Lee_K_81 Posted September 7, 2007 Posted September 7, 2007 BTY: why did you go into her account and not just send her an email warning her that it was to be deleted? I believe it was a free email, e.g. hotmail. Very difficult to delete by yourself. Quite possibly the easiest thing to do is contact hotmail, gmail, yahoo or whoever, tell them of the issue. Ask them if they can disable the account or just delete it etc. as it contains your business name and the person using it is pretending to still work there. Then contact the person, tell them you no longer have access to the account and that you have requested it be disabled / deleted as it contains the school name and that it is not appropriate for them to have it. Let em deal with M$'s lawyers!
Skoggmeiger Posted September 7, 2007 Posted September 7, 2007 I would have thought if you have the password and the 'forgotten password' thingy goes to you and not to her, then surely it is your account? BTY: why did you go into her account and not just send her an email warning her that it was to be deleted? I have just deleted the ex-head's account - he left 6 months ago - and he has come up and asked why he can't access it as he needs the email addresses on it! I am not in the least worried (it is a school easymail so slightly different to your situation) but the new head keeps telling me not to worry! It is just good practice to delete email addresses of people who have left. BUT I am going to issue guidelines on email usage and a reminder that the account will be deleted AS SOON AS the person leaves. An in-school email would sort out your problem as there can be no argument as to who the email account belong too. Good luck - what have your school said? Has he been using it for the previous 6 months or did you disable it as soon as he left?
localzuk Posted September 7, 2007 Posted September 7, 2007 Has he been using it for the previous 6 months or did you disable it as soon as he left? That wouldn't matter if it was a school address - it is the school's property, so they can delete it as and when they like.
witch Posted September 7, 2007 Posted September 7, 2007 He had been using it. I left it live for a bit as I knew he would take ages to get his stuff off it, but I thought he would have done it by now!
tech_guy Posted September 7, 2007 Author Posted September 7, 2007 He had been using it. I left it live for a bit as I knew he would take ages to get his stuff off it, but I thought he would have done it by now! Lol, took us 6 months to get our old head to return his laptop - he 'forgot' he still had it.... 8O
Friez Posted September 11, 2007 Posted September 11, 2007 He had been using it. I left it live for a bit as I knew he would take ages to get his stuff off it, but I thought he would have done it by now! Lol, took us 6 months to get our old head to return his laptop - he 'forgot' he still had it.... 8O That's the other classic one, staff who think the school laptops they recieve are their own personal property.
tech_guy Posted September 11, 2007 Author Posted September 11, 2007 That's the other classic one, staff who think the school laptops they recieve are their own personal property. Yeah, tell me about it. Amazing isn't it how much stuff can reside off-site - printers, scanners, laptops, digital cameras, etc...
Geoff Posted September 11, 2007 Posted September 11, 2007 He had been using it. I left it live for a bit as I knew he would take ages to get his stuff off it, but I thought he would have done it by now! Lol, took us 6 months to get our old head to return his laptop - he 'forgot' he still had it.... 8O That's the other classic one, staff who think the school laptops they recieve are their own personal property. Oh they can keep them. However they need to reimburse the tax man for the 17.5% VAT of the original retail purchase price.
Friez Posted September 12, 2007 Posted September 12, 2007 He had been using it. I left it live for a bit as I knew he would take ages to get his stuff off it, but I thought he would have done it by now! Lol, took us 6 months to get our old head to return his laptop - he 'forgot' he still had it.... 8O That's the other classic one, staff who think the school laptops they recieve are their own personal property. Oh they can keep them. However they need to reimburse the tax man for the 17.5% VAT of the original retail purchase price. Can we pretend the laptop cost 10k?
Skoggmeiger Posted September 12, 2007 Posted September 12, 2007 Has he been using it for the previous 6 months or did you disable it as soon as he left? That wouldn't matter if it was a school address - it is the school's property, so they can delete it as and when they like. I know it's the schools's property. Just wondered what procedures folk took when staff left, in terms of disabling accounts for a certain period rather than deleting them straight away.
srochford Posted September 12, 2007 Posted September 12, 2007 He had been using it. I left it live for a bit as I knew he would take ages to get his stuff off it, but I thought he would have done it by now! I think this would be fascinating if it ever did get to court. Essentially, you have approved this personal use of the email account by allowing it to continue. I suspect a half decent lawyer would make a real meal out of that - even if policy was that staff shouldn't use the email for personal purposes, this is effectively countering that. There's a term used in employment law "custom and practice" - basically, if you allow something to happen for a period of time then even though it's not formally part of the contract then it can be deemed to have been accepted as part of the contract. For example, if a manager regularly lets someone work from 8 to 4 instead of 9 to 5 then that person can argue that this has now become part of their terms and conditions and can insist that it remains. It's not the same as allowing someone access to personal email and I'm definitely not a lawyer. Common sense says that you're right; a lawyer might persuade a judge otherwise ...
localzuk Posted September 12, 2007 Posted September 12, 2007 I think this would be fascinating if it ever did get to court. Essentially, you have approved this personal use of the email account by allowing it to continue. I suspect a half decent lawyer would make a real meal out of that - even if policy was that staff shouldn't use the email for personal purposes, this is effectively countering that. It's not the same as allowing someone access to personal email and I'm definitely not a lawyer. Common sense says that you're right; a lawyer might persuade a judge otherwise ... Considering, as I said before, the email address is the property of the school, and the school has no obligation to provide the address to their staff let alone ex staff (if they did, simply through not disabling it when they left, then the school would have to sustain a costly system for the length of the life of the account, regardless of their own wishes).. So, the account can be deleted at any time as all contents are the school's - and no lawyer would argue otherwise as there is no contract to show that it would stay open.
GrumbleDook Posted September 12, 2007 Posted September 12, 2007 @localzuk The above would be true if the school was paying for a service that t had allowed to be used by the ex.employee after they left. Since this was a free service that was set up on behalf on the ex-employee by another employee of the school a lawyer might argue that it was never explicitly mentioned that the service signed up for had been done so on behalf of the school and not the individual. The 'custom & practice' that Steve is referring to then means that the school (or an employee of the school) has to have been aware that it was being used for purposes other than work and the failure to prevent or rectify this means that it has been agreed that it can continue being used in this way. Since this service does not contain anything in the T&C that it has to be explicitly used for work then it can be argued that the school failed to provide adequate instruction to the ex-employee. The fact that the service may have been signed up for at any point the ex-employee, and then used for work purposes on behalf of the school, means it would be difficult to show that the school had any right to set up the service on behalf of the ex-employee in the manner that it did. In short ... the only people that win from this are the lawyers. The providers of the service find that it is in dispute and freeze it, any emails coming in get bounced, it then gets deleted because it is frozen for more than 90 days and the case hasn't even been to court.
localzuk Posted September 12, 2007 Posted September 12, 2007 Ah, but srochford was replying to WITCH who was talking about the user at her school...
tech_guy Posted September 12, 2007 Author Posted September 12, 2007 Just to update everyone on the outcome of the original reason for this thread - the ex-employee has finally seen sense and after their solicitor 'became aware of all the facts' the matter has been resolved.... ...it might have had something to do with the content of some of the personal emails in the account that we printed out and sent to them?! ;-)
oldav Posted September 13, 2007 Posted September 13, 2007 Hmm, ROFL, long time Ed IT admin, just joined to see what the site is like and I came across this. What a storm in a teacup. If you are lucky if this user wont sign that account up for every dodgy site/mail list/spam sender on the net, and do so for your personal email addy as well. If I was them, I would! Dont be so petty, Get a life, why on earth should you care about an old free account? I think hanging aound with Teachers is getting to you(-: Dav
_Bat_ Posted September 13, 2007 Posted September 13, 2007 Dont be so petty, Get a life, why on earth should you care about an old free account? Because it was owned by the school and used for school business? In other words, people might e-mail the account expecting to get through to the school?
tech_guy Posted September 13, 2007 Author Posted September 13, 2007 Hmm, ROFL, long time Ed IT admin, just joined to see what the site is like and I came across this. What a storm in a teacup. If you are lucky if this user wont sign that account up for every dodgy site/mail list/spam sender on the net, and do so for your personal email addy as well. If I was them, I would! Dont be so petty, Get a life, why on earth should you care about an old free account? I think hanging aound with Teachers is getting to you(-: Dav Dav, ur a plonker.
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