The Information Commissioner’s Office received 15,335 complaints against organisations over DSAR obligations failures in 2023 – making up 45% of all complaints made to the ICO over the year.

Although the number of complaints received by the ICO is high, employment law firm GQ Littler says it is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the of actual number of DSARs submitted – and that, with such a high volume of requests being issued, many businesses are struggling to comply with them efficiently within the statutory timeframe.

Businesses routinely deal with DSARs from individuals, many of whom are from disgruntled former employees who use the data to obtain copies of documents pre-disclosure, or as a strategy to encourage the employer to reach a settlement.

DSARs are also expensive for businesses to comply with, with some costing tens of thousands of pounds to fulfil.

“Responding to DSARs can take up a significant amount of business resources in terms of both cost and management time. Bearing in how much data we create and process about employees on a daily basis, the time spent trawling through documents is overwhelming for many businesses," said Deborah Margolis, senior associate at GQ Littler.

“DSARs were intended to help individuals to determine if their personal data was being mishandled but some individuals have now weaponised DSARs with the intention of causing disruption for employers and forcing them into reaching favourable settlements.”

Following Brexit, the UK government has proposed to amend the UK Data Protection Law in a shift away from GDPR, with the Data Protection and Digital Information Bill, which is expected to pass in 2024 (subject to the upcoming election). This is expected to make compliance with DSARs less burdensome for businesses. Of particular interest to employers, under the draft Data Protection and Digital Information Bill, it would be easier for organisations to reject or charge a fee for ‘vexatious’ DSARs, which should provide some relief to employers.

“This would be a welcome change for employers many of whom feel that the existing rules allows too many opportunities for abuse,” Margolis added.

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