Site Changes

On 1 November 2010 the Office of the Privacy Commissioner was integrated into the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner and a new website established at www.oaic.gov.au.

Note 1: Major changes to the Privacy Act 1988 will come into effect in March 2014. Agencies, businesses and not for profits need to start preparing for these changes. For more information go to our privacy law reform page at www.oaic.gov.au
Note 2: From 12 March 2013 content is no longer being added to, or amended, on this site, consequently some information may be out of date. For new privacy content visit the www.oaic.gov.au website.

Answer 4 (more)

Question 4:

Have you lodged your complaint with another dispute resolution body, for example the Commonwealth Ombudsman or Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, which is investigating your complaint?

Your answer: Please give me more information

The Commissioner may decide not to investigate your complaint if you have already complained to another body about the same matter and a different law applies to it. If your complaint is being dealt with adequately under this other law, then the Commissioner will usually decide not to set up an additional investigation into it (Section of the Privacy Act to read: 41(1)(e)).

The Commissioner may also decide not to investigate your complaint if it would be more appropriately dealt with by another body (Section of the Privacy Act to read: section 41(1)(f)).

Some of these bodies are:

The following case notes: 2004_6, 2004_8, will tell you more about how the Commissioner makes decisions in this kind of situation.

KEY POINTS

The Commissioner may decide not to investigate your complaint if another body is investigating it.
The Commissioner may decide not to investigate your complaint if another body is more appropriate for dealing with your complaint.

Disclaimer

Click here to return to the start of the ComplaintChecker

Click here to return to Question 4