Unions raise concerns about online personnel records system

An effort to digitize federal employees' personnel records is receiving a mixed response from organized labor leaders, who cite the easy access of the Internet as both a blessing and a curse.

The National Treasury Employees Union issued a statement saying that union officials think that the Office of Personnel Management's plan to centralize agencies' personnel records in an online database makes sense, but they want more information on exactly how the system will work.

The effort was launched in 1999 and was incorporated into the Bush administration's official list of e-government initiatives in 2002. The system is expected to be fully implemented in all agencies in 2007.

NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley said many employees are concerned about the security risks of putting personnel information online, but she believes the system ultimately will provide important benefits for employees, such as the ability to verify personnel records' accuracy.

Other concerns raised by NTEU include how employees can report errors, how mistakes will be investigated and corrected if necessary, whether printed documents will be kept once online records are available, how an employee's survivors can obtain records, and how records eventually will be destroyed.

Terry Eleftherion, a vice president of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, was much more critical of the plan. He said in a statement that the government's record of ensuring federal workers' privacy is "less than stellar." He cited recent reports of missing government charge-card account data in Bank of America files as a reason to doubt the government's ability to secure employee information.

"Switching to an electronic system to secure the private personnel information of federal workers would lead to plenty of skepticism among those who could suffer the consequences," Eleftherion said. "I am very dubious about such a proposal."

J. Ward Morrow, AFGE assistant general counsel, said that the system seems like a good idea, but "the devil is in the details."

"Who would have access to this information and how easy would it be for someone to hack in?" Morrow said. "You're talking about some of the highest positions in the government having their home addresses online."

The consolidation of agencies' human resources functions, which includes placing employee personnel files online, could allow for the easy access of records that are otherwise cumbersome to deal with. Placing the information online makes it easier to analyze records to identify personnel trends and to protect files from potential fire and water damage.

According to OPM, the new system meets federal regulations for the protection of personal information. The information in an employees records is only made available exclusively to personnel specialists in his or her agency.

Integic Corp. of Chantilly, Va., is providing the software for the initiative. Agencies can contract with Integic on a fee-for-service basis to set up systems.