The ICO are concerned that insufficient systems may be in place for staff to deal properly with subject access requests (SARs) under the Data Protection Act 1998 and have published some top tips to help organisations. 46% of all complaints made to the ICO last year were about SARs and the difficulties people face getting hold of their personal information. The figures show the importance of making sure staff are fully equipped to deal with requests. ICO have set out top tips from its recent SAR webinar to help organisations. These are well worth reading, particularly bearing in mind that in a recent ET case, McWilliams v Citibank NA, part of the ET’s reasoning for finding that a dismissal was unfair was that the employer refused to respond to the Claimant’s SAR which substantially restricted her ability to respond meaningfully to allegations of misconduct.

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