Some time has passed since the Polish Labour Code was adjusted to the provisions of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation, but some issues remain unclear. Problems with interpretation of the provisions arise at the stage of recruitment and determining which personal data of candidates may be collected and processed by prospective employees. Doubts are raised for example by the issue of the permissibility of obtaining residential addresses from job applicants.

Since January 2019, employers may keep their employees’ records in electronic versions. However, labour law regulations do not define the concept of electronic version. Nonetheless, certain guidelines are to be found in the provisions of the Labour Code and the regulation dated 10 December 2018 of the Minister of the Family, Labour and Social Policy on employee documentation specifying the requirements related to changing the version of employee documentation from paper to electronic.

Amendments to the Polish Labour Code in force since May 2019 resolved the existing doubts as to the admissibility of obtaining employees’ consent to processing of their personal data by employers.

Before, the courts had held quite clearly that if an employee’s consent to processing of his personal data were considered a circumstance legalising the gathering of personal data from an employee other than those specified in Art. 22¹ of the Labour Code, that would constitute a breach of that provision and a circumvention of the law (Supreme Administrative Court judgments of 1 December 2009, case no. I OSK 249/09, and 6 September 2011, case no. I OSK 1476/10). Therefore, as a rule, obtaining personal data other than those indicated in Art. 22¹ of the Labour Code based on the employee’s consent was deemed inadmissible.