Call Recording & Transcription.
Last updated: 30 July 2026
Read this before you switch recording on. Recording a phone conversation is regulated by State and Territory law in Australia, and the rules are not the same everywhere. Getting it wrong is a criminal offence in several jurisdictions, not merely a privacy complaint. Pitlane HQ gives you the controls; the legal obligation to record lawfully is yours.
1. Who this applies to
Call recording and transcription are optional features, off by default. They only apply if your workshop uses Pitlane Phones and an authorised user has turned recording on and acknowledged the consent requirement in Settings.
If you have not enabled them, no calls are recorded and no transcripts exist. Nothing else in this notice applies to you.
As at the date above, Pitlane Phones is not yet available on our production service, so no customer calls are being recorded through Pitlane HQ at all. This notice is published in advance so the obligations are clear before anyone can switch the feature on, and it will be updated when the feature becomes available.
2. What we do when recording is enabled
- An announcement is played. Our telephony provider, RingCentral, plays a recording announcement at the start of the call. This is a control we provide, not a legal opinion that the announcement is sufficient in your State — see section 4.
- Audio is captured and stored if you have enabled audio storage. Playback is restricted in code to authorised users of your own workshop. Our production storage is in Australia; the providers and their locations are set out in our Sub-processors list rather than restated as a guarantee here.
- A transcript may be generated — either live during the call or afterwards — using automated speech-to-text. Transcripts are text records of what was said, held against the call record.
- AI may summarise the transcript into key points where you have that feature enabled. As with all our AI output, a summary is a draft, not a record of fact, and the audio and transcript remain the source of truth.
- Retention is yours to set. You choose a retention period in months, and you can turn audio storage off entirely while keeping transcripts. At the end of that window we delete both the audio and the transcript, including any AI summary generated from it. Deletion runs on a scheduled sweep rather than at the exact moment the period expires, so read the retention period as “deleted shortly after” rather than to the minute. The fact that a call was transcribed stays in the record; the content does not. If you need something destroyed sooner, ask us and we will do it.
- Acceptance is recorded. Enabling recording requires an explicit acknowledgement, and we store which user acknowledged it and when, in the audit log. (An earlier version of this notice also said “from where”. The audit record does not capture an IP or location, so that was inaccurate and has been removed.) The record exists to protect you: if a caller ever disputes a recording, you can show when the obligation was accepted, and by whom.
3. Our role and yours
| Responsibility | Whose |
|---|---|
| Providing the recording, transcription, storage, retention and deletion controls | Pitlane HQ |
| Playing a recording announcement at the start of the call | Pitlane HQ (via RingCentral) |
| Keeping recordings encrypted, access-controlled and audited | Pitlane HQ |
| Deciding whether recording is lawful in your State or Territory, and obtaining whatever notice or consent the law requires | You |
| Telling your staff their calls are recorded, and complying with workplace surveillance law | You |
| Deciding what you use a recording for, and who you give it to | You |
| Responding if a caller asks for a copy of their recording, or asks you to delete it | You (we will help you locate and export or delete it) |
In privacy terms: the recordings and transcripts are your records of your customers' personal information. We hold them on your behalf as a processor under our Data Processing Addendum. We do not listen to your calls.
Transcripts are sent to our AI provider when you use the after-call summary or follow-up extraction features — that is the feature doing its job, and it happens only for your own workshop's calls. We do not use your recordings or transcripts to train models, and nothing from your calls is used to build a model served to another customer.
4. The legal position, stated honestly
Recording a private conversation is governed by State and Territory legislation — for example the Invasion of Privacy Act 1971 (Qld), the Surveillance Devices Act 2007 (NSW), the Surveillance Devices Act 1999 (Vic), and equivalents elsewhere. The Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles apply on top, because a recording is personal information.
These regimes differ from each other in ways that matter. Whether it is enough to announce the recording, or whether every party must actively consent, is not uniform across Australia. Nor is the answer always obvious for a call that crosses State lines — which, for a phone call, is common.
We are not able to give you legal advice, and we are not going to imply that switching a feature on makes you compliant. What we will say clearly:
- An automated announcement is a strong and widely-used control, and in some jurisdictions it is sufficient for the caller. Do not assume it is sufficient everywhere, or for your own staff.
- If you record calls with staff on the line, workplace surveillance law may also apply — in New South Wales the Workplace Surveillance Act 2005 requires written notice to employees before surveillance begins. Telling your staff is not optional politeness.
- Using or disclosing a recording is often regulated separately from making it. A recording you lawfully made can still be unlawful to share.
- Get advice for the States you operate in before you enable this. It is a short conversation with a lawyer and it is much cheaper than the alternative.
5. What we recommend you do
- Confirm with a lawyer what your State requires, and whether an announcement alone is enough.
- Keep the recording announcement enabled. Do not disable it to make calls feel smoother.
- Tell your staff in writing before you turn recording on, and keep that notice. Put it in their employment paperwork.
- Set the shortest retention period that meets your actual business need.
- Turn off audio storage if a transcript is enough for you — it materially reduces what you are holding.
- Update your own privacy policy to say that you record calls and why.
- Restrict which of your users can play back recordings.
6. If you are a caller, not a workshop
If you called an automotive workshop and heard a recording announcement, the recording belongs to that workshop, not to us. We store it for them.
To ask for a copy, ask for it to be deleted, or complain about being recorded, contact the workshop directly — they are the organisation that holds your information and they are the right party to answer. If you cannot get a response, you can contact us at privacy@pitlanehq.com.au; we cannot make decisions about a workshop's records, but we can make sure your request reaches them and we will follow up. You can also complain to the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner.
7. Bay cameras
Camera-based features that identify vehicles arriving at a workshop bay are a separate matter with their own legal requirements, including surveillance-device and workplace-surveillance obligations. Those features are not enabled for any customer and will not be made generally available until that review is complete and a specific notice is published here.
8. Contact
- Privacy: privacy@pitlanehq.com.au
- General: hello@pitlanehq.com.au
- Phone: 07 4800 9005