C33/2002 BREACH OF PRIVACY - PIPS PC PROCESSING OF MARITAL SEPARATION

Purpose

The purpose of this Departmental Instruction is to;

•       Provide information to all States about a privacy breach resulting from an incorrectly processed marital separation case, and
•       Ask States to ensure that marital separations are being processed correctly within the State.

Background

A system problem was identified late last year, which meant that marital separation cases could not be processed in one action through PIPS PC. A system fix was implemented in February.

It has come to light that, between the time the fault was identified and fixed, a local practice of processing cases as illness separated assessments was introduced.  For staff who adopted this practice, instructions were given to readjust the assessment once the system fix was implemented.

The local practice did not include instructions to amend the CO.CO (Client correspondence) facility that can be used to request separate advice letters.

A breach of Privacy has occurred where the local practice failed to revert a case to the correct assessment type following the implementation of the system fix and advices were issued jointly.

Privacy Breach

In June each year, the Department undertakes a bulk mailout to issue approximately 350,000 households with advice letters to persons in receipt of a service pension, age pension or income support supplement.  The majority of these letters will include Payment Summaries for the end of the financial year.  For illness separated assessments, certificates are forwarded jointly to the veteran's address and include advice letters which may include Income/Asset statements for recipients on less than maximum rate.  In the case of marital separations however, automatically generated information is forwarded to the separate addresses of the couple.

Unfortunately a Privacy Breach has occurred where an illness separated assessment was not reverted to marital separation and the veteran was issued with all details for both he and his separated spouse.

Correct Processing Method

Marital separation cases should be processed through PIPS PC using the correct assessment type and not as illness separated.

Any states where alternative procedures may have been introduced should ensure that alternative practices are no longer followed and cases have been correctly assessed since the system fix was implemented.

As in the case detailed above, a breach of privacy can occur should incorrect processes be adopted.

System Problems

All system problems should be reported to the System Delivery Section through State System Support Officers as soon as they come to light.

Where States adopt local workaround practices, they must ensure that corrective action is taken once faults have been corrected.