After the HMRC scandal earlier this week two more smaller scale balls
ups have come to light.

Several thousand recipients of Winter Fuel Payment notifications have
received either two notifications addressed to them in the same
envelope (only one payment though) or a second notification addressed
to someone else (still only one payment though) in the same envelope.

Earlier today it came to light that the Post Office Card Account
Statements for several thousand people were sent to the wrong
addresses.

Although two seperate organisations (DWP and the PO) are involved the
IT supplier that designs and maintains the software and hardware as
well as printing and posting the notifications is the same; EDS.  Lets
not forget that something similar happened in february with the annual
uprating notifications for tens of thousands of State Pension
customers.

The processes involved here are not new, they are routine and should
be executed with far more care by the supplier of the services.  I am
sure however that EDS will not have any significant fallout from these
breaches of the Data Protection Act and will continue to provide IT to
pretty much all government departments.

Mike

On 23 Nov, 18:24, Mike 
wrote:
> After the HMRC scandal earlier this week two more smaller scale balls
> ups have come to light.
>
> Several thousand recipients of Winter Fuel Payment notifications have
> received either two notifications addressed to them in the same
> envelope (only one payment though) or a second notification addressed
> to someone else (still only one payment though) in the same envelope.
>
> Earlier today it came to light that the Post Office Card Account
> Statements for several thousand people were sent to the wrong
> addresses.
>
> Although two seperate organisations (DWP and the PO) are involved the
> IT supplier that designs and maintains the software and hardware as
> well as printing and posting the notifications is the same; EDS.  Lets
> not forget that something similar happened in february with the annual
> uprating notifications for tens of thousands of State Pension
> customers.
>
> The processes involved here are not new, they are routine and should
> be executed with far more care by the supplier of the services.  I am
> sure however that EDS will not have any significant fallout from these
> breaches of the Data Protection Act and will continue to provide IT to
> pretty much all government departments.
>
> Mike

I used to get those situations all the time when I used Norwich Union
for insurance.
Its a problem not limited to government departments.

However, I have known TNT (the mail carrier) to lose a pallet of forms
I had ordered, so not sure they will find HMRC disks.
Martin  <><