Privacy Policy

Overview

Home & Heart Clearance is a specialist estate and property clearance service operating across Auckland, New Zealand, trading under Navigate Japan Limited (NZBN 9429052367342). This Privacy Policy explains what personal information we collect, why we collect it, how we use and protect it, and what your rights are under the Privacy Act 2020 (New Zealand).

This policy is intended to help you understand our privacy practices before you submit an enquiry form or engage our services. We have designed these practices to be clear, proportionate, and respectful — consistent with how we approach every clearance job we undertake.

Who We Are

Legal entity

Navigate Japan Limited

Trading name

Home & Heart Clearance

NZBN

9429052367342

Registered address

Suite 1013, Unit A Level G26, Hobson Street, Auckland 1010, New Zealand

Privacy contact

Privacy enquiries can be sent to info@homeandheart.nz

Primary contact

Ken Yonei (director and field operations lead)

Navigate Japan Limited is incorporated in New Zealand and subject to New Zealand law, including the Privacy Act 2020.

Information We Collect

We collect personal information in the following categories, depending on how you interact with us:

Contact and identity information

Your name, phone number, email address, and postal address — provided when you submit an enquiry, booking form, or correspond with us directly.

Property information

The address of the property to be cleared, its approximate size, and details about its contents relevant to planning the clearance (room count, access conditions, volume estimate).

Estate and executor information

Where the clearance relates to a deceased estate: the name of the deceased (for documentation purposes only), the name and contact details of the estate executor or solicitor, and any probate reference number provided voluntarily.

Photos and visual records

Photographs of the property interior and its contents, taken by Ken during a site visit or submitted by you through our online intake form. See Section 5 for full details of how photo data is handled.

Service preferences and instructions

Your choice of farewell tier (ceremonial karakia coordination, secular farewell, or standard clearance), any cultural or religious instructions you provide, and any specific instructions about items to be treated with particular care or returned to family members.

Payment information

Invoice records, payment confirmations, and any bank account details provided for refund or payment purposes. We do not store credit card numbers. All electronic payments are processed through our bank or a secure payment gateway.

Professional referral information

If you are an estate lawyer, property manager, or other professional referring clients to us: your name, firm, email address, and phone number for the purpose of managing referral relationships, including any lawful and disclosed referral arrangement where applicable.

Information provided by authorised contacts

Where a clearance is arranged by an executor, solicitor, property manager, retirement village, agent, or family representative, we may receive personal information about other people connected with the property or estate, such as contact details, relationship to the property, or instructions about belongings.

Website and analytics data

Basic usage data collected through website analytics (see Section 10). This data is aggregated and not linked to identifiable individuals unless you submit a form.

Where we collect personal information indirectly from someone other than the individual concerned, we take reasonable steps to make sure the individual is aware of the collection, the purpose of collection, who may receive the information, and their rights to access and correct it, unless an exception under the Privacy Act 2020 applies.

How We Use Your Information

We use the personal information we collect for the following purposes only:

• Delivering the clearance service — scheduling, quoting, planning, executing, and documenting the clearance job you have engaged us for
• Communicating with you — responding to your enquiry, confirming bookings, providing updates during the job, and delivering aftercare reports
• Producing documentation — written quotes, signed agreements, disposal weight records, aftercare summaries, and auction consignment records for your files and for estate or probate purposes
• Coordinating third-party services — contacting auction houses, freight providers, or farewell ceremony contacts on your behalf where you have requested these services
• Processing payments and referral fees — issuing invoices, confirming payments, and paying registered referral partners
• Compliance and record-keeping — meeting our obligations under the Privacy Act 2020, IRD tax and record-keeping requirements, and applicable Auckland Council waste, disposal, or licensing requirements
• Improving our service — using anonymised, aggregated feedback to improve our quoting accuracy, service delivery, and documentation

We do not use your information for unsolicited marketing, profiling, or automated decision-making. We do not sell, rent, or trade personal information to any third party.

Property Photos & Visual Data

Photos play an important operational role in how we work. They allow us to assess items, plan logistics, communicate with auction houses where required, and document the clearance process for the client or estate. We take the handling of these images — which may show private homes and personal belongings — seriously.

What we photograph

Property interiors, room layouts, access points, and specific items relevant to quoting, salvage, auction, donation, disposal, or aftercare reporting. We take reasonable steps to avoid photographing people, intimate personal material, or highly sensitive documents unless necessary for the Services.

Where photos are stored

Photos may be stored in our job-management system and associated secure cloud storage. Access is limited to authorised Navigate Japan Limited personnel and service providers who need the information to deliver or administer the Services.

Who sees photos

Authorised company personnel may access photos from New Zealand or overseas, including Japan, where this is necessary for operations, systems, or administration. Where an auction house appraisal is sought, only photos of the relevant item and necessary item information are shared with the auction house being consulted.

Retention and deletion

Property photos are retained only for as long as reasonably required for quoting, job management, aftercare reporting, auction or donation records, tax, insurance, legal, or dispute-resolution purposes. Unless a longer retention period is required for one of those reasons, property photos are scheduled for deletion within 12 months after the clearance job is marked complete. We may delete some photos earlier where they are no longer required.

Photos submitted by clients

If you submit photos through our online intake form or by email for salvage assessment or quoting, those photos are handled under the same access, use, and retention rules above.

Who We Share Information With

We share personal information with third parties only where necessary to deliver the service you have requested and only to the minimum extent required. The categories of third parties are:

• Auction houses, valuers, and resale partners we engage — item descriptions and photographs only, for appraisal, valuation, listing, consignment, resale, or donation-routing purposes. No personal details about you or the deceased are shared unless specifically required for consignment or transaction documentation.
• Farewell ceremony contacts (kaumātua or appropriate cultural, spiritual, or religious representatives) — your name, the property address, and the requested ceremony type only, where you have specifically requested a Tier 1 or privately arranged farewell.
• Freight, courier, or shipping providers we engage — shipping name, destination address, contact details, and item descriptions only, where memorial keepsake shipping, including katami-wake (形見分け) item shipping to Japan, has been requested.
• Estate lawyers and property managers — where you are the referrer, we may confirm job status and share aftercare documentation. Where you are the referred client, we share documentation with the referring professional only if you have authorised this in writing.
• IRD (Inland Revenue) — as required under New Zealand tax law for payroll, PAYE, and GST obligations.
• Auckland Council — waste disposal records where required by law, council bylaws, or applicable waste-disposal or collection requirements.

We do not share information with social media companies, data brokers, advertising networks, or any party for commercial purposes.

Some personal information may be accessed, processed, or stored outside New Zealand, including by cloud service providers and authorised company personnel or contractors working from overseas. Where we disclose personal information outside New Zealand, we take reasonable steps to ensure the disclosure is consistent with Information Privacy Principle 12 of the Privacy Act 2020.

How Long We Keep It

We retain personal information only for as long as necessary for the purpose for which it was collected, subject to the following minimum retention periods required by law:

• Job records and documentation (quotes, agreements, aftercare reports, disposal records) — 7 years from job completion, as required for tax and business record purposes under the Tax Administration Act 1994
• Property photographs — retained for up to 12 months after job completion unless earlier deletion is appropriate or longer retention is required for tax, insurance, legal, or dispute-resolution purposes (see Section 5)
• Estate and executor contact information — retained with the job record for 7 years, then deleted
• Farewell preference and cultural/religious information — retained only for as long as required to deliver the service, complete aftercare documentation, and resolve any follow-up issues; then deleted unless we are required by law to retain it
• Referral partner information — retained while the referral relationship is active and for 2 years after the last referral, then deleted on request or automatically
• Website enquiry form submissions — retained for 12 months from the date of submission if no job resulted, then deleted
• Financial records — 7 years from the date of the transaction, as required by IRD

When retention periods expire, records are deleted from our job-management systems and any associated cloud storage where deletion is technically practicable and lawful. Hard copy records, if any exist, are shredded.

Security

We take reasonable steps to protect personal information from loss, unauthorised access, use, modification, or disclosure. Our security measures include:

• Access to our job-management systems is restricted to authorised personnel only, using separate login credentials and two-factor authentication where available
• Information stored in cloud systems is protected by the security controls offered by those providers, including encryption in transit and account-level access controls where available
• Client documents and aftercare reports are shared via secure email or controlled-access links where the information is sensitive
• Physical documents containing personal information are stored securely and shredded when no longer required
• Our website is served over HTTPS

No method of data transmission or storage is completely secure. In the event of a privacy breach that is likely to cause serious harm, we will notify affected individuals and the Office of the Privacy Commissioner as required under the Privacy Act 2020.

Your Rights

Under the Privacy Act 2020, you have rights in relation to personal information held by Navigate Japan Limited, including:

• Access — you may request a copy of the personal information we hold about you
• Correction — you may request that we correct personal information that is inaccurate, incomplete, or out of date
• Deletion where lawful and practicable — you may ask us to delete information we no longer need and are not legally required to retain
• Complaints — you may raise a concern with us if you believe we have handled your personal information incorrectly

To exercise these rights, contact us using the details in Section 13. We will respond to access and correction requests within 20 working days as required under the Privacy Act 2020. We will not charge a fee unless a charge is permitted by law, and we will tell you before any charge is applied.

If you believe we have breached your privacy rights, you may make a complaint to our privacy contact in the first instance. If you are not satisfied with our response, you have the right to complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner at privacy.org.nz.

Cookies & Website Analytics

Our website is hosted on Squarespace. Squarespace uses cookies and similar technologies to provide website functionality and collect basic analytics data. We use this data in aggregated form to understand how our website is being used — page views, traffic sources, device types — and to improve the site.

At the date of this policy, we do not intentionally use advertising cookies, third-party tracking pixels, retargeting technologies, Google Analytics, or similar tools that identify individual users across websites. If this changes, we will update this policy.

You can manage cookie preferences through your browser settings. Disabling cookies may affect some website functionality. For more information about how Squarespace handles data, refer to the Squarespace Privacy Policy.

Children's Privacy

Our services are not directed at children under the age of 16, and we do not knowingly collect personal information from children. If you believe we have inadvertently collected information from a child, please contact us and we will delete it promptly.

Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices, our services, or New Zealand law. We will update the "Last updated" date at the top of this page when changes are made.

For significant changes that affect how we handle information you have already provided, we will notify you directly by email where we hold your contact details.

The updated policy will apply from the date it is published, unless we state otherwise.

Contact & Complaints

For any questions about this Privacy Policy, to exercise your rights, or to make a privacy complaint, please contact us:

If you are not satisfied with our response to a privacy complaint, you may contact the Office of the Privacy Commissioner:

• Website: www.privacy.org.nz
• Phone: 0800 803 909
• Post: PO Box 10094, Wellington 6143, New Zealand