Is it legal to record a phone call in Australia? Call recording laws by state

Quick note before we start: this is general information for Australian professionals, not legal advice. Recording and surveillance laws differ by state and territory, they get updated, and the facts of your situation matter. If you record client calls as part of your job, check the current legislation for your state or get advice from a lawyer who knows it.

The short answer

There is no single national rule on consent. Recording a conversation is governed mostly by state and territory surveillance and listening devices Acts, and they split into two camps. A federal Act, covered below, adds a separate rule for recording on the phone line.

• All-party consent (everyone on the call has to agree): New South Wales, Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania, and the Australian Capital Territory.
• One-party consent (a person who is part of the conversation can record it under the state Act): Victoria, Queensland, and the Northern Territory.

So the honest answer to "is it legal to record a phone call in Australia" is: it depends where you (and arguably the other person) are, and whether you have consent. For a professional recording client calls, the safe and sensible approach is to get consent every time, regardless of which state you are in. More on why below.

Call recording laws in Australia, state by state

Treat this table as a starting point. Each Act has definitions, exceptions and rules about using and sharing a recording that a one-line summary cannot cover, and they change. We re-read the sections cited on this page on 12 October 2026. Check the current version for your state before you rely on it.

All-party consent states: NSW, WA, SA, TAS, ACT

In these jurisdictions, the general position is that you need the consent of every party to a private conversation before you record it. "Private conversation" is doing a lot of work in those Acts - it broadly means a conversation the parties could reasonably expect not to be overheard or recorded. A client call about their finances will usually qualify.

The relevant legislation by jurisdiction:

• NSW: Surveillance Devices Act 2007 (NSW)
• WA: Surveillance Devices Act 1998 (WA)
• SA: Surveillance Devices Act 2016 (SA)
• TAS: Listening Devices Act 1991 (Tas)
• ACT: Listening Devices Act 1992 (ACT)

Practical upshot: if you or your client are in one of these five, get a clear yes on the call before you start recording, and note who consented and when. A recording made without the consent the Act requires can be an offence in itself, and passing it on can be a second one. Whether it can be used as evidence is left to the court: the NSW Act, for example, says it is not intended to limit a court's discretion to admit or exclude evidence (s 3(2)). There are narrow exceptions in some of these Acts (for example, where recording is reasonably necessary to protect a lawful interest), but you do not want your compliance to rely on arguing an exception after the fact.

One-party consent states: VIC, QLD, NT

In Victoria, Queensland and the Northern Territory, the general position is that the state or territory Act does not make it an offence for a party to a private conversation to record it, even without the consent of the others. The offence in each of those Acts is aimed at people who are not part of the conversation.

• VIC: Surveillance Devices Act 1999 (Vic)
• QLD: Invasion of Privacy Act 1971 (Qld)
• NT: Surveillance Devices Act 2007 (NT)

That sounds like a free pass, but two things narrow it for professionals. First, being allowed to record is not the same as being allowed to use or share that recording - several of these Acts restrict communicating or publishing a private conversation even where the recording itself was lawful. Second, you are almost never just in one state. Calls cross borders constantly, and it is genuinely unsettled which state's law governs a call between, say, a broker in Melbourne and a client in Perth. The cautious reading is that the stricter (all-party) rule could apply.

You may not need to record the call at all. Most firms record so they can write an accurate file note afterwards. If your phone system or Teams already makes a transcript, a tool that works from the transcript gives you the note without keeping a recording. That is how CallNote works: it never records the call. The sample below shows the kind of file note that comes out.

The federal law for phone calls

Phone calls also sit under the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979 (Cth), which applies in every state and territory. Section 7(1) says a person shall not intercept a communication passing over a telecommunications system. Section 6(1) says interception consists of listening to or recording, by any means, such a communication in its passage over that system without the knowledge of the person making the communication. Under section 105, contravening section 7(1) is an indictable offence punishable by imprisonment for up to 2 years.

For a firm, a recording made inside the phone system, on the line, is the kind of recording the federal Act is aimed at, and the test there is whether the person speaking knows about it. That applies in a one-party state too. Whether a recording made another way, for example on a separate device beside the phone, is made "in its passage" over the system depends on how it is made, and that is a question for a lawyer if you plan to record without saying so. The state Acts and the federal Act stack, and meeting one does not excuse you from the other. Telling the other person and getting a yes at the start of the call deals with both: knowledge for the federal Act, consent for the state Act.

It is not just surveillance law - privacy obligations stack on top

Surveillance and listening device Acts tell you whether you can record. The Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) and the Australian Privacy Principles tell you what you can do with the recording and the personal information in it. The Act covers most businesses with an annual turnover above $3 million, and some smaller ones regardless of size, such as health service providers (section 6D). If it covers you, APP 5 requires reasonable steps to tell people what you are collecting and why, APP 11 requires reasonable steps to keep it secure, and APP 6 limits using or disclosing it for a different purpose without consent or a listed exception.

On top of that, your AFSL, ACL or professional body almost certainly has its own policy on recording client conversations, retention and storage. For mortgage brokers and financial advisers, your aggregator or licensee will usually have something in writing. Read it. It can be stricter than the law.

How to capture and keep consent properly

The mechanics matter as much as the law. Getting a mumbled "yeah sure" that nobody wrote down does not help you in two years when a complaint lands. Here is a clean process that works in every state:

1. Ask at the very start of the call, before anything substantive is discussed. A simple line: "I record our calls so I have an accurate record of what we agreed - are you happy for me to do that?"
2. Wait for an actual yes. Do not start until you have it.
3. Capture the consent on the record itself - the moment they agreed, in their words where possible, with the date and time.
4. Keep it with the file note for that client, not in a separate system that gets lost.
5. If they say no, don't record. Take notes the old way and document that they declined.

That third step - getting the consent onto the permanent record - is the one most people skip, and it is the one that actually protects you. A recording with no documented consent attached is a liability sitting in your archive.

Where CallNote fits (and where it deliberately doesn't)

CallNote turns an existing transcript into a draft file note. Paste or upload the transcript, forward it by email, or use a supported connection. You can also record a post-meeting voice recap; that is your recollection, not a verbatim transcript. Check the draft, then copy, export or publish it to a supported connected CRM. Using CallNote does not remove your obligations around recording, transcription, privacy or sharing.

Two things follow from that. First, the recording decision and its legality stay with you and whatever system actually made the recording or transcript. CallNote is not adding a recorder or a meeting bot to your call. Second, the consent still has to be collected on the call and written into the note. Our free Can I record this call? tool shows the rule for each state, and there is wording to copy in our call recording disclosure examples.

CallNote stores your data in Sydney, encrypted, and your data is never used to train AI models. Some jobs, such as writing the note, are done by providers overseas, and our security page lists each one, what it receives and who can see a note. The compliance section on the landing page covers the audit log and the templates.

Related reading

If you record client calls, the recording is only half the job - the file note is the part that has to stand up. Our guide on how to write a compliant NCCP file note walks through the suitability standard and what a defensible note needs to include. And if you are weighing up tools, do AI note takers record your calls explains the difference between tools that record and tools that only receive an existing transcript - which matters a lot for the consent questions above. Before your next call, the free Can I record this call? tool shows the rule and the Act for your state.

See a transcript become a draft note

If you keep notes for client work, choose the example for your profession: mortgage broking, financial advice or legal practice. The example below shows a general client conversation; it does not establish whether any recording was lawful.

Compare the source with the finished draft

This fictional example shows the level of detail the source supports. The example note is prewritten for illustration. In CallNote, you generate a draft, check it and decide when it is ready to file.

Common questions