AIBU to make a complaint?

[confidentialitybreach]

I had a private scan booked for when I was 10 weeks pregnant and due to there being issues at their end it was cancelled the day before - annoying but nothing I can do on that part.
But, when the appointment was cancelled I was notified by email and this email was not just sent to me but looked to be sent to everyone who had been cancelled for that day. So I could see all of their email addresses and them mine.

Am I right in thinking that this is GDPR breach? This would be a serious issue if it was NHS so why should it be different for private and I don’t think it should just be left. There are women who don’t want others to know they are pregnant or could be attending and expecting bad news and as we are a small town anyway i could easily have recognised someone.

So should I make a complaint about this? I don’t want to be that person but it’s been niggling away at me.

Yes. Definitely complain. That's awful

That is a terrible way to operate! Perhaps it was an error and the names were supposed to be part of a group, but it needs to not happen again.

It's really no different to this case

www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-36247186

Yes, report it - you'd be within your rights to report to the ICO.

Holy shit! Yes, complain, and report to ICO.

As you say, there's many reasons why people don't want pregnancies to be general knowledge.

Yes, report them to the ICO, that's bang out of order. The ICO helpline is on 0303 123 1113.

I would raise it with the clinic before dashing off to report it to the ICO.
If they note their mistake, apologise and assure you they won’t do it again, then job done; if they claim to have done nothing wrong and/or intend to continue with the mass email approach, then that’s the time to escalate the issue.

Yes, complain and report to ICO and the local press too. It's obviously a simple error, not pasting the list into the BCC field, but it must be reported to prevent them doing it again.

Send an email of complaint copying in all the other recipients of the cancellation email. See what the response is.

Don’t copy in all the other recipients, that’s just making the situation worse!

You can complain to the ICO but in reality they won’t do anything. You should definitely complain to the clinic though. It’s probably just human error but they need to be aware in case additional GDPR training is needed.

@ChainJane

Yes, complain and report to ICO and the local press too. It's obviously a simple error, not pasting the list into the BCC field, but it must be reported to prevent them doing it again.

Local press?

Get a grip

@ChessieFL

Don’t copy in all the other recipients, that’s just making the situation worse!

You can complain to the ICO but in reality they won’t do anything. You should definitely complain to the clinic though. It’s probably just human error but they need to be aware in case additional GDPR training is needed.

Yes to all of this

Some admin has made a mistake. A big mistake but they clearly need refresher training

The clinic should report themselves to the ICO but you could do that anyway

Having known someone do something similar, she was devastated at her mistake and had a verbal warning too

As for that poster saying go to the local press. Please don't. People that do that rarely come out of it well