The Limes Surgery Hertfordshire may use a data processing company called DocMail to handle some mailings to patients. Typically this is for bulk mailings such as the invitations to attend the flu clinics where it is difficult to accommodate the administrative work involved without affecting our ability to serve patients.
This is permissible under guidance from both the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and the Department of Health (DoH) subject to the provisions of the Data Protection Act
Please find below some more information about DocMail and how we work with them to ensure that we protect our patients’ personal data at all times.
What is DocMail
DocMail is provided by CFH Total Document management Ltd a secure print and mailing company who provide print and mailing services for Local Government, GPs, Dentists, Medical practices, Schools, Exam Boards and Banks etc. throughout the UK.
The system can be found online at www.docmail.co.uk and requires a secure user name and password for us to log on and upload our letters and address lists to create the printed output for dispatch to Royal Mail. The system allows us to upload a letter template and mailing data for the patients we want to write to via a secure web portal.
The Data Protection Act (2018) (DPA)
The Limes Surgery Hertfordshire and DocMail are both fully compliant with the Data Protection Act.
The Information Commissioners Office issued guidance in February 2012 for organisations that outsource some of its data processing to a third party. The Data Protection Act allows outsourcing to take place but stipulates certain conditions that must be met for it to be compliant.
An organisation that processes personal data is required to handle personal data in accordance with the data protection principles. A data controller may choose to use another organisation to process personal data on its behalf – a data processor.
The data controller remains responsible for ensuring its processing complies with the DPA, whether it processes in-house or engages a data processor.
Where a data processor is used the data controller must ensure that suitable security arrangements are in place in order to comply with the seventh data protection principle.
Further extracts from the guidance are reproduced below and the entire document is available on the ICO website.
The Limes Surgery Hertfordshire has strictly adhered to this guidance in setting up the partnership with DocMail.
- The Limes Surgery Hertfordshire remains the data controller and as such has the responsibility for ensuring compliance with the provisions of the Act. We are not able to pass on those responsibilities to DocMail whose role is that of a data processor.
- The Partners of The Limes Surgery Hertfordshire have satisfied themselves that DocMail have provided sufficient guarantees in respect of the technical and organisational security measures governing the processing to be carried out.
- The partners have taken, and will continue to take, reasonable steps to ensure that DocMail are compliant with these security measures.
- No data will pass outside of the European Union
Connecting for health
DocMail has achieved a 100% rating in the Department of Health’s Information Governance Toolkit Assessment for 2011-2012 and we meet with the terms and conditions of the DH Information Governance Assurance Statement. This assessment is publicly available and can be viewed here
Other approvals
DocMail is also approved by the following:
- Government Procurement Service for Hybrid Mail – which allows all government organisations to use DocMail.
- Health Trust EuropeOutgoing Mail Solutions – which includes University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS trust who visited our premises last week to carry out a site audit.
- 67 Primary Care Trusts for Medical Studies have approved the use of DocMail. 500,000 medical studies packs were sent in 2011 across 200 surgeries
- Caldicott Guardian across a number areas have approved the use of DocMail when asked
- Ethics Committees have approved the use of DocMail by surgeries for use in medical studies
Accreditations & security policies
In addition to the credentials listed above, we have been supplied with DocMail’s Corporate Policies and certifications:
- ISO 27001:2005 Information Security management System Certificate
- CFH Site Security Policy
- CFH Information Technology Security Policy
- Information Security Policy
Process
The data file provided to DocMail will only contain enough data to enable them to fulfil the contract. This means that it will include name and address details and, where appropriate, the date and time of an appointment as well as the name of the clinician you will be seeing or the name of a clinic you will be attending eg Flu Clinic or NHS Health Check. We will of course exercise the same discretion in writing the letters as we would if we were printing and posting them at the surgery.
The letters will be delivered to your address by Royal Mail in the normal way. The letters will carry the DocMail logo and the return address on the reverse side. This address does not identify the letter as having come from a doctor’s surgery.
DocMail delete the personal data 28 days after the mailing.
If you have any questions or require further information about this please ask to speak to the practice manager