Collecting personal information - Prospective employer - Applicant required to complete a personality test - Whether collection was 'necessary' for a 'lawful purpose' - Complainant not informed of intended recipients - Information privacy principles 1 and 3

A woman applied for a sales representative's position and was asked to complete a form containing 200 questions. She later discovered that the form had been sent to another agency for evaluation and complained to me. The other agency was a church organisation which makes extensive use of personality testing.

The complaint raised issues under information privacy principle 1, which prohibits the collection of personal information unless:

(a) The information is collected for a lawful purpose connected with a function or activity of the agency; and
(b) The collection of the information is necessary for that purpose.

I considered the collection of some information about a prospective employee's personality and attitudes appeared to be a 'lawful purpose' connected with the employer's function.

The applicant complained that the questions were too personal for a sales representative's position, but I noted that other agencies used tests with comparable questions. I considered that the use of such extensive questions could probably be justified only in the context of obtaining the information as part of a comprehensive personality test to assess aptitude for a particular position. I could not say in this case that such a test was not necessary, or that the amount of information collected was excessive, so I could not establish that principle 1 had been breached in this case.

The complaint also raised issues under principle 3, which requires agencies to take reasonable steps to draw certain matters to a person's attention when information is being collected from them, such as the intended recipients.

I accepted the applicant's evidence that she had not been advised that her name and address and the questionnaire would be sent to another agency for evaluation. I did not consider that any of the exceptions allowing non-compliance with principle 3 applied in the circumstances, and formed the opinion that the respondent had breached principle 3.

The complaint was settled after the respondent ensured that the agency destroyed the information about the applicant and gave an assurance that he would no longer send personality tests there for evaluation.

August 1999