ERS Application Privacy
Protecting the privacy of individuals
Education providers are responsible for ensuring that information collected about individuals is kept private in accordance with the Privacy Act 2020. This includes information like names, date of birth and addresses. Education providers should make sure that any hard copies of a child, student, or teacher’s personal information is kept in a secure location.
Under the Privacy Act 2020 an individual can request any information held about themselves within the ERS.
All notifications about payment advice and request outcomes will be sent via email from the ERS to the general/admin email the Ministry has on file for your organisation. If you want to change this address, let us know.
Personal details collected for the purposes of calculating and processing your payment will be held within the ERS for your organisation. The exception to this, is if you don’t have an ERS account for your school or early learning service, in which case, some personal details will be sent via email.
The Ministry’s Code of Conduct states that misuse or disclosure of official information, which includes all personal information, could result in disciplinary action, including dismissal.
We strongly advise that education providers put in place appropriate processes to ensure that the privacy of information within the ERS is maintained.
Access to information within the ERS
Education providers should limit access to authorised users to submit accurate information to the Ministry, and to meet obligations for the careful treatment of personal information under the Privacy Act 2020.
For the purposes of the ERS, an authorised user refer to any person(s) who has been provided with access to the ERS by their school principal (or delegated authoriser) or early learning service provider contact (or delegated authoriser).
A user of the ERS may have administration rights only, where they are authorised to enter and access information pertaining to that organisation’s funding requests/information, but cannot submit this to the Ministry. The other role a user may have is as an approver. An approver will check and submit the information entered by the administrator.
Authorised users are required to use a logon and password to access the ERS. Authorised users can only access information related to their early learning service or school.
Ministry staff are authorised to have access to this information for the purpose of resourcing, and for educational research, statistics, monitoring, and reporting to Government and the public.