This is a long winded explanation and question but I would be
grateful for opinions:
I work in a student advice service. We have been reviewing our
processes for some months now to ensure compliance with the dp
act.
Student applies to us for money (we fundraise for stus with financial
difficulties). In order to assess "his" application we must have
details of his partner's (usually a spouse) income. We also process
details of partner's name, nationality, immigration status. We would
ask for details of numbers of children and ages. We need all the
third party data in order to process the application. We would
probably disclose to the spouse if "she" requested the info being
held on her although by implication this would confirm that her
spouse had applied to us for money, so we would judge each case
as it came along. The situation becomes complicated where both
the couple are students. Our client, usually the man, might need to
give us his spouse's student number so that we can check whether
or not she has any debts within the University. In the past we have
just gone ahead and done this. The University would supply us with
the info. (We work in the SU but are on joint contracts with the
University. The University inform students at registration that their
data might be passed to us for casework purposes.) I'm getting
increasingly concerned about this and wonder if we should just
insist on seeing both partners so that both are aware of what we are
doing and what data we are holding on them. This would add to the
bureacracy of a system which students already sometimes find
lengthly and intrusive. Unfortunately many of them don't understand
our need to check what they tell us.
Thanks in advance for any thoughts on this.
Diane Pedder
Welfare Services
Leeds University Union
Tel 0113 231 4277
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