Idiocy at work →[More:]

My employer, like many quasi-public organisations, is becoming increasingly paranoid about security, data protection, etc. We have a complicated and cumbersome case management system onto which we have to log all letters, phone calls, emails, etc.

Along side this, email encryption has been introduced. How it works is like this:

A case handler receives an email relating to a case. It has to be attached electronically to the case record. In order to do so, It has to be given a password. Which the casehandler chooses. It can be different for every single email. These days, most files have lots of email correspondence attached.

Fast-forward a few weeks. The case is transferred to me. For whatever reason, casehandler A did not print off any of these emails so they're not in the paper file. I can see them in the case record, but I can't tell who they're from or what they say because I can't open any of them because I DON'T HAVE THE FUCKING PASSWORDS!

When this utter fuckwittery was launched a couple of months ago, this scenario was put to management who assured us that it wouldn't be a problem because IT could sort it all out.

Casehandler A has now left the company. IT deleted his email account when he left.