PEXA – UK Joint Privacy Notice for Applicants

What is the purpose of this document?

1.1. “PEXA” is the trading name of Digital Completion UK Limited. Smoove Limited is a holding company which comprises the following wholly owned trading Subsidiary companies: United Legal Services Limited, Legal-Eye Limited, and Amity Law Limited (Smoove Limited and its Subsidiaries, hereinafter “Smoove”). PEXA, Smoove, and Optima Legal Services Limited (“Optima Legal“) are all owned directly by DigCom UK Holdings Limited, which is a wholly owned Subsidiary of PEXA Group Limited in Australia (ACN 140 677 792; ASX: PXA). PEXA Group Limited and its wholly owned Subsidiaries, including Property Exchange Australia Limited, are hereinafter referred to as “PEXA Australia”. In this notice we refer to PEXA, Smoove and Optima Legal as comprising the “UK PEXA Group”. In this Policy, where relevant, we refer to the UK PEXA Group collectively as “we”, “us”, or “our”, as applicable.

1.2. For the purpose of data protection laws, PEXA, Smoove and Optima Legal are “Joint Controllers” in relation to Applicant Personal Data. This means that we are responsible for deciding how we hold and use personal information about you. You are being sent a copy of this Privacy Notice because you are applying for work with us (whether as an employee, worker or contractor). It makes you aware of how and why your Personal Data will be used, namely for the purposes of the recruitment exercise, and how long it will usually be retained for. It provides you with certain information that must be provided under the UK General Data Protection Regulation (“UK GDPR”). If we intend on further processing any Personal Data other than for the reasons and under the lawful basis provided for in this Privacy Notice, the Privacy Notice will be updated accordingly. If you are successful with your application then you will be provided with our Privacy Notice for Employees and Contractors.

Personal Data

Personal Data, or personal information, means any information about an individual from which that person can be identified. It does not include data where the identity has been removed (anonymous data), e.g. Personal Data rendered anonymous in such a manner that the Data Subject is no longer identifiable. There are certain types of more sensitive Personal Data which require a higher level of protection, such as information about a person’s health or sexual orientation. Information about criminal convictions also warrants this higher level of protection.

Data protection principles

We will comply with data protection law and principles, meaning that your data will be:

• Used lawfully, fairly and in a transparent way.
• Collected only for valid purposes that we have clearly explained to you and not used in any way that is incompatible with those purposes.
• Relevant to the purposes we have told you about and limited only to those purposes.
• Accurate and kept up to date.
• Kept only as long as necessary for the purposes we have told you about.
• Kept securely.

The kind of information we hold about you

In connection with your application for work with us, we will collect, store, and use the following categories of personal information about you:

• The information you have provided to us in your curriculum vitae (“CV”) and any covering letter.
• The information you have provided on our application form (if applicable), including name, title, address, telephone number, personal email address, date of birth, gender, employment history, and qualifications.
• Any information you provide to us during an interview.

We may also collect, store and use the following types of sensitive personal information:

• Equal opportunity monitoring information about your race or ethnicity, religious beliefs, sexual orientation and political opinions.
• Information about your health, including any medical condition, health and sickness records, so that we can make reasonable adjustments (where applicable).
• Information about criminal convictions and offences.
• Information about your entitlement to work in the United Kingdom.

How is your personal information collected?

We collect personal information about candidates from the following sources:

• You, the candidate.
• Recruitment agencies or talent providers who have referred you to us.
• Publicly available professional profiles, such as LinkedIn, where this is relevant to the role.
• Companies House in respect of any directorships.
• FCA Financial Services Register in respect of any current or previous authorisations by the FCA or the PRA.
• From any other applicable regulatory body or register, e.g. the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA).
• Disclosure and Barring Service in respect of criminal convictions.
• Any named referees, from whom we may collect details of your professional experience.
• CIFAS in relation to any fraud notifications.
• Our vetting and screening providers whose screening checks will, in addition to the above, include media searches, adverse financial information, identity checks and PEP/sanctions checks.
• Technology suppliers that provide recruitment platforms and assessment tools that we use during the recruitment process.

How we will use information about you

We will use the personal information we collect about you to:

• Assess your skills, qualifications, and suitability for the role.
• Carry out background and reference checks, where applicable.
• Communicate with you about the recruitment process.
• Keep records related to our hiring processes.
• Comply with legal or regulatory requirements. For example, we are required to check a successful applicant’s eligibility to work in the United Kingdom before the start of employment.

Having received your CV and any covering letter and/or your application form, we will then process that information to decide whether you meet the basic requirements to be shortlisted for the role. If you do, we will decide whether your application is strong enough to invite you for an interview. If we decide to call you for an interview, we will use the information you provide to us at the first interview and any subsequent interviews to decide whether to offer you the role. If we decide to offer you the role, we may then contact references and carry out a background check before confirming your appointment. Where required by law, we will also undertake a criminal background check.

Change of Purpose

We will use your Personal Data for the purpose for which we collected it, as outlined above in ‘How we will use information about you’. If your application is unsuccessful, we may wish to keep your information on file for longer than our standard retention period in case there are future employment opportunities with us that are suitable. We will ask for your consent before we retain your Personal Data on file for this purpose. You may withdraw your consent as any time.

Legal basis of processing

The legal basis for processing your Personal Data as per Article 6 UK GDPR is:

• Contractual: We need to process your Personal Data to decide whether to enter into a contract of employment with you.
• Legal Obligation: It is necessary to comply with a legal obligation for our onboarding processes, we will also undertake a criminal background check.
• Consent: If we rely on your consent to process your Personal Data for the purpose of your application during the recruitment process, you will have the right to withdraw your consent to such processing at any time by submitting a written request to: the UK DPO at PEXA at uk.dpo@pexa.com.au
• Legitimate interests: It is in our legitimate interests to decide whether to appoint you to the role because it would be beneficial to our business to fill the role. Where it is necessary for our legitimate interests and your interests or fundamental rights and freedoms do not override our interests.

The legal basis for processing your special category Personal Data is:

• You have given us explicit consent.
• Your obligations or rights as a Data Subject under employment, social security and social protection (if authorised by law).

Your Duty to inform us of changes

You must ensure that your Personal Data remains accurate to support reliable application records. If your Personal Data changes after you submit your application, contact us at uk.dpo@pexa.com.au.

If you fail to provide personal information

You have no statutory or contractual obligation to provide information to us during the recruitment process. However, if you fail to provide such information when requested, which is necessary for us to consider your application (such as evidence of qualifications or work history), we will not be able to process your application successfully. For example, if we require a criminal background check or references for the role and you fail to provide us with relevant details, we will not be able to take your application further.

How we use particularly sensitive personal information

We will use your particularly sensitive personal information in the following ways:

• We will use information about your disability status to consider whether we need to provide appropriate adjustments during the recruitment process, for example whether adjustments need to be made during an interview.
• We will use information about your race or national or ethnic origin, religious, philosophical or moral beliefs, or your sexual life or sexual orientation, to ensure meaningful equal opportunity monitoring and reporting.

Information about criminal convictions

When required by law, we will process information about criminal convictions.

We will only collect information about criminal convictions if it is appropriate given the nature of the role and where we are legally able to do so, and where you have given your consent. Where appropriate, we will collect information about criminal convictions as part of the recruitment process or we may be notified of such information directly by you during the recruitment process.

We have in place an Appropriate Policy Document and safeguards which we are required by law to maintain when processing such data.

Automated decision-making

You will not be subject to decisions that will have a significant impact on you based solely on automated decision-making.

Data sharing

When might you share my personal information with other entities in the group?

We may share your personal information with other entities in our group as part of our regular recruitment activities. All our other entities in the group are required to take appropriate security measures to protect your personal information in line with our policies and we only permit them to process your Personal Data for specified purposes and in accordance with our instructions.

Transferring information outside the UK

We may transfer the personal information we collect about you outside the UK as part of our regular recruitment activities, including to group companies in Australia. There are no adequacy decisions in respect of Australia – comparable to that of the European Union. This means that the country to which we transfer your data is not deemed to provide an adequate level of protection for your personal information.

However, to ensure that your personal information does receive an adequate level of protection we have put in place technical and organisational measures to ensure that your personal information is required to be treated by those third parties in a way that is consistent with and which respects UK law on data protection. If you require further information about these protective measures, you can request it from our Data Protection Officer.

To contact the UK DPO email uk.dpo@pexa.com.au.

Data security

We have put in place appropriate security measures to prevent your personal information from being accidentally lost, used or accessed in an unauthorised way, altered or disclosed. In addition, we limit access to your personal information to those employees, agents, contractors and other third parties who have a business need-to-know. They are only permitted to process your personal information on our instructions, and they are subject to a duty of confidentiality. They must also comply with their obligations under applicable data protection legislation. Details of these measures may be obtained by contacting our UK Data Protection Officer at uk.dpo@pexa.com.au.

We have put in place procedures to deal with any suspected data security breach and will notify you and any applicable regulator of a suspected breach where we are legally required to do so. This will be done in line with our Data Protection Policy.

Data retention

How long will you use my information for?

We will retain your personal information for a period of 12 months after we have communicated to you our decision about whether to appoint you to the role. We retain your personal information for that period so that we can show, in the event of a legal claim, that we have not discriminated against candidates on prohibited grounds and that we have conducted the recruitment exercise in a fair and transparent way. After this period, we will securely destroy your personal information in accordance with our Records Management Policy.

If we wish to retain your personal information on file, on the basis that a further opportunity may arise in future and we may wish to consider you for that, we will seek your explicit consent to retain your personal information for a fixed period on that basis.

Rights of access, correction, erasure, and restriction

Under certain circumstances, by law you have the right to:

• Request access to your personal information (commonly known as a “Data Subject Access Request” or “DSAR”). This enables you to receive a copy of the personal information we hold about you and to check that we are lawfully processing it.
• Request correction of the personal information that we hold about you. This enables you to have any incomplete or inaccurate information we hold about you corrected.
• Request erasure of your personal information. This enables you to ask us to delete or remove personal information where there is no good reason for us continuing to process it. You also have the right to ask us to delete or remove your personal information where you have exercised your right to object to processing (see below).
• Object to processing of your personal information where we are relying on a legitimate interest (or those of a third party) and there is something about your particular situation which makes you want to object to processing on this ground. You also have the right to object where we are processing your personal information for direct marketing purposes.
• Request the restriction of processing of your personal information. This enables you to ask us to suspend the processing of personal information about you, for example if you want us to establish its accuracy or the reason for processing it.
• Request the transfer of your personal information to another party, as long as it meets certain criteria.
• Withdraw your consent at any time, where our processing is based on your consent (or explicit consent).

If you want to review, verify, correct or request erasure of your personal information, object to the processing of your Personal Data, or request that we transfer a copy of your personal information to another party, please contact our Data Protection Officer.

Data Protection Officer

We have appointed a Data Protection Officer to oversee compliance with this Privacy Notice. If you have any questions about this Privacy Notice or how we handle your personal information, please contact the UK Data Protection Officer at uk.dpo@pexa.com.au.

If you wish to contact us, you can do so by post at:

• Digital Completion UK Ltd, Suite 5a, West Village, 114 Wellington Street, Leeds, LS1 1BA.
• Optima Legal Services Limited, Suite 5a, West Village, 114 Well Suite 5a, West Village, 114 Wellington Street, Leeds, LS1 1BA.
• United Legal Services Limited, Masters Court, Church Road, THAME, Oxfordshire, OX9 3FA.
• Legal Eye, Masters Court, Church Road, THAME, Oxfordshire, OX9 3FA.
• Amity Law, Second Floor, Paragon House, Paragon Business Park, Chorley New Road, Horwich, BL6 6HG.

You have the right to make a complaint at any time to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) who is responsible for data protection issues in the UK by visiting https://ico.org.uk.

Changes to this Notice

We reserve the right to update this Notice at any time We may also notify you in other ways from time to time about the processing of your personal information.