Terms of Use | Payment Times Reporting Scheme

Before you use our sites, you must read, understand and agree to be bound by these Terms of Use. If you are representing an organisation, you must agree that it will be bound by these terms and warrant that you are authorised to make that statement and to bind the organisation.

Terminology
1. In these Terms of Use, the following words have the meanings given below:
  Act
  
  means the Payment Times Reporting Act 2020 (Cth).
  
  Harmful Code
  
  means any form of harmful surreptitious code or other contaminants, including viruses, bugs, trojan horses, spyware or adware.
  
  Portal
  
  means the Payment Times Reporting Portal.
  
  Register
  
  means the Payment Times Reports Register.
  
  SBI Tool
  
  means the Small Business Identification Tool.
  
  Sites
  
  means the Website, the Portal, the Register, and the SBI Tool
  
  Terms
  
  means these Terms of Use.
  
  we, us and our
  
  refers to the Commonwealth of Australia, as represented by the Department of the Treasury.
  
  Website
  
  means the Payment Times Reporting Scheme website at https://paymenttimes.gov.au/.
  
  you and your refers to:
  1. when using the Website, downloading the Register or accessing the SBI Tool: you and your organisation, if you are a representative of an organisation.
  2. when using the Portal: each registered user of the Portal and your organisation, if you are a representative of an organisation.
General
1. These Terms relate to the use of the Sites and explain our obligations and your obligations when accessing and interacting with the Sites and using information or material contained in or obtained from the Sites.
2. Before you begin using any of the Sites, you must agree to these Terms.
3. You will be taken to have acknowledged that you have read, understand and agreed to be legally bound by these Terms, as updated from time to time, if you:
  1. access the Website;
  2. register for, access or use the Portal;
  3. download the Register or any information from it; or
  4. use the SBI Tool.
Acceptance of these Terms
1. If you are accepting these Terms on behalf of an organisation or as an organisation administrator, subject to clause 3b, you are:
  1. accepting and agreeing to these Terms on your own behalf and on behalf of that organisation; and
  2. warranting to us that you are an agent of that organisation and that you are properly authorised by your organisation to make the application and to represent the organisation and to bind it to these Terms.
2. If you are accepting these Terms on behalf of an organisation that is a non-corporate Commonwealth entity (as defined in the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013 (Cth)), it is acknowledged that these Terms are not legally binding on your organisation. Nevertheless, you and your organisation must comply with these Terms as though you and it are legally bound by these Terms.
Creating accounts
1. If you want to use the Portal, you or someone else in your organisation must apply to register an account for one of the following:
  1. yourself;
  2. your organisation; or
  3. your organisation administrator, who will represent your organisation.
2. If you are applying to register an account for your organisation or organisation administrator, the following rules apply:
  1. you must not apply to register more than one account;
  2. you must only use your full registered name or business name, when applying to register an account and you must not use any slogans, brands or marketing elements to name your account; and
  3. you must include your or your organisation’s ABN, as applicable, if you have or your organisation has one.
3. When you apply to register an account as an individual or on behalf of an organisation, you warrant to us that you are not misrepresenting your identity or your organisation’s identity.
4. You acknowledge that giving false or misleading information to the Commonwealth is a serious offence under section 137.1 of the Schedule to the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth).
5. You acknowledge that we may notify you of, and you must comply with, specific requirements in relation to account registration from time to time.
Your responsibilities
1. In accessing the Sites, you agree that:
  1. you allow us to collect data about your use of the Sites for the purposes of administering the Payment Times Reporting Act 2020 (Cth) (PTR Act) including taking actions in furtherance of the objectives of the PTR Act;
  2. if you register to use the Portal or submit payment times reports in accordance with the PTR Act, we will collect personal information in accordance with our privacy policy and collection notices (see clause 8a below for further detail);
  3. you will monitor, control and take responsibility for all activities occurring under your accounts, user names, logins, passwords, and security questions and answers, including any activities that may result from your negligence, carelessness, misconduct, or failure to use or maintain appropriate security measures;
  4. you will promptly report any suspicious or unauthorised conduct concerning your accounts, user names, logins, passwords, or security questions and answers to us if you become aware of any such conduct; and
  5. any documentation that you submit to us must (and will) contain the type(s) of information required to be contained in that particular type of documentation.
2. While using any of the Sites, you agree to:
  1. only use the relevant Site(s) for their intended purposes, for lawful purposes, and in a manner that does not infringe the rights of or restrict or inhibit the use and enjoyment of the relevant Site(s) by us or any third party;
  2. only use the Sites in a manner that complies with all applicable legislation including the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth); and
  3. only use the Sites strictly in accordance with these Terms, and all notices, protocols, guidelines and other instructions provided or advised to you by us from time to time.
3. While using the Sites, you agree not to:
  1. impersonate any person or falsely represent your association with any person or organisation (including us);
  2. provide false or misleading information in connection with the Portal or information provided to the Payment Times Reporting Regulator (Regulator);
  3. access or attempt to access or use information that you are not authorised to access or use;
  4. transmit any message, data, image or program that would violate the property rights of others, including unauthorised copyrighted text, images or programs, trade secrets or other confidential proprietary information;
  5. interfere with the rights of others to use the Sites;
  6. attempt to modify, adapt, translate, sell, reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble any portion of the Sites, including through the use of automated tools;
  7. use any scripts or processes on the Website, Portal or SBI Tool, nor any data scraping or data mining tools on the Website, Portal or SBI Tool;
  8. modify or copy:
    - the layout of the Website, Portal or SBI Tool; or
    - any computer software and code contained in or forming part of Website, Portal or SBI Tool; or
  9. transmit any Harmful Code.
4. While accessing the Portal, in addition to the above matters, you agree:
  1. to maintain the confidentiality of all account information including user names, logins, passwords, and security questions and answers that you use to access any page or feature of the Portal;
  2. to access and read all notices and information provided by us in relation to the Portal;
  3. that all information submitted on the Portal is (and will be) true and accurate, and that you will keep such information up to date; and
  4. to log off from your account when you finish using the Portal.
5. While using the SBI Tool, in addition to the above matters, you agree that:
  1. the SBI Tool is made available by the Treasury for the purposes of the Act;
  2. you will only access the SBI Tool for the sole purpose of identifying which of the suppliers you engage are “small businesses” for the purpose of preparing your payment times report for submission under the Act; and
  3. that you will not access, use, decompile, reverse engineer or download the SBI Tool for any other purpose.
Use on behalf of another person
1. When you are using the Sites in relation to, or on behalf of, another person, you agree that:
  1. the other person must have appointed you to access the Sites on their behalf, and that appointment must not have been revoked;
  2. if that appointment is based on you holding a certain position (for example, as that other person’s employee or agent), you must currently hold that position;
  3. if that appointment is based on you holding a certain qualification (for example, as a legal practitioner), you must currently hold that qualification, and that qualification must not currently be suspended or cancelled; and
  4. you will comply with any request made by us for you to verify any of the above matters.
Guidelines on use of the Sites
1. From time to time we may issue more detailed protocols, guidelines or instructions for the use of any of the Sites (as may be updated from time to time). These protocols, guidelines or instructions form part of these Terms and are legally binding on you.
Privacy
1. By using the Portal, you agree to our collection, use and disclosure of your personal information as set out in our Privacy Policy and the privacy collection notice.
2. If you are providing information about a party other than yourself, you warrant that you have obtained all necessary consents to provide that information to us.
Security
1. When you are using the Sites, you agree that you must not and that you will not:
  1. tamper with the Sites;
  2. attempt to bypass any security controls contained in or forming part of the Sites;
  3. use the Sites in a manner that makes unnecessary use of our disk space, processors or other system resources;
  4. make deliberate attempts to interfere with the functionality of the Sites, overload the Sites or attempt to disable a host of the Sites; or
  5. attempt to use the Sites without authorisation.
2. When you are using the Sites, you agree that we may routinely log, monitor and analyse your use of the Sites for any misuse or attempted or actual security breaches.
Links to other websites
1. The Sites may contain links to sites on the internet owned and operated by third parties which are not under our control. In relation to the other sites on the internet, which are linked to any of the Sites, we provide the links to other sites as a convenience to you and the existence of a link to another site does not imply any endorsement by us of the contents of the linked site.
2. You agree that:
  1. we are not responsible for the accuracy or otherwise of the material contained on those linked sites; and
  2. to the extent permitted by law, we accept no liability (whether in contract, tort (including negligence, statute or otherwise) in respect of those linked sites.
IP Rights
1. All intellectual property comprised in or derived from the Sites, including copyright comprised in the Sites, is owned by us or another third-party owner.
2. All logos, icons, brand names, business names, URLs, trade marks or service names that identify us are owned by and remain the property of the Commonwealth of Australia.
3. All other trade marks or service marks on the Sites are the property of their respective owners.
4. You must not make any unauthorised use of any material appearing on the Sites (and must not breach the intellectual property rights in respect of that material). If you do so you may become liable for a breach of the intellectual property rights of the Commonwealth or a third party. See the terms of authorisation contained in the copyright notice.
Disclaimer
1. We do not warrant, guarantee or make any representation that:
  1. the Sites, or the servers that make the Sites available on the internet, are free of software viruses;
  2. the functions contained in any software contained on the Sites will operate uninterrupted or are error-free; or
  3. errors and defects in the Sites will be corrected.
2. You acknowledge and agree that:
  1. your use of the Sites is on an 'as is, as available' basis only; and
  2. we make no representation and give no warranty that the Sites will meet your requirements, be uninterrupted, timely or error-free.
3. You should promptly notify us if you discover or suspect any error or malfunction in any of the Sites. In such an event, you agree to promptly provide to us information and details regarding any such error or malfunction to the extent reasonably necessary to identify, confirm, investigate and rectify any such errors or difficulties (including, when relevant, any details of your operating environment or that of your organisation).
Liability and indemnity
1. You agree that we will not be liable to you (whether in contract, tort, statute or otherwise) for any loss or damage (including special, indirect, consequential or exemplary damages) that you suffer as a result of, or in connection with:
  1. your use of, or inability to use, the Sites (including your reliance on any material, links, opinions or recommendations made available through the Sites);
  2. any unauthorised access to, or alterations of, your transmissions or data into or from the Sites;
  3. any inappropriate activities resulting from the loss or misuse of your username and password relating to the Portal;
  4. any attempt by you, or by a person on your behalf, to use the Sites without authorisation;
  5. any errors or omissions in the Sites or linked sites on the internet;
  6. any delays to, interruptions of, or cessation of, the services provided through the Sites or linked sites;
  7. the Sites not being available or operative; and
  8. any statements or conduct of any third parties on the Sites (including materials, opinions or recommendations of third parties made available through the Sites, or defamatory, offensive or illegal conduct by any user of the Sites).
2. You accept the full cost of any necessary upgrade, repair, correction and maintenance of any of your computer software or hardware, which may be necessary as a consequence of you accessing the Sites.
3. You indemnify us and hold us harmless from and against (which means that you must meet our costs and expenses, including legal costs on a full indemnity basis, arising from) any loss, damage, cost, expense, claim, proceeding or liability of any kind that we may incur or that may be brought by any person against us, that arises directly or indirectly from:
  1. your breach of these Terms; or
  2. your use of the Sites and your activities in connection with the Sites.
Termination of use of the Portal or SBI Tool
1. We may immediately suspend your account, or your access to or use of the Portal or SBI Tool, if we suspect that you might have breached any of these Terms, until we determine that:
  1. you have not breached these Terms, in which case we will reinstate your account, access to or use of the Portal or SBI Tool; or
  2. you have breached these Terms, in which case we will terminate your account, access to or use of the Portal or SBI Tool, unless the breach is remediated to our satisfaction.
2. Your obligations under these Terms continue to apply during any period in which your account, access to or use of the Portal or SBI Tool is suspended.
3. If we terminate or suspend your account, or access to or use of the Portal or SBI Tool, we:
  1. are not required to give you access to any of the services made available on the Portal or SBI Tool, unless we are required by the PTR Act and associated rules and regulations to give you information relating to the SBI Tool, in which case clause 14e will apply; and
  2. will not be responsible for any missed opportunities or other losses due to your inability to access or use the Portal or SBI Tool.
4. We reserve the right to report to the proper authorities any offence which might have occurred in connection with your use of the Portal or SBI Tool.
5. If we terminate or suspend your account, and we are required by the PTR Act and associated rules and regulations to give you access to information relating to the SBI Tool, we will give you access to information relating to the SBI Tool in a manner that is agreed with the Regulator.
Notices
1. We may notify you of any changes to your registration, access and use of the Sites and any changes to these Terms by the publication of a notice on the Website or the Portal.
Changes to these Terms
1. We may change these Terms at any time.
2. You will need to accept any new Terms if you want to continue using the Sites.
Governing law and jurisdiction
1. These Terms are governed by the laws of the Australian Capital Territory, and you agree to submit to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of the Australian Capital Territory.