Advice

[SlightlyfreakedouT1]

I was sacked this week. The week before I made a complaint to my boss that the company IT man had been logging onto my worktop whilst I was using it at home. My friends husband (who runs an IT company)confirmed this by looking at the logs for the remote access.

What I did not realise is that the IT man in question is my ex-bosses brother in law. I am unsure if this is a criminal offence or not and whether I should pursue it?

How long were you employed by the company? More than, or less than 2 years? If more than 2 years you have statutory employment rights which means they need to have gone through a proper disciplinary process before they can sack you.

What reason did they give you when they sacked you, what did they say you had done wrong?

I presume this is a company laptop we are talking about. Your contract and/or your employee handbook may well contain clauses allowing them to monitor your use of emails and the internet. Even if it does not it is not a criminal offence for them to monitor your laptop usage. It may be a data protection issue, however, so you can refer this to the Information Commissioner.

If you have been employed more than two years you have employment rights as daisychain01 says. Whether the dismissal was unfair depends on the reasons given and the process by which they arrived at the decision.

I was only employed for 9 months so I am aware that I can not take it to a tribunal. The laptop was a company one yes but I was never given a contact or shown any of the company policies. I used the laptop for music when I was in the shower and would sit in bed semi naked reading the news and what have you. I first became aware of the cursor moving without me touching the keyboard but how I found out was I was talking to my friend on a Google hangout and I noticed the Teamviewer app box pop up and then get minimised straight away. I started to tell my friend about the pervy IT man at work and the next thing a chat box appears in the middle of the screen and he wrote "it's purely a coincidence that I am on here at the same time as you I am performing updates. You can imagine I was rather startled. Closed the lap top, took it to my friends husband the next day and the last months Team viewer logs came up and he was basically on there every evening and at weekends. The box that required me to give permission for someone to access my laptop had been unchecked so that he did not have to get the code off me when he went on. I felt as though I had in effect had a modern day peeping tom in my house listening and watching everything that was going on without my knowledge. When I brought it up to my boss he looked embarrassed but didnt say anything about it. I went on holiday for a week and when I got back they sacked me on the spot saying that my figures didnt add up. This is a complete lie as from month 3 I had exceeded my sales target to the point to the point that he said I did not have to have a target as I was doing so well.
As well as vehicle tracking on company vehicles, he also had cameras covering every square inch of the building and recording devices. Apparently he would sit at home listening in to what everyone was saying. He never made me aware of this but staff who had worked there for a longer time told me to be careful what I said because of it.
Can I go to the police? Is it a criminal offence? When I told my boss I should add, he said that the IT guy had been doing 'maintenance'. I said I would be interested to know if he had been invoiced for all of that time to which he didnt reply but looked worried. What do you think?

I think your IT man is talking bollocks or is crap at his job. Most updates can be run automatically, and he should very rarely have to log on remotely to do anything - and if he does, it's good practice to tell the person whose device it is and get them to give permission every time it's needed.

Also, while I expect most employers do a certain level of surveillance, they should not be listening into every conversation, not as a matter of course. (It may happen as part of an HR investigation.)

Having said that, I would expect that company equipment could be subject to investigation at any time, and even if you haven't seen an IT use policy, the safest thing is do work stuff on work equipment and personal stuff on your own.

I'm not quite sure what the law is, but I suspect there is at least some blurring of lines. I'd want to be looking for a new job anyway, sacked or not.

Thank you, i missed a bit too, I phoned in sick on Tuesday (the first sickness i took) as I had an interview. It's possible that they read my private emails that I did log into from time to time on the works lap top. I didnt do anything that I would be ashamed of on there - I was simply reading the news or listening to music. I had no idea about the web cam thing though which is the bit that disturbs me the most. I feel like it was a massive invasion of privacy.

The surveillance and monitoring sounds more extreme than any company I've known (although they may be reacting to a security breech). But ultimately the laptop you were using to stream music is their property, so I'm afraid you're on shakey ground.

If the laptop had been your private property, used in your personal time (i.e. if your company had operated a Bring Your Own Device) then I expect you would have had a much stronger case.

As it stands they probably have a clause in their IT Policy/Handbook about the ability to use monitoring that they would use to justify their (admittedly draconian) monitoring methods.

Lessons learned, don't use work laptop for anything other than business use and always request the company's IT policy on company computer equipment - which is a contractual obligation nowadays - even if they don't offer it (surprising, its normally one of the first things companies discuss at induction, due to IT security risks).

Thank you, I know now. Feeling stupid.

If we used our work laptop for private email, streaming music etc we could lose our job.

The IT and equipment forms were given ti use when we signed our contract. Part of a whole host of forms, online courses we needes to complete.

The fact that you were using it for personal use means they could say they have reason for monitoring you to build a case for dismissal.

It could be turned into they were simply montioring you because you were misusing equipment. Then they discovered your numbers didnt add up so dismissed you for that, instead.

I am really surprised anyone doesnt know you shouldnt use work equipment for personal use. But lesson learnt. Hope your interview went well and you get a new job soon.

Are you saying that you think the IT guy used the remote access to turn on the webcam and so to see you semi-naked in your bedroom? Usually a light comes on next to a webcam but some software lets you run them without the light on.

This would be illegal surely.

The fact that you were using it for personal use means they could say they have reason for monitoring you to build a case for dismissal.

Yes, but you can monitor without actively being logged on and taking control, just as you can push out updates to run automatically. If your IT guy doesn't know how to do that, he's not very good at his job. I suspect he does know, but is just spying.

Our laptop cameras come on automatically with certain applications (e.g. instant messaging) - no light comes on. I was glad I discovered this before being on-call, where I sometimes work from bed.

I think he was definitely being a peeping tom. But trying to prove that especially when the OP was misusing company property is going to make it difficult to prove.

Im saying exactly that! For sure he could see and hear or definitely hear what I was saying on the Google hangout that day as he acknowledged it by popping up in the chat box. But for the fact that I had glimpsed the remote access box popping up and the being minimised I wouldn't have known he was there. When my friends husband checked the log the next day, he had been logged in for 45 minutes before he announced he was there. if, like he said, he was doing maintenance, I surely would have noticed abnormalities on my screen but I didn't? I am waiting to hear about the job interview and thank you.

Oh and I understand about using the laptop for private use but often I was doing work on it and my boss was fully aware of this.

You could also be in trouble for letting your friend's husband access the company laptop.

Working where I work, you breached all kinds of policies - letting someone else access work laptop is data protection breach, slagging off computer man, using work laptop for personal use and you lied to get time off for an interview.

This article is worth a read - www.theguardian.com/money/work-blog/2015/may/15/is-your-employer-allowed-to-watch-you

The challenge will be proving it, did you keep the logs? In your shoes I would be speaking to a solicitor for advice, as your discovery could be what led to your dismissal, which might then make it unfair. I'm not a legal person though. Might be worth posting a question on the legal board as well..

Also. We wouldn't be allowed to download things like google hangout without specific approval.

Many companies have policies that do permit personal use, so unless her company's policy said that it was not allowed, then I don't see that she has done anything wrong.

But surely letting someone else see the laptop and access it is a data protection breach if any personal information is held on it like names and addresses for example?

often I was doing work on it and my boss was fully aware of this.

Can you prove your post gave you permission to use the laptop for music streaming, chatting to friends, own email, allowing someome else outside the company to access it?

The OP says they have people under constant supervision. Its really extreme. I doubt that doesnt extend to laptops.

The point is i think the OP has been screwed. The company sounds awful. But pursuing this has a high chance of being unsuccessful, will perhaps look bad on the OP given her use of the laptop, be king and drawn out, stressful.....all for nothing in the end.

And add the fact that there is a realky goid chance they know she phoned in sick to go to an interview.

Its doeant look great on the OP.

Many companies have policies that do permit personal use, so unless her company's policy said that it was not allowed, then I don't see that she has done anything wrong.
This is true, so she doesn't have to prove it was allowed, the company has to prove there was a policy stating that it wasn't, AND that she had seen it (many companies have you signs to say you've seen it).
Monitoring is allowed to be proportionate, i cant believe there woukd ever be justification that would stand up legally, for a company monitoring everything you do, and recording sound in communal areas. Checking work emails for inappropriate content would generally be reasonable, but using your personale email login details to inspect private emails, when they allow you to use a work machine to check them, would not (i dont think its certain that this happened tho).

I don't think she needs to prove she had permission. This is not the issue, the issue is that her employer has been spying on her in her own home which is shocking. The more I think about this the more I think that this is a criminal offence and the OP might want to have a chat to the police for some advice. The police could then ask for the logs from the company to investigate, which they may not be able to produce of course as they will probably have deleted them.

I cannot believe people can be so accepting of this type of behaviour from an employer saying well you were using Spotify. The employer has potentially been listening into the OPs private conversations, seeing her after coming out of the shower and possibly hoping to see or hear her having sex with her partner.

I was never given any of the companies policies or even an induction. I knew that the emails were being monitored as sometimes they would comment on the content of something I had sent/received. I understand what you are saying about letting a third party have access to the laptop and I only did it to get confirmation that my suspicions that he had been logging in and out of an evening and weekend were correct. The guy who owns the company is a magistrate but he is actually as bent as a five bob note when it comes to the running of his business.

But you lied and took sick time off to go for an interview. That would be gross misconduct where I am.