Written By John R. Gilmore

There have been enumerable privacy seminars in recent months. Those that attended these seminars know that the Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) is now in force. While many may feel PIPAed to death already, many privacy seminars may have not noted a significant last minute amendment to PIPA.

Outside of the employment relationship, PIPA requires an individual's consent for any collection, use or disclosure of their personal information, prior to that collection, use or disclosure. Within the employment relationship, PIPA did not originally require an employer to obtain consent to collect, use or disclose any personal employee information, as long as the information was being used to administer (establish, manage or terminate) the employment relationship.

With the recent amendment, consent to collect, use or disclose personal employee information is now required, unless an employer, before collecting, using or disclosing the information, provides the employee with reasonable notification that the information is going to be collected, used or disclosed and the purposes for that collection, use or disclosure.

There is clearly a great deal of personal employee information that an employer collects, uses and discloses in administering the employment relationship, such as: benefit information, health information (including disability issues), performance evaluations (including discipline issues), banking information, employee contact information and salary information. Based on the recent amendment, employers will now have to notify employees of the intended purpose for the collection, use and disclosure of that information, prior to any such activity.

To comply with this recent amendment, Alberta employers should:

• review the personal employee information presently being collected, used and disclosed in administering the employment relationship;
• determine what notification(s) need to be implemented, which are necessary under PIPA. This notice does not have to be technical or elaborate and could be a simple restatement of what an employer is already doing in its collection, use and disclosure in the administration of the employment relationship;
• and implement the notifications.

The amendment is an important change to the originally proposed Bill 44. The original bill granted broad powers to employers to collect, use or disclose personal employee information in the employment relationship. The notification amendment balances employees' rights with those of employers. Access rights, and the inability of employers to charge fees for copying any employment documents, also balances the rights between employers and employees. Certainly, the amendments are consistent with the overall flavour of PIPA in attempting to balance an organization's ability to conduct its business with an individual's privacy rights.