Privacy Policy

Last updated: [date]

This privacy policy explains what information AU Salary After Tax (blog.aussalaryaftertax.com) collects, how we use it, and the rights you have over your data.

privacy policy AU Salary After Tax

Who we are

AU Salary After Tax publishes free Australian salary and tax calculators and plain-English guides about take-home pay, income tax, Medicare, HECS/HELP, superannuation and related topics. This blog is our publishing home for in-depth guides that sit alongside the calculators.

What information we collect

Information you give us. If you email us or leave a comment on an article, we receive your name, email address and the contents of your message. We use this only to respond to you and, for corrections, to verify and fix the issue you reported. We never use your correspondence for marketing.

Information collected automatically. Like most websites, our hosting server records standard technical information when you visit — such as pages viewed, browser type, device type and approximate location derived from your IP address. We use this for security, to keep the site running reliably, and to understand which content is useful.

Calculator inputs. Our salary and tax calculators run in your browser. The figures you enter into them are processed on your device — they are not sent to us, stored on our servers, or linked to you in any way.

Cookies

We use a small number of cookies for basic site functions, such as remembering your preferences and keeping the site secure. If analytics is enabled, we may also use privacy-friendly analytics cookies to see aggregate patterns (for example, which guides are most read) — never to identify you personally. You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings at any time; the calculators and guides will still work.

Embedded content from other websites

Some articles may include embedded content, such as videos or social media posts. Embedded content behaves exactly as if you visited the other website directly: that site may collect data about you, use its own cookies, and track your interaction according to its own privacy policy. Common examples include YouTube videos, social media posts and maps — you can usually tell content is embedded because it appears inside a frame on our page but is served from another site’s servers.

Data breaches

If we ever became aware of a data breach likely to cause serious harm — for example, unauthorised access to correspondence containing your personal information — we’d act quickly: contain the breach, assess what was affected, notify you directly if you’re at risk, and report to the OAIC where the law requires it. We’d also review what went wrong to prevent a repeat, and update this privacy policy if needed. You can help protect yourself by not sending sensitive information (tax file numbers, bank or account details) by email in the first place — if a question needs figures, round example numbers work just as well.

International visitors

This site is written for people in Australia, but anyone in the world can read it. If you visit from outside Australia, your use of the site is still covered by this privacy policy. We don’t transfer your data overseas as part of our normal operations; standard internet routing may carry data across borders, which is outside anyone’s control.

Your choices at a glance

  • Browse anonymously — reading guides and using calculators requires no account and no personal details.
  • Comment selectively — only share what you’re comfortable seeing published publicly.
  • Control cookies — block or delete them in your browser settings at any time.
  • Ask us anything — request access to, correction of, or deletion of your information under this privacy policy by email.
  • Complain independently — contact the OAIC if you’re not satisfied with our response.

Questions about this policy

Privacy policies are long, and the formal language doesn’t help. If anything here is unclear, just ask — email us and we’ll explain what a section of this privacy policy means in plain English. If you think we’ve missed something this privacy policy should cover, we’d like to know that too. This policy was written to be read by humans, not lawyers — but where legal precision matters (for example, when describing your rights), we’ve kept the formal terms and defined them in the Definitions section above.

Who we share your data with

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not share it with advertisers. We disclose data only where necessary to operate the site — for example, with our hosting provider — or where required by Australian law (for instance, in response to a lawful request from authorities).

How long we retain your data

We keep correspondence only as long as needed to handle your enquiry, then delete it. Server logs are retained for a limited period for security purposes and then deleted or anonymised. If you leave a comment, the comment and its metadata are retained so we can recognise follow-up comments without re-moderation.

What rights you have over your data

Under the Australian Privacy Principles, you have several rights regarding your personal information:

  • Access — ask what personal information we hold about you.
  • Correction — ask us to fix anything that’s inaccurate, out of date or incomplete.
  • Deletion — ask us to delete information we no longer need (for example, old correspondence).

How to make a request. Email us at the address in “Contact us about privacy” below and tell us clearly what you’d like us to do — for example, “please send me a copy of the personal information you hold about me” or “please delete my comment on [article]”. Include enough detail for us to identify your information (the email address you wrote from, approximate dates). We aim to respond within a reasonable timeframe — usually within 30 days. We may need to verify your identity before releasing information, to make sure we’re giving it to the right person.

If you’re not satisfied with our response, you can complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) — the independent body that oversees privacy in Australia. The OAIC’s website explains the complaint process step by step.

Definitions

A few terms used in this privacy policy, in plain language:

  • Personal information — information or an opinion about an identified (or reasonably identifiable) individual. Your name and email address are personal information; an anonymous visit count is not.
  • Sensitive information — a special category (health, beliefs, and similar) with extra protections. We don’t collect sensitive information.
  • De-identified data — information with identifying details removed, so it can’t reasonably be linked back to you. We use de-identified notes when keeping records of reported site errors.

Do Not Track and similar signals

Some browsers send “Do Not Track” signals or use privacy modes. We don’t run behavioural advertising or cross-site tracking, so there’s nothing to opt out of — but we respect your browser’s privacy settings regardless, and blocking cookies won’t break the calculators or guides.

Contact us about privacy

If you have any questions about this privacy policy or how we handle your information, email us at: [contact email] or via our contact page.

Comments

If you leave a comment on an article, the comment itself — along with the name you provide — is visible publicly on the site. We also store your email address (not displayed publicly) and technical details such as your IP address and browser information, which WordPress records automatically to help prevent spam. Comments may be held for moderation before appearing. Please don’t include sensitive personal information (tax file numbers, account details, addresses) in comments — if you need to share figures to illustrate a question, round numbers are safer.

If you leave multiple comments, we retain them so we can recognise follow-up contributions. You can ask us to remove your comments at any time by emailing us.

Analytics in more detail

If analytics is enabled on this site, it collects aggregate, non-identifying information about how visitors use the blog — for example, which guides are read most often, how visitors arrive at the site, and which calculators people click through to. This data is reported in totals and trends; it is never linked to you personally, never sold, and never used for advertising targeting. Because our calculators run entirely in your browser, the figures you enter are never part of any analytics data.

Cookies in more detail

Cookies are small text files stored on your device. We use them sparingly, in three categories:

  • Strictly necessary cookies — required for the site to function (for example, remembering that you’ve dismissed a notice, or keeping the site secure). The site cannot work properly without these.
  • Preference cookies — remember choices you make, such as display settings. These are optional.
  • Analytics cookies — only if analytics is enabled; used to count visits and understand aggregate usage patterns as described above.

You can block or delete cookies at any time through your browser settings (usually under Privacy or Security). Blocking all cookies may affect some site functions, but the calculators and guides will still work — calculation happens in your browser and doesn’t depend on cookies.

Data security

We take reasonable steps to protect the information we hold. Access to correspondence and site data is limited, and we don’t collect more than we need in the first place — the strongest protection is not holding data at all, which is why calculator inputs never leave your device. That said, no method of internet transmission or electronic storage is completely secure, so we can’t guarantee absolute security. If we ever became aware of a data breach affecting your information, we’d tell you promptly and take steps to fix it.

Who we share your data with — in detail

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not share it with advertisers or data brokers — ever. The limited sharing that does occur is:

  • Service providers — for example, our hosting provider, which stores the site’s files and databases as part of operating the service. These providers only process data to deliver their service to us.
  • Embedded content providers — when you interact with embedded content (a video you play, a social post you engage with), that provider receives data directly, governed by its own privacy policy.
  • Legal requirements — we may disclose information where required by Australian law, for instance in response to a lawful request from authorities or a court order.

We do not transfer your data overseas as part of our normal operations; if that ever changed, this privacy policy would be updated first.

Our articles link to external websites — the ATO, the Fair Work Ombudsman, calculators on our main site, and similar resources. This privacy policy covers only blog.aussalaryaftertax.com. When you follow a link to another site, that site’s privacy policy applies, and we encourage you to read it. We’re not responsible for other sites’ practices, though we only link to sources we’d trust ourselves.

Children’s privacy

This site is written for adults managing their pay and tax. It is not directed at children, and we don’t knowingly collect information from children. If you’re under 15, please don’t email us personal information — ask a parent or guardian to contact us on your behalf if needed.

How long we retain your data — in detail

Different data has different lifespans:

  • Correspondence (emails, contact messages) — kept only as long as needed to handle your enquiry, then deleted. If your message reports a site error, we may keep a de-identified note of the issue for our records.
  • Comments — retained indefinitely alongside the article, so conversations stay readable; deletable on request.
  • Server logs — retained for a limited period (typically weeks to a few months) for security and troubleshooting, then deleted or anonymised.
  • Analytics data (if enabled) — retained in aggregate form; individual visit records, if any, are deleted or anonymised on a rolling basis.

Changes to this privacy policy

We may update this policy from time to time — for example, if we add new features that handle data differently. When we do, we’ll revise the “Last updated” date at the top of this page. Significant changes will be noted here so you can review them.