lodged in your name.
Land Use Victoria, or Land Services SA
The titles offices where the dealing is lodged and registered.
The electronic lodgement network
Settlement happens electronically, so your matter sits in a secure online workspace the parties and their banks share.
Our insurer and our own advisers
Only if a question about a matter arises, and only what the question needs.
Our IT, hosting and email providers
They keep our systems running and can technically reach what sits on them. Nothing else.
Anyone you tell us to deal with, and anyone the law requires
Including a subpoena or a statutory notice we have no choice about.
Security
How your information is held
Enquiries from this site
The site runs over HTTPS, so what you type into a form is encrypted on the way to us. The enquiry is emailed to the practice and written to a file kept above the public web folder, where a browser cannot reach it.
Matter files
Held in our practice systems, with access limited to the people working on your matter. Identity documents are handled as verification requires, not emailed around for convenience.
Paper
Kept at the Cranbourne office and destroyed securely once we no longer need to hold it.
If something goes wrong
No system is completely safe and we will not pretend otherwise. If information is lost or accessed without permission in a way likely to cause you serious harm, we have to tell you and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner, and we will.
Overseas
Information that leaves Australia
Google Analytics and Google Ads are run by Google, which stores and processes information on servers outside Australia, including in the United States. Browse this site with analytics cookies allowed and information about your visit goes overseas as part of that.
Some of the software behind the website and our email may also store data outside Australia. Where it does, we take reasonable steps to satisfy ourselves it is handled in line with the Australian Privacy Principles.
Retention
How long we keep it
Conveyancing files are kept for at least seven years after the matter finishes. Record keeping obligations and our insurer both require that, so it is not something we can shorten on request.
An enquiry that never becomes a matter is different. Those are kept for around two years, so a conversation you started can be picked up if you come back, then deleted. Ask us to delete one sooner and we will, as long as we are not required to hold it.
Your rights
Seeing it, fixing it, complaining about it
Access and correction
You can ask for a copy of the personal information we hold about you. Email us and say what you are after. We will ask a question or two to confirm you are who you say you are, then get it to you, normally within 30 days. Asking costs nothing. In the limited cases where the law lets us refuse, you will get the reason in writing.
If something we hold is wrong, out of date or incomplete, tell us and we will correct it. If we do not agree it is wrong, you can ask us to attach a note to the record saying you disagree, and we will.
If you want to complain
Tell us first. Email convey@wisestep.com.au with "Privacy complaint" in the subject line, or write to the office. We will acknowledge it within five business days and answer within 30 days.
Not satisfied with how we handle it? Take it to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner, the national privacy regulator. Complaining to the OAIC is free, they are at oaic.gov.au and on 1300 363 992, and you do not need our agreement to go to them.
Contact
Talk to us about privacy
Questions about this page, a request to see what we hold, and complaints all go to the same place. Put it in writing if you can.
We may update this policy. The date at the top is when it last changed, and if we change something that materially affects information we already hold, we will say so here.
Wise Step Conveyancing
- Post and in person
- Office 4, Level 1, 105A High Street
- Cranbourne VIC 3977
- convey@wisestep.com.au
- Phone
- 0450 016 397
- Hours
- Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm
- Weekends by appointment
See also our terms of use and disclaimer.