How bad is this mistake

[SuePream]

Just wondering if I am being irrationally angry or not about this.

Currently selling my old family home after death of parents last year. I instructed the solicitors recommended by the estate agent - they had thousands of great reviews online so all good.

As it is a probate sale I had to send the originals of certain documents to the solicitors - deeds of probate, death certificates and my own ID. All very private information. Solicitor told me they would return these by registered post on 22 December, which was their last working day until 4 January. Today I had a knock on the door from my neighbour who said that a letter had been sent to their address by mistake a couple of days ago and they had opened it. They didn't recognise the name on it (it's my birth name, which nobody knew until now).

The solicitor had sent my original documents plus a letter about the progress of the sale to the wrong address. The neighbours are 12 Wrong Road and I am 12a Wrong Road. The neighbours only realised it must be for me when they saw the correct address on the deeds of probate and saw my photo ID, so they clearly read through the documents.

We have had numerous issues with these neighbours in the past and give them an extremely wide berth. I am sitting here horrified that they have been given access to so much personal information about me, my parents, the house I am selling, the size of my parents' estate, how they died etc etc.

What would you do about this? Complain or let it go as it's just human error? Ask to swap to a different solicitor?

It is a minor slip up
There are bigger things in life

If you complain they may well say that they no longer want to act for you, and you will have to start again

Humans make errors, have you never made an error at work? Sent an email to the wrong person? Copied all by mistake?

I'd check your original contract with them did that have wrong add on . Normally there a clue asking you to check and correct it.

Realistically all the would happen is legal secretary would get bollocking or fired is that what you want .

@thosetalesofunexpected

Hi Op You need to play holy hell.! (Read Riot Act with this solicitors office and the Royal mail office too.!!! Its Clearly a very serious Data protection Breach.!!! If Anything because of their Profession Status,/handling very sensitive infor on regular basis.

Solicitors/support staff there, should be even more so of high exacting standards.

Royal Mail office
Also Were at fault too,if this mail was sent by speacial recorded delivery,?(Why on earth was it pushed through your neighbours door???
This should never happened.!!!
p.s (Are you entitled to small compensation in any way,for the distress this has caused you family.???

You should at least receive letters of apologises from the solicitors office of estate and of course Royal mail office.

Wow, that's a very excited post, and really compensation for distress?

but the fault is with your neighbours.. - the Postal Act 2000 says it is an offence to open mail you believe is not intended for you (and it clearly did not have their name on it, so it doesn't matter that it had their addtess).

I think the key is opening mail you don’t believe is intended for you. This would rule out 99% of incorrectly opened mail.

Seriously, who gets each piece of mail and looks to see it’s definitely addressed to them before opening religiously and without fail? I just get a pile and rip it all open. Disclaimer there is DH seemingly has an allergy to opening mail and if I don’t open his it would never be opened. I certainly have his permission, he wants nothing more than someone else to take care of it. Occasionally I read something and think ‘huh, that’s so weird, doesn’t make sense at all’ and then have a look at address and/or pile of envelopes and it’s invariably not for us. Once had a wedding invitation for people neither of us knew and after much memory wracking and head scratching I went to the bin, went through the envelopes and found one addressed to neighbours at neighbours address so that solved that mystery. I don’t have time to be anal over mail, a 30sec rip open and eyeball of pile so I rely on things because no addressed and delivered correctly. I believe everything delivered is intended for us and occasionally get surprised.

For the love of God these threads are always so infuriating. The legal secretary will not get fired, I can assure you the firm will have breached several times if not this year, than this month, it's incredibly common. People do not get fired for small data breaches, they usually don't even get fired or disciplined for big ones if it isn't malicious!

Make the complaint, you well within your rights to, it is useful for the firm, they need to document it, (they won't threaten to not represent you 🙄)

It most likely won't need to go to the ICO, you will look ridiculous if you demand they report themselves.

If you dont know data protection law, the best thing is to just raise your grievances, see how the firm responds, if you don't feel their response is satisfactory the ICO website has a lot of information, last resort you can complain to them, but they will not read your complaint until you have tried to deal with the company directly first.

Not helpful to the OP, but it is not an offence, if people quoting the Postal Services Act actually read it, you'll see that 'reasonable excuse' allows you to open mail with your address on as it is 'reasonable' to do so.

Your neighbours (even if you don't like them) did nothing wrong - something arrived at their house with their address and an unrecognized name. They opened it and returned the documents to you.

The solicitors and possibly the Royal Mail are at fault. I completely understand why are are upset, but the documents can't be unseen. I would speak to your solicitors and see how they respond.

Just ring the solicitor and tell them fgs.

All the froth over opening the mail is wrong. I don’t always look addresses, if the envelope is upside down for eg.

Report them to the ico if you want but they are overwhelmed at present, it’ll be months before someone comes back to you and the most that will halogen is they’ll tell the firm to check addresses more carefully.

Not sure why your actual name is such a secret. Surely it’s on your passport, driving licence?

[quote Soontobe60]@MissLucyEyelesbarrow
It is an offence.

‘The Postal Services Act 2000 section 84 states: "A person commits an offence if, without reasonable excuse, he - (a)intentionally delays or opens a postal packet in the course of its transmission by post, or (b) intentionally opens a mail-bag."

It also says that: "A person commits an offence if, intending to act to a person’s detriment and without reasonable excuse, he opens a postal packet which he knows or reasonably suspects has been incorrectly delivered to him."

It continues: "A person who commits an offence under subsection (1) or (3) shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to both."[/quote]
Section 84(1) is about interfering with mail in transit. If it applied to mail that has been misdelivered, section 84(3) would be redundant. MissLucyEyelesbarrow is correct. It is not an offence to open mail that has been delivered to you incorrectly unless you intend to act to a person's detriment and don't have a reasonable excuse,

Not sure why your actual name is such a secret. Surely it’s on your passport, driving licence? I wondered this too (sheer nosiness being honest!) Do you mean like your birthname was Sue Bloggs and now you're married and it's Sue Peam or that your birth name was something completely different like Betty Bloggs and no one knows this?

Thanks so much for the replies.

My birth name is Jane Smith and my current name is Sue Pream due to a new start and moving several boroughs to go NC with certain people.

I agree that this is all readily available information online (if you pay for it) but would have to be searched for individually and it would be very unlikely for everything to be linked together if it hadn't been sent in the same envelope. I absolutely don't blame the neighbours for opening it and it was good of them to return it to me really as someone else might have panicked and thrown it away.

I have made the odd work error in my time of course but I can honestly say I would check the address numerous times before returning originals to clients. I don't want to get anyone fired but this is a really shoddy and upsetting mistake, and they were at the high end of quotes I received.

Sorry but your neighbours are the ones in the wrong here. I used to live at say 1 main road, but there was also a block of flats which were say 1, main road house, main road. The post got muddled all the time and I would t have dreamt of opening it.

@thosetalesofunexpected

Hi Op You need to play holy hell.! (Read Riot Act with this solicitors office and the Royal mail office too.!!! Its Clearly a very serious Data protection Breach.!!! If Anything because of their Profession Status,/handling very sensitive infor on regular basis.

Solicitors/support staff there, should be even more so of high exacting standards.

Royal Mail office
Also Were at fault too,if this mail was sent by speacial recorded delivery,?(Why on earth was it pushed through your neighbours door???
This should never happened.!!!
p.s (Are you entitled to small compensation in any way,for the distress this has caused you family.???

You should at least receive letters of apologises from the solicitors office of estate and of course Royal mail office.

I sometimes think the more exclamation marks there are in a post, the less notice anyone should take of it.

It was an administrative error. The solicitors need to know it happened and must ensure it doesn't happen again.

I have made the odd work error in my time of course but I can honestly say I would check the address numerous times before returning originals to clients

You'd be very inefficient if you checked an address numerous times before posting a letter. That would get you the sack!

You acknowledge you have made errors, as have we all. Let the sols know and move on.

Yes I would most certainly get the sack if I spent an extra minute checking that a client address on a letter was the same as the one on my file, their ID and the documents I was sending back to them, rather than not bothering to check so I could finish up early for Christmas.

@Palavah

12/12a might ne an easy mistake but it is not one I would expect a solicitors' firm to make. Irrelevant whether it's a lawyer or admin error.

Second PP asking them to report themselves to the ICO.

Me too, it is a serious breach and the firm should take this very seriously themselves.

@Tier4billion

Sorry but your neighbours are the ones in the wrong here. I used to live at say 1 main road, but there was also a block of flats which were say 1, main road house, main road. The post got muddled all the time and I would t have dreamt of opening it.

But it had the neighbours' correct address on it and the name of someone they hadn't heard of. How were the neighbours supposed to know where to take it if they didn't open it?

Oh come off it - if you’re at 12 and there’s a 12a you’d say “is this for you”?

[quote Soontobe60]@MissLucyEyelesbarrow
It is an offence.

‘The Postal Services Act 2000 section 84 states: "A person commits an offence if, without reasonable excuse, he - (a)intentionally delays or opens a postal packet in the course of its transmission by post, or (b) intentionally opens a mail-bag."

It also says that: "A person commits an offence if, intending to act to a person’s detriment and without reasonable excuse, he opens a postal packet which he knows or reasonably suspects has been incorrectly delivered to him."

It continues: "A person who commits an offence under subsection (1) or (3) shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to both."[/quote]
Er, can't you read? The section that you have quoted applies to a postal packet in the course of its transmission or to a mail-bag.

A letter that has been delivered is not in transmission, nor is it a mail-bag. If section 84 applied to letters that had been delivered, it would - on your reading of it - be an offence to open your own post.

You have also ignored the important caveat of "without reasonable excuse".

If you don't believe me, try spending 2 minutes on Google or applying a bit of common sense.

@Tier4billion

Oh come off it - if you’re at 12 and there’s a 12a you’d say “is this for you”?

Why would they do that if it was addressed to someone they had never heard of (as it's not the name they know the OP by)? Why on Earth would they assume it was intended for the OP, as opposed to someone who had previously lived at number 12 or a different address entirely? As they know the current name of the OP, it's more likely that they would have assumed it definitely wasn't for her until they opened it.

Because Op may have had mail being delivered to her for a friend, a family member etc.
As I say I used to have this a lot due to an unusual address and the first port of call would always be to ask the similar address If it was theirs.

It's categorially not illegal to open post without malicious intent...

And it's also not unusual to open post that is delivered to your address with someone elses' name on it. If it happens often, you'd get into the habit of asking the other address, perhaps - but most people are more likely to either not notice the name and open the envelope, or to see the name, wonder why a stranger is getting post sent to their house, and open it to see what it is. You'd likely be thinking more that your address was being used for something dodgy then that it'd been misdelivered, especially if you know your neighbour as Pam Smith and the letter is for Rachel Jones.

That said, it is an error, and although it's likely just a human mistake, it's reportable. I'd ask the solicitors if they are intending to report themselves to the ICO, and if not, you can do it.

I wouldn't expect anything from it, though. A bank gave my new address to a violent ex, accidentally... they were writing to me to confirm that they'd keep the address secret and not disclose it to anyone to keep me safe from him, and accidentally sent it to him. The bank offered me £50 and then £150. The ICO took the case, it took them seven months to investigate and then they decided that it was human error which likely had caused me stress and inconvience but they wouldn't be taking it any further due to lack of manpower... and that was before COVID.

@SendMeHome I remember your thread - that was awful.

You say you have issues with the neighbour. They could have chucked it all in the bin but they gave it to you. Quite helpful I think

I would point out to solicitor the address mistake and ask to make sure all future post is addressed correctly.

As for opening I never really look before opening and have accidentally opened post put wrongly through my door and did as your neighbour has done taken it to them and apologised, they could of binned it.

There is another house in my town with the same name as mine. We are constantly getting each other’s post and very often open it as you do when your just presented with a pile of letters. I’ve received bank statements, mortgage statements, the lot over the years and they’ve probably got the same for me. It’s a bit irritating but just one of those things that occasionally happen. I couldn’t get worked up over it - nothing bad happened, you got your stuff back, all the info was publicly available anyway. Just let the solicitors know they’ve got your address wrong and carry on with life.