Arun

FAIR PROCESSING NOTICE

Arun District Council is required by law to protect the public funds it administers.  It may share information provided to it with other bodies responsible for auditing or administering public funds, in order to prevent and detect fraud.

The Audit Commission appoints the auditor to audit the accounts of this Council.  It is also responsible for carrying out data matching exercises.

Data matching involves comparing computer records held by one body against other computer records held by the same or another body to see how far they match.  This is usually personal information.  Computerised data matching allows potentially fraudulent claims and payments to be identified.  Where a match is found it indicates that there is an inconsistency that requires further investigation.  No assumption can be made as to whether there is fraud, error or other explanation until an investigation is carried out.

The Audit Commission currently requires the Council to participate in a data matching exercise to assist in the prevention and detection of fraud.  The Council is required to provide particular sets of data to the Audit Commission for matching for each exercise, and these are set out in the Audit Commission's guidance, which can be found at the Audit Commission’s National Fraud Initiative web page:- National Fraud Initiative (NFI) - Audit Commission

The use of data by the Audit Commission in a data matching exercise is carried out with statutory authority under its powers in Part 2A of the Audit Commission Act 1998.  It does not require the consent of the individuals concerned under the Data Protection Act 1998.

Data matching by the Audit Commission is subject to a Code of Practice.  This may be found at the Audit Commission’s - Code of Data Matching Practice web page:- Code of data matching practice - Audit Commission

For further information on the Audit Commission's legal powers and the reasons why it matches particular information, see the Audit Commission’s - Fair Processing Notice web page:- Level 3: Full text - Audit Commission

For further information on data matching at this Council, please email your request for information to internal.audit@arun.gov.uk

The following notification was published by the Council for the Audit Commission’s 2012 data matching exercise:- Fair Processing Notice 2012 [pdf] 17KB