Warning data protection issues deterring some GAA volunteers

Data protection

issues are creating difficulties for club officials and, in some cases, discouraging volunteers within the

GAA

. That’s the view of a specialist company, which works closely with clubs in relation to on-line fund raising and communications technology.

The changeover from paperwork to digital storage as the preferred means of keeping records has brought with it challenges in a new area of responsibility.

Warren Healy is founder and CEO of MyClubFinances.com, a company that has overseen the migration online of fundraising activities for more than 800 sports clubs as well as the use of the platform for communicating with members both at home and globally in a time of high emigration.

The company was nominated in both the eBusiness and Sports categories at the 2013 Eircom Spiders awards. Healy says that concerns about data protection are regularly raised in consultations with clubs.

“There’s a lot of misunderstanding about these issues. There’s no legal obligation on volunteers in the sense that they’re not answerable at law but at the same time there’s an expectation that data be protected as well as an anxiety among the clubs themselves to do the right thing.

“Data protection is always coming up when we meet clubs: how long can we store data and how can we use it? In one instance it emerged that club e-mails were being used for business purposes. The intention might have been innocent enough but we had to change our terms and conditions to stop that happening.

“It can be daunting for potential club officers and because everyone’s aware that this is an issue you can see how these considerations discourage volunteers from getting involved.”

Healy’s company is also certified as data protection practitioners and he believes that the issue should be straightforward to address.

“The profile of club volunteers is changing all the time and gradually we are seeing younger, more technology-aware people coming through... In our experience there are a manageable number of pitfalls in the way clubs administer data – most commonly in relation to compliance in the processing of credit card payments and the maintenance of data bases.”

Organise seminar

In response to inquiries from clubs, Healy says it is his company’s intention to organise a seminar on the subject of data protection compliance for volunteer officials.

The seminar will be held at the end of next month and one of the speakers will be Hugh Jones, managing partner of Sytorus, a company specialising in data protection consultancy, and an associate of the Irish Computer Society. He is an expert on the voluntary and charity sectors.

A Croke Park spokesperson said the GAA's former IT manager, Declan Fanning, moved on during the summer but a new appointment is imminent and the issue of data protection will be part of the new chief information officer's remit.