Monitoring and security of staff

The right ways to monitor your staff

There are often good reasons to monitor and record information about staff movements and actions, eg security or proof of delivery. This monitoring may affect staff, and employment relations, in other ways, so it's important you let them know about it. The Data Protection Act 1998 sets out principles for monitoring staff:

• Staff must know they are being monitored, what data is being collected and for what purpose it is being kept.  Download a quick guide to the Employment Practices Code from the Information Commissioner website (PDF) . Covert (or unannounced or hidden) monitoring is only likely to be justified if there is reason to suspect serious criminal or equivalent malpractice and where telling the individuals about the monitoring would be likely to prejudice its prevention or detection.
• Include monitoring policies in your workers' contractual terms and alert them to these when they start work. However, this is not an explicit requirement of the Act.
• The benefits must justify the negative effect of intrusion.
• Interception of communications , ie checking telephone calls, faxes, emails and letters, can be unlawful. It is legitimate only if all reasonable efforts have been made to inform potential users that interceptions may be made, and for certain purposes where it is necessary or relevant to the business, eg ensuring compliance with self-regulatory practices, preventing or detecting crime and checking whether communications are relevant to the business if an employee is away from work.  Find information on the Lawful Business Practice Regulations at the DTI website .
• Don't access anything that is clearly private or personal where personal use of electronic communications is permitted. Monitoring should be proportionate to your business' needs. Monitoring of clearly personal emails or communications will only be justified in exceptional circumstances.
• Methods that cause significant intrusion , eg staff searches, are justified only if your business is at serious risk. Discuss methods with staff or trade unions.

Other ways of monitoring

You could consider less intrusive ways of monitoring, for example spot checks or checks on stored emails rather than continuous monitoring. You can also try using an automated system of checking.

Subjects covered in this guide

• Introduction
• Why you might monitor your staff and what monitoring includes
• When an employer is allowed to monitor staff
• Set up monitoring policies
• The right ways to monitor your staff
• The laws and penalties for improper monitoring
• Checklist of monitoring issues
• Staff security - your responsibilities as an employer