I informed my manager (in private) that my mother died and that I would need some time off. During this conversation, I mentioned that my mother and I hadn’t spoken in a while. After returning back to the office, I had several other employees questioning how my mom died, as well as why we didn’t speak for so long. Is this legal for her to disclose this information to my co-workers? I never mentioned to another co-worker at all that my mother died — only to my manager, in her office, in a private conversation.
Rita Risser Chai Replies:
I am so sorry to hear of your loss. The fact that you had not spoken in a while could have made it even harder for you.
Your manager was incredibly insensitive for telling your co-workers about this. It may violate your company’s policy about confidential information, and even if it doesn’t, it’s bad management practice that you could confront your manager about, and/or report to Human Resources.
There is no federal law that prohibits this, as this is not information about a serious health condition.
Every state has a general law protecting people’s privacy. However, you might be surprised at what is considered private and under what circumstances. The fact that a person died would not be considered private, especially if there was an obituary in the paper. Deaths are a matter of public record. If you did not extract a promise of confidentiality from your boss, you might not be seen as treating the information as private. If you told anyone other than your boss about the death and about not speaking for a while, such as friends outside work, a court would probably say you weren’t treating the information as private.
You could talk to an employment lawyer to get a definitive answer. Good luck.
Posted 02-24-2020
Information here is correct at the time it is posted. Case decisions cited here may be reversed. Please do not rely on this information without consulting an attorney first.
