Vetting and Monitoring Employees A Guide for HR Practitioners

Most employers will at some time need to monitor, record and read e-mails sent and received by their staff, or check on their employees' use of the telephone and internet, or access business correspondence received at work but addressed to a member of staff. There may also be clear cases where covert surveillance either by video camera or private investigators is considered as a means to collect evidence of criminal activity on site. The law in this area is complex and, in some cases, contradictory. Gillian Howard aims to set out the law clearly and give practical guidance, both to employers as to their legal rights, and to employees as to what safeguards to their privacy the law gives them. She provides precedents and useful examples of policies and procedures for monitoring employees at work. Vetting staff before taking them into employment can be equally fraught with legal issues. The Data Protection Act 1998 requires employers to obtain explicit consent from an employee before seeking and using certain sensitive information. This book gives guidance in this difficult area of employment law with practical advice, precedents and policies, and details of legal interpretations of the law by the Courts and Employment Tribunals.

Contents: Introduction; The law on monitoring telephone calls and emails and internet regulation; Monitoring telephone calls; Discipline and dismissing employees; Harassment, diversity and pornography; Covert surveillance and Data Protection; Data Protection and Freedom of Information; Human rights and monitoring employees; Pre-employment checks and references; Defamation and the internet; Email and internet policies and procedures; Appendices: Policy documents; Index.

Gillian Howard is an employment lawyer, specialising in employment law, personal injury and medical negligence. She has both corporate and individual clients and has a wide-ranging practice in both contentious and non-contentious work. She represents clients at tribunals as well as advising and drafting on company policies and procedures. She is author of many publications, including Tolley's Drafting Contracts of Employment and Fitness for Work - Medical Aspects, published by Oxford University Press. She regularly writes articles in HR and medical journals. She appears on the TV and radio on employment law issues. She is an Honorary Fellow of the Faculty of Occupational Medicine, Royal College of Physicians and Honorary Senior Lecturer at the Institute of Occupational Medicine at the University of Birmingham.