New Deal: YMCA Training discloses confidential information to tracking statistic firm

Posted on July 14th, 2009.

Post Categories: Dencora House Detention Centre • Ipswich • New Deal • YMCA Training
Tags: learner survey, QDP services, YMCA Training

YMCA Training has, without their New Deal participants consent, sent their contact details to some statistics company who has contacted them asking to complete an anonymous survey on the YMCA Training New Deal courses.

This company, however, uses a unique tracking code to check up on who said what – not anonymous – and the letter contained details advising the person taking the survey that they wouldn’t be able to be traced.

YMCA Training & Information

YMCA Training gets its data on New Deal participants directly from the Jobcentre. They do request information via another form filled in by the participant as procedure even though they already have it. None of these forms have a disclaimer mentioning about they could use information to contact you after the course for statistical purposes or for any other reasons.

In fact, apart from basic information such as your name and training centre (and of course the documents kept for audit but kept at a different place confidentially) after the New Deal course they should not have any of your personal details on file.

So how can they send you a survey a few months later?

Who sent it?

The frank stamp on the envelope clearly states Macclesfield in Cheshire however YMCA Training doesn’t have an office in Macclesfield and the CEO is in Banbury: so how did you receive it?

They sent without your permission, your personal details to a company called Q D P Services.  Ironically a quick Google search of the name confirms that the registered office for Q D P Services is “QDP Services, Head Office 2nd Floor Newbridge House, Henderson Street, Macclesfield, Cheshire, SK11 6RA”.

The letter

Thanks to the benefits of OCR we have an exact textual copy of the letter sent without having to type it out. The name, address and tracking code is faked if you wondered the rest remains “as is”.

June 2009

Joe Bloggs
34 White House Road
Ipswich
IP1 5LU

Z1234

Dear Learner,

Learner Survey 2008-2009

YMCA Training is committed to continually improving its services and training practices. As part of this commitment, it is very important to us to receive feedback from all our learners about their experience with us.

You are receiving this questionnaire because you recently finished or left a course with YMCA Training, and this is your chance to express your views. A questionnaire is enclosed for you to complete. Your feedback will help to improve provision for future learners.

YMCA Training has asked QDP Services to manage this process on our behalf. QDP Services is an independent data processing agency and has managed similar surveys for other organisations efficiently. It is important that you can express your views honestly and QDP are able to guarantee that your responses are confidential and cannot be attributed to you. Your feedback and observations are really valuable and will be collated into overall reports which give us important information to help us improve our services.

Please complete the questionnaire and return it using the pre paid envelope by 31 July 2009 to QDP Services.

Thank you for taking the time to help us improve for the future.

Yours faithfully,

Anne Linsey
Chief Executive

Some concerns with the letter:

1. It is a letter with a logo of YMCA Training at the top right hand side – this is illegal. As a limited company details such as the address, company registration number and other contact details have to be visible.
2. This was sent out by Q D P Services and NOT YMCA Training – this is misleading.
3. Under the address is a tracking code, this is on every page of the survey TWICE minus the prefixed letter
4. The letter gives the opinion that this was sent from YMCA Training and you are giving your consent by mailing it to another address for process by another company – when in fact they already have your details.
5. I would like to quote this: “It is important that you can express your views honestly and QDP are able to guarantee that your responses are confidential and cannot be attributed to you.” This isn’t true – you have clearly been found out – sorry for that. There clearly is a link!
6. It states “Dear Learner” even though they have your full name – learn how to mail merge properly!

The survey

On every page a line of tracking codes are visible:

Some code        Page Number       Tracking code    Tracking Code

The first code keeps the first digit on all pages while the second is the page number.

Page number obviously increases.

Two lots of tracking codes (don’t ask me why) the same on the letter minus the letter in front.

So for example:

Page 1:         61     1     1234    1234
Page 2:         62     2     1234    1234
Page 3:        63     3     1234    1234
Page 4:        64     4     1234    1234

Isolated problem or do most New Deal providers do it?

There are already a survey after each “module” you have to complete so why can’t they hand you out this survey while you are there and ask you to send it off?

Please leave a comment if your New Deal provider also uses Q D P Services or another business for statistics and sends out unauthorised mailings to you after your New Deal provider breached your personal information they should no longer hold.

If you have YMCA Training and you also received this survey please tell us about it.

Next steps?

First thing I would do is write to Q D P Services using their prepaid envelope to complain and also sticking some leaflets you get through the door so it costs them more. I would then complain to the Jobcentre. I would then complain to YMCA Training.

Make a Comment

16 Responses to “New Deal: YMCA Training discloses confidential information to tracking statistic firm”

1. 1

   

   Funny A4e photos says:
   

   July 14th 2009 at 11:33 pm  

   This is a clear breach of the 1998 Data Protection Act.

2. 2

   

   Lowestoft's Finest says:
   

   July 15th 2009 at 4:52 pm  

   This is nothing by Lowestoft YMCA New Deal Data protection standards. I was recently forced to endure a 13 week New Deal ordeal at YMCA Regent Road, Lowestoft and their Data protection is non existant. A set lesson is to have the class split into two groups each participant then has to hand in a copy of their own CV and state their first choice of job, they are then handed to the other group and each participent has to write a speculative letter for who ever they gets job choice then find them a relevant company to send it to, then along with that persons CV they are then posted off to the company, all of which without anybody’s permission. Not only is this illegal but it is a total disaster for the person who had the letter sent for them as you could be contacted by a company and won’t have the foggiest idea what the other person said especialy as they would have no knoledge of what your field of work entailed, this leaves you with some serious explaing to an employer as to what has been going on. To make matters worse I discoverd that the person who had been allocated my name had been working his way through the local yellow pages contacting relevant employers on the phone for me totaly without my permission. especialy as I had contacted them all already so you can imagine the problems.

3. 3

   

   Ipswich Unemployed Action says:
   

   July 15th 2009 at 6:39 pm  

   Sounds like an ICO issue. You should report it to the Information Commissioners Office and keep us in the loop about their responses. A quote from their site:

   Under the Data Protection Act, those who collect and use personal information have to follow rules of good practice for handling information (called the data protection principles). The Act also gives rights to individuals whose information they collect and use.

   How do I know if my problem is a data protection problem?

   You might have a data protection problem if any of the following apply to you:

   You have been denied any of your rights, including your right to see the personal information an organisation holds about you.

   Personal information about you is used, held or disclosed:

   unfairly
   for a reason that is not the one it was collected for, or
   without proper security.

   Personal information about you is:

   inadequate, irrelevant or excessive
   inaccurate or out of date, or
   kept for longer than is necessary.

   Before you complain to us

   First, tell the organisation concerned and give it an opportunity to put things right. Many data protection problems can be solved quickly without us getting involved. You can call our helpline on 08456 306060 or 01625 545745 for advice to help you to solve the problem.

   Their web address: http://www.ico.gov.uk or http://www.ico.gov.uk/complaints/data_protection.aspx

4. 4

   

   Lowestoft's Finest says:
   

   July 15th 2009 at 10:13 pm  

   Hi, by way of an update to my previous post I can confirm that as I had such high feelings there and then that what I was being asked to partake in was both illegal and could have legal future legal fallout for those concerned I spoke to the member of YMCA staff hosting the exercise along with the member of the other group who had been advised to do my application and me his. Both me and the other participant were so anti the idea of each others applications being sent off without permission we both agreed between ourselves not to seal the envelopes and hand them to each other afterwards, so they didn’t enter the postal system without our permission, When making my views clear to the member of YMCA staff I was told that this was an actual YMCA lesson plan and not something they had personally dreamt up for a lesson. I also pointed out that I had past experience of working for the Postal Service and what was going on hear is totally illegal. The end result was as we created such a stink both mine and my fellow participant’s applications weren’t sent off as we refused to actually send them, though unfortunately everyone else’s were sent off. It would be interesting to know just how wide spread and how long this lesson has been used at YMCA, and why hadn’t any warning bells been heard over its obvious illegality before then?

5. 5

   

   Ipswich Unemployed Action says:
   

   July 15th 2009 at 10:22 pm  

   I am still not any the wiser what the purpose of this was. I think that sometimes it helps for someone to advise what to write as a personal statement as a lot of people find it hard to write positive stuff about themselves. But, this is absolutely silly!

   Ironically, If I didn’t post about this statistics scam then we would have never found out about this.

6. 6

   

   jane says:
   

   July 19th 2009 at 11:26 pm  

   im on new deal an as im old like 57 worked all my life was told i need a cv went to pertemps as i was told wold help me get on all i di was sit at a table lookin for jobs in paper and webb hat i can do with out goverment paying them to do well some one is makeing money out off it and its not us

7. 7

   

   A Friend says:
   

   May 11th 2010 at 8:27 am  

   Be warned. I have found out that TNG RIP YMCA & A4E now know about and monitor this site. The latest ploy at rip is to phone you at home and call you in for a job interview [screening by the above staff] and you find out it is just a mock interview with a look at a placement not a job. You get called at 03.15pm and are aske to be back by 4.00pm for the interview. This is a punishment to try and get as many people into placements as they can so we don’t spend time on the internet looking at this and affilliated sites. Also rumour they are going to have Ipswich Unemployed Action site taken down. {Overheard their conversations-did not know I was in the computer room area at the time].

   • 8

     

     Flexible New Deal says:
     

     May 11th 2010 at 10:39 pm  

     Cheers… lol A4e has been working on that day one…. failed miserably.

     YMCA knows about the site and had great difficulty blocking people accessing it and printing it out at Dencora House.

     TNG… not sure – they are aware of the website as we tipped them off (Avanta website marketing department or whatever they call themselves) about the fact they couldn’t spell “success”.

     RIP are very upset about the site too I think.

     This said to date I have not received a single letter demanding the site to be taken down. Funny that. They are welcome to block the websites – people can access them elsewhere and are more likely to spend more time researching the content – everything is factual and fair. A4e and the like use specific marketing tools where they find out whats been said on the web – while others use Google Alerts.

8. 9

   

   Ipswich Unemployed Action says:
   

   July 15th 2009 at 12:23 pm  

   Yes – two main points I like to raise are:

   1) YMCA Training should no longer keep your details so long after the course ended.

   2) Knowing of this breach, they have decided to make it appear that only they have your details and the survey being anonymous. When in fact, they already have sent your details to a third party without consent.

9. 10

   

   Kyron says:
   

   May 12th 2010 at 7:37 am  

   Hi IpswichI would try and contact the information commissioner this isa clear breach. run with it and the complaintas far as you can

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