◆
Australia–Bhutan Association of Canberra Incorporated (“ABAC,” “we,” “us”)
Last updated: 14 August 2026
ABAC is incorporated in the Australian Capital Territory and collects personal information from members, applicants, and dependants to administer membership under our Constitution and Membership Policy. This statement explains what we collect, why, who can see it, how long we keep it, and how you can access or correct your own record.
Australian law. Associations of ABAC’s size are generally exempt from the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) as a “small business operator.” The Executive Committee has nonetheless chosen to handle personal information in line with the Australian Privacy Principles as good governance, consistent with clause 6.2 of the Membership Policy.
Bhutanese law. Your Citizenship ID (CID) number is issued by the Royal Government of Bhutan, and many members hold an ongoing legal and personal connection to Bhutan. Bhutan’s own data protection framework — Chapter 21 of the Information, Communications and Media Act 2018, and the National Digital Identity Act 2023 — is administered by the Bhutan InfoComm and Media Authority (BICMA), but Bhutan does not currently have a standalone data protection statute or a dedicated data protection regulator equivalent to Australia’s OAIC. As the Constitution commits ABAC to a close working relationship with the Royal Bhutanese Embassy, we treat your CID with the same care Bhutanese law expects for citizen identity data, even though ABAC, as an Australian association storing data on Australian-hosted infrastructure, is not itself subject to Bhutanese jurisdiction.
When you apply for or renew membership (single or family), we collect:
We do not collect passport numbers, home addresses, or financial account details.
Payment information. If you pay the membership fee, your card details are entered directly with our payment processor, Stripe, and never pass through or get stored on ABAC’s systems. We only receive confirmation that payment succeeded, and a reference we use to activate your membership.
Contact form. If you use the Contact page, your name, email, and message are forwarded once by email to the committee’s inbox and are not stored in our membership database.
When a business or organisation applies for Corporate Membership, we collect:
We do not collect the business’s financial records, internal documents, or sensitive operational data beyond what’s needed to record the sponsorship.
ABN and contact details. ABN is used only to verify the business entity for our records. Contact person’s details are used to send membership confirmations, payment information, and ABAC updates. These fields are not displayed publicly except for the business name, logo, and website (if provided) on the "Our Partners" page showing approved, active members by tier.
Individual and family membership. We use this information to:
Corporate membership. For business sponsorships, we use business and contact information to:
We do not use your information for unrelated marketing, and we do not sell or trade it.
Individual members. Access to your CID, date of birth, phone number, and suburb is restricted to authorised Executive Committee office-bearers who need it to administer membership — consistent with clause 3.3 of the Membership Policy. This is enforced technically, not just by policy: our database rejects any request for this data except from a signed-in, authorised committee member, and no public page or API ever exposes it.
Your name and membership status may be visible to the committee member(s) responsible for events or welfare coordination where relevant to your participation.
Corporate members. A sponsoring business's ABN and contact person's email/phone are visible only to authorised committee members who administer corporate sponsorships. The business name, logo, website, and sponsorship tier are published on the public "Our Partners" page for approved, active members only.
We do not share your information with any other third party — including the Royal Bhutanese Embassy — unless required by Australian law (for example, a court order), or with your explicit consent.
If you register a spouse/partner or children as part of a Family Membership, you confirm you are authorised to provide their details on their behalf. Dependent children’s information is used only to record their participation in ABAC activities — never for marketing, and children never receive email from us directly.
Individual members. We keep your membership record for as long as you remain a member, and for 7 years after your membership lapses or you resign, to meet our recordkeeping obligations under the Associations Incorporation Act 1991 and to preserve continuity of your membership number if you rejoin.
Corporate members. We keep a sponsoring business's record for as long as the sponsorship is active, and for 7 years after it expires or is terminated, to meet the same legal recordkeeping obligations and for accounting purposes.
Individual members. You can:
Corporate members. The sponsoring business contact person can:
To do any of these, email bhutancanberra@gmail.com with your name (individual member) or business name (corporate member). We’ll respond within a reasonable time.
If you’re unhappy with how we’ve handled your information, contact us first at the email above. If you remain unsatisfied, you may complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (oaic.gov.au) — the applicable regulator, since ABAC and its data are based in Australia. Bhutan does not currently operate an equivalent standalone data protection authority.
We’ll update this page if what we collect or how we use it changes and update the date at the top.