This blog has been in play for some months. To gain the full story, go to left hand side "blog archive" go to bottom post of January with same title as this Blog and read upwards
Current telecom participants
Bridgette Dalzell current head of outsourced customer care at telecom New Zealand whom is Michelle Young's direct report at time of incident
Michelle Young call center manager Hamilton call center, whom is Shaun Hoults direct report at time of incidents
Shaun Hoult team manager weekend team Sat-Tues Hamilton
Iain Galloway HR representative spends a lot of time in Hamilton
Hannah Sullivan HR Telecom instruction person to lawyer John Rooney
John Rooney Telecoms legal representative partner in Simpson Grierson
there is no such thing as a minor breach of ethics you are either honest or you are not
Bridgette Dalzell current head of outsourced customer care at telecom New Zealand
has done it again read further
30 June 2010
Paul Evans-McLeod
17 Minnie Place
Pukete
HAMILTON 3200
Dear Mr Evans-McLeod
Privacy Act Complaint: Paul Evans-McLeod and Telecom New Zealand Limited (Our Ref: C122243)
I refer to previous correspondence concerning the Privacy Act (“the Act”) complaint you have made about the actions of Telecom New Zealand Limited (“Telecom”).
We have now received a response from Telecom regarding your complaint. Having reviewed the information provided by Telecom, it is my preliminary view that Telecom has not interfered with your privacy in this case. The reasons for my view are set out below. As this is my preliminary view, I am happy to take into consideration any comments you may wish to make.
Background
During the course of an ongoing employment dispute between you and your former employer, Telecom, you formed the view that Telecom had been reading personal emails which you had sent to your friends and family from work. You based this view on the fact that Telecom had sent an email to you and had copied in an acquaintance of yours, Nigel Dick, and asked him to confirm that he was acting as your lawyer.
You also advised that you had made a request for information from Telecom which was originally sent to Trish Keith, Bridget Dalzell, Michelle Young and Shaun Hault. It is not clear from the information you provided to us when this request was initially sent.
You advised that as you did not receive a response to this initial request, you then sent a copy to Tanya Bowers on 6 March 2010. I understand that following this, you then contacted Ms Bowers directly for an update and were advised that the matter was being dealt with by someone in the HR department. You advised that as of 16 April 2010 you had not received a response to your request.
You then made a subsequent request to Telecom on 26 May 2010, for a copy of all the personal information it holds about you.
The Privacy Act
There are two main privacy issues raised by your complaint. The first issue is in relation to your request for information from Telecom. The second issue is in relation to your concerns that Telecom accessed your personal emails while you were at work. I will deal with these in turn below.
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Issue One — Telecom’s Response to Your Request for Information
This aspect of your complaint raises issues in terms of principle 6 of the Act. Principle 6 sets out that an individual is entitled to request that an agency which holds personal information about them provides them with a copy of that information. However that this is not an absolute right as the agency may be entitled to withhold information on the basis of the withholding grounds set out in sections 27-29 of the Act.
In this case, as noted above you made a request to Telecom for access to your information on several occasions without receiving a response. We notified Telecom of this aspect of your complaint. Telecom has advised that it did not receive your initial request for information. This is on the basis that Telecom had placed a block on your email address due to the content of previous emails which you had sent to Telecom.
Telecom has further advised that on 25 February 2010, it wrote to you requesting that all future correspondence be directed to Simpson Grierson directly. Telecom has advised that the block was put in place on 23 December 2009, although it may not have been fully actioned until the beginning of 2010. Telecom further advises that on 20 April 2010, the block was removed on a very limited basis so that your emails could be received by five HR email addresses.
Telecom has advised that as such, it did not receive your request for information until 26 May 2010. I understand that Telecom has responded to your request and advised that it is seeking an extension of an additional 20 working days in which to respond to your request for information.
I note that you had advised that you had spoke with Ms Bowers regarding your complaint and she had noted that your concerns were being dealt with by the HR department. Telecom has advised that this comment was made in relation to a online complaint which you had made on 4 March 2010 through Telecom’s customer help website, rather than being in relation to your information request.
As Telecom did not receive your initial requests made earlier this year for access to the personal information it holds about you, I am satisfied it has not breached the Act by not responding to these requests.
I am also satisfied that Telecom has a proper basis under section 41 of the Act to seek an extension on responding to the information request which it received on 26 May 2010.
As such, I am satisfied that Telecom has not interfered with your privacy in relation to your request for information. However, please note that if Telecom does not provide you with a response within the extended timeframe, by 22 July 2010, or if you are dissatisfied with the response which Telecom provides, you may bring this matter to our attention.
Issue Two - Access to Your Personal Emails
The second aspect of your complaint relates to your concerns that Telecom had collected information from personal emails which you had sent from your work email address. You advised that you believed that Telecom had accessed your emails based on the fact that it had sent an email to you dated 6 April 2009 which asked for you to confirm that Mr Dick was acting for you. Mr Dick was also copied into this email.
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This aspect of your complaint raised possible issues in terms of principles 1-4 of the Act. These principles set out the obligations on agencies when they are collecting personal information, including what information they are allowed to collect, who they can collect personal information from, what they should tell people when they are collecting personal information, and the manner in which they can collect this personal information.
However in this case, Telecom has advised that it did not collect any information from your work email in the way in which you have alleged. Rather, Telecom has stated that Ms Dalzell’s comments regarding your confirmation as to whether Mr Dick was acting as your lawyer were based on a discussion she had had with you previously where you had advised her that Mr Dick was acting for you. Telecom has further advised that Ms Dalzell copied Mr Dick into her response on the basis that she was responding to an earlier email which you had sent to her that day at 9.l3am, which she had also copied Mr Dick into.
having mr dick pretend to be my lawyer was a deliberate trap to find out who was accessing my emails here is where she is lying if im setting a trap the very last thing i am going to do is tell the person about the trap it just wouldnt make sense
by her accessing the email she with the understanding at that piont in her own mind that nigel was my lawyer and by her own statement has breeched a principle in law called "legal professional privilege" this is the forth time in correspondance she has lied
i have highlighted this fact among other to the directors has they are respondible for the code of ethis with bridget has breach to have her adnmonished but they have neither replied or acknowledge so im in the process of taking the next step
Given the information provided by Telecom, I am not satisfied that you have provided us with sufficient evidence to demonstrate that Telecom did in fact collect information from personal emails which you had sent from your work email. As there is no evidence that your information was collected by Telecom in this way, I am satisfied that it has not interfered with your privacy in this case.
Additionally, I note that even if it was the case that Telecom had collected information from your work emails, this would be unlikely to raise issues in terms of principles 1-4 of the Act. This is on the basis that Telecom has clear guidelines in place regarding the use of its work emails. Telecom has provided us with a copy of these guidelines which clearly set out that while personal use of Telecom email systems is permitted, this system is subject to monitoring and inspection at any time to ensure compliance with the email guidelines. The guidelines clearly state that Telecom provides no guarantees to ensure email privacy and that all messages should be considered to be viewable by a third party. The guidelines go on to set out that Telecom reserves the right to monitor and inspect individual staff email activity for a number of reasons, including to ensure compliance with the email guidelines.
Finally, I note that you have raised concerns regarding a potential violation of trust between communications between a lawyer and client. This is something which is referred to as legal professional privilege, and is relevant to the Privacy Act as, for example, an agency may be entitled to withhold documents that involve correspondence between them and their lawyer on the basis that it would breach legal professional privilege if it was forced to disclose this information.
However, legal professional privilege only applies in situations where there is a communication between a lawyer and a client, or in limited situations another third party, and that communication has been made in confidence. I note that in this case, the communications which you have raised concerns about were not between you and your lawyer, rather it was a friend who does not actually appear to be a lawyer. Additionally, based on the clear guidelines set out by Telecom, it is clear that any communication made through the work email system was not confidential, due to the fact that Telecom reserve to the right to monitor work emails.
As I am not satisfied that Telecom did in fact collect information about you from your work emails, and given that it is likely they would have been entitled to under the Act due to their clear guidelines, I am satisfied that Telecom has not interfered with your privacy in relation to this aspect of your complaint.
Conclusion
For the reasons set out above, it is my preliminary view that Telecom has not interfered with your privacy. As this is a preliminary view, I am happy to consider any further comments you may wish to make. If you wish to comment please do so by 26 July 2010. If I do not hear from you by then we may proceed to form his final opinion regarding these aspects of your corn plaint.
Yours sincerely
Investigating Officer (Auckland)
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