Most managers would rather not spend their time reading employee emails.
Aside from the practice bordering on the creepy, it’s fair to assume employers have more important things to do than comb through emails…
But sometimes, it becomes necessary to access an employee’s inbox, such as when wrongdoing is suspected.
For U.S. employers, it helps to know what is and is not allowed.
Expectation of privacy
Generally, employers are in the clear if they want to read employee emails sent using their work email accounts.
The nonprofit Privacy Rights Clearinghouse notes that several workplace privacy court cases “have been decided in the employer’s favor.”
And the legal information website Nolo says, “Courts have found that employers are generally free to read employee email messages, as long as there’s a valid business purpose for doing so.”
Complicating the issue
The issue becomes a little fuzzier if a worker is using a private account, but is on the clock and/or using company-issued devices.
In a 2010 case, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled against an employer who had accessed emails that an employee had sent to her lawyer. The worker used her private email account on her work laptop, but the court ignored both those issues and zeroed in on the issue of attorney-client privilege.
The Court held that the attorney-client privilege applied to emails, even though the employer had a general policy stating that the employee should have no reasonable expectation of privacy in communication sent over company equipment. – Privacy Rights Clearinghouse
In another case, a California court ruled that emails sent by an employee to her lawyer were not protected by attorney-client privilege. The worker used a company email account.
She had already been been told:
- Computers were to be used only for company business
- The company would monitor for compliance
- Employees using company computers had no right to privacy
For employers
To be safe, U.S. employers should be careful about accessing workers’ emails to lawyers.
Employee monitoring software can help with email monitoring tasks. For more information, go to Digital Endpoint.