Privacy Policy.

Who we are

This platform (the LINK Broker Portal and the pages, links and portals it sends you) is operated by LINK Business Melbourne (Arcadia Group Melbourne Pty Ltd, trading as LINK Business) and used by the LINK Business offices in Australia that run their engagements on it. The licensed office entity responsible for your engagement is named on the engagement agreement, confidentiality agreement or other document you sign, and is available on request from any office.

We are bound by the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles. Where we act as a licensed business broker we are also bound by the agents legislation of the State or Territory of the office (see Disclaimers).

What we collect

• Identity and contact details: name, email address, mobile number, postal address, position and the entity you act for (including its ABN), and the identity details an engagement agreement, a confidentiality agreement or an identity check before signing requires.
• Business information (vendors): financial statements, tax returns, activity statements, management accounts, payroll and staff details, leases, supplier and customer information, premises and plant, and your answers to the information memorandum questionnaire. Where you connect Xero, MYOB or QuickBooks we read your accounting data; we never write to it, and you can disconnect at any time.
• Transaction information: appraisals and valuations, proposals, engagement agreements, marketing choices and fees, buyer enquiries, confidentiality agreements, data-room access, offers and heads of agreement, contract milestones, deposits and settlement details.
• Buyer information: what you give us in an enquiry, a confidentiality agreement or an offer, including your funding position. When you sign a confidentiality agreement we may also compile publicly available information about you and your entity (the Australian Business Register, your organisation's website, professional networks, the press and licensed business databases) into a short brief, with its sources, so the broker and the vendor can decide what to release to you.
• Engagement information: when you open a proposal, memorandum, data room, questionnaire, agreement, offer form, portal page or market update; which sections you read and for how long; the device, browser, IP address and approximate location used; one-time codes sent to verify a device; and drafts of an offer as you type them, including the price and terms you are considering.
• Communications: emails, SMS, calls, voice notes and their transcripts, notes between you and our team, your replies to automated messages, and your answers to feedback and satisfaction surveys.

Why we collect it

• To appraise, value, market and sell businesses, and to advise on acquisitions, as you engage us to.
• To qualify buyers and protect the vendor's confidentiality before a teaser, memorandum or data room is released.
• To prepare, send, track and sign proposals, engagement agreements, confidentiality agreements, offers and heads of agreement.
• To keep vendors and buyers informed about their campaign, and to tell you about businesses or services that match what you have told us you are looking for.
• To verify identity where the law or the engagement requires it, and to meet our record-keeping, trust-account and reporting obligations.
• To understand how our documents are read so the broker can follow up well, and to improve the platform using aggregated information that does not identify you.

Automation and AI assistance

Some emails and SMS are sent automatically in the name of the broker responsible for you, at times set by the office. They are logged and can be stopped by replying, by the unsubscribe link, or by contacting the office.

Some voice notes you receive are rendered from the broker's written note using a model of the broker's own voice, made with that broker's consent. Calls and voice notes may be transcribed.

We use AI models to help draft documents, summarise information you provide, research publicly available information and read published market data. A broker reviews what is sent to you. Your information is not used to train those models.

Who we share it with

• The other side of your transaction, to the extent the engagement requires: a vendor sees who has enquired and what they offer; an approved buyer sees the memorandum and data room the vendor has cleared.
• Your and the other party's legal, accounting and finance representatives, and financiers where you ask us to introduce you.
• Business-for-sale portals and advertising platforms, where a campaign is published. Listings are advertised blind: the business is not named and your personal details are not published.
• Other LINK Business offices and LINK's franchisor for network reporting, referrals and awards, at broker and office level, not a vendor's confidential information.
• Service providers that host the platform and its database, send email and SMS, render voice notes, run AI models, provide business and market data, and process payments. Some of these providers store information outside Australia (including in the United States). We require them to protect it.
• Regulators, courts and others where the law requires or permits it.

How we protect it

Documents are reached by unique links; sensitive pages (data rooms, signing, offers) add a one-time code to your device. Information is encrypted in transit, access is logged, and each office's staff see only their own office's engagements. Downloads from a data room are watermarked and recorded. We keep records for as long as the engagement, the agents legislation and the tax law require, then delete or de-identify them.

Access, correction and complaints

You can ask to see or correct the information we hold about you, ask us to delete what we are not required to keep, or opt out of marketing, at any time by contacting the office named on your document or melbourne@linkbusiness.com.au (1300 763 668). We will respond within 30 days.

If you are not satisfied with our response you may complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner at oaic.gov.au.

Cookies

The portal uses the cookies needed to keep you signed in and to remember a device you have verified. We do not run third-party advertising cookies on this platform. Pages opened from a link record the open and the reading described above.

Changes

This policy may change as the platform changes. The version in force is dated at the top of this page; the current version is always at this address.