Personal Email on Previous Employer Email Account

SpecialTrooper

I left my employer, a university, at short notice through a settlement agreement just before Christmas (politics). The employer has 'locked' email account on last day of employment and it remains active. Unlike other universities, there was no warning or email notification that it would be inaccessible. There is no out of office and as an academic it was legitimate to use the account for personal/other academic duties through contract e.g. editor or external examining (as outlined in the policy). I imagine contacts throughout the world are sending emails and not receiving answers or know that I have left. Is there any legal method by which I can access those 'personal' emails and insist an out of office reply is given or the account closed? I have no problem in the emails being vetted and the University is being difficult about me accessing the account / obstructive? I understand they don't need to offer the account, but at the moment it seems odd that its active and yet I can't deal with the non-university activity such as external examining which will cause reputational damage both to the university and myself. Any thoughts very welcome. I wondered whether I could use a Special Access Request under the DP legislation?

Dox

I think you may mean a Subject Access Request? It won't solve the problem because the university will only be required to confirm the data it holds on you, why, and to whom the information is disclosed.


You can't insist on an out of office message or access to what you consider personal e-mails. If you're an academic without contacts 'throughout the world', then presumably you are sufficiently high profile for news of your departure to spread fairly quickly. If not, then make sure your LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and any other social media accounts you might have give that information. Presumably most people with your e-mail will also have your mobile or some other means to contact you once they realise they aren't getting replies?

I presume you've tried an ultra-polite approach pointing out your concerns, both for you and the university's reputation?

fwor

Unfortunately, this is something that you need to plan as part of your "exit strategy". Trying to force them to help you after the event probably won't work - if they own the domain, they hold all of the cards. If they wanted an excuse not to cooperate, they could simply say that allowing you to continue to access an official .ac email address would give the false appearance that you are still a member of staff at a UK university.

As above, asking nicely might help, but I suspect that they won't want to set a precedent that they would then have to refuse to others.

getmore4less

This is something that should have been in the settlement agreement.

why was it not included?

Don't you have a copy of the contacts list that you can use to update everyone with your new status.

Why was this not done before you left?

Might make sense to set up your own professional account for those contacts.

SpecialTrooper

Thanks for the replies.

Yes, I did mean Subject Access Request - sorry it was late when I wrote the post.

Yes, I have all the contacts etc, and have posted on Linkedin etc and I did have an exit strategy. It was also in the settlement agreement, but of course it turns out that they want to change the email address post-settlement and refuse access to the orginal email adddress - something that is unknown of my experience having wworked at several unis. Normally, as is one recent place it says you account will be closed on 28 days, 7 days, etc, but here no obvious policy and just switch off.

Also I was interested in the emails arrived after I left related to the non-university business, e.g. external examining etc. I wanted to be careful about saying I left as of course when you do a settlement agreement in a week, you don't have another job to go to.

I tried very hard to be constructive, polite, helpful under difficult circumstances and it seems that either the machine or others don't want to help becuase I suspect the fear culture that existed there.

I'd rather they just closed the email rather than let people send information... is might be hard to fight, but there does seem an injustice here that they can give the impression I am still there with an active email, but I can't do anything.

getmore4less

What is in the settlement agreement about email access?

if it allowed you access then ask the legal representative you used what you need to do and if they have broken the agreement and if they have does it make it all void.

you did get independent legal advice?

SpecialTrooper

Yes, I did get independent legal advice. I was trying to avoid the legal road for a while and work through issues, but of course, the change of email address was not foreseen as the settlement agreement said access to email, etc. but no specific email address was mentioned. I guess it was implied/assumed it would remain the same. After all, why would you assume that another 'alias' would be created?

Undervalued

The last time I saw something like this in the academic field part of the agreement was to allow continued email access for a defined period of time (3 or 6 months, can't remember). An automatic response was put on the account saying "XX has now left the university, if your email is university related please resend to YY. If it is for XX personally, please resend to XX@XX.com.

Basically the agreement was that XX could access the account to tidy things up but wouldn't continue to use it other that to advise people of the change.

I understood that sort of arrangement was fairly normal in the academic field so I would suspect it is more an oversight rather than a deliberate desire to be difficult.

getmore4less

If the email address has gone then any new messages to that should bounce.

If they are just forwarding them to a new account then you should have access to everything that has arrived using the original address.

SpecialTrooper

Thanks, yes it is conventional to continue which is why I find my current circumstances so frustrating. It is not an oversight as I have for the past four weeks corresponded on the matter in most constructive way and all I get is that it needs to be referred by Legal (they blame GDPR) and I have suggested to keep the same email address (and again 'its not normal practice').

The email hasn't gone, its just 'locked' so I cannot access. In all other respects, it is working and I have sent test messages to see what happens. I don't believe any email is being forwarded.

jonnygee2

If you're an academic without contacts 'throughout the world', then presumably you are sufficiently high profile for news of your departure to spread fairly quickly

Most academics have some sort of an international network. It doesn't make you Noam Chomsky!

@OP can you not just contact everyone you can think of on linkedin / send them emails saying you've moved? Either that, or you need to try and remember which internal IT staff member you were most friendly with and see if they'd do you a favour by adding an out of office to your account.