Medway bans Facebook use in work hours

Tags: Security

18 Sep 2007

Staff at the Medway Maritime Hospital in Kent, have been banned from using social networking website Facebook during working hours.

The trust says the move is aimed at monitoring internet usage and optimising efficiency, denying reports the website was responsible for slowing down the hospital’s computer systems.

Andy Horne, chief executive at Medway NHS Trust said, “Recently a decision was taken by the IT and operations departments of Medway NHS Trust, to add a number of sites, including Facebook.com, to the restricted list. This is part of work ongoing within the trust to monitor internet usage and optimise efficiency.

“While the trust has no objection to staff accessing the internet for personal reasons during breaks, we reserve the right to limit access in any way we deem necessary, and maintain a strict policy of correct and acceptable internet usage.”

Facebook was added to the trust's list of restricted websites as part of ongoing work to monitor internet usage by staff and ensure they don't waste work time on the net.

The trust sent a global email to all staff informing them the new restriction had been put in place, and that staff may only log onto the site from trust computers outside of working hours.

Some staff have set up a group on Facebook to protest against the ban. Horne added: “Should any member of staff have valid reasons why they should need to access any site which may currently be restricted, they are invited to contact director of operations, Ellen Ryabov, in order to discuss these further.”

Other hospitals have also begun monitoring internet usage to stop staff from spending time using networking sites such as Facebook.

Ipswich Hospital is one of them. Jan Rowsell, spokeswoman for the hospital, said: “Moderate personal use of the internet is allowed and is carefully monitored.

“We take the view that we want to be supportive to staff and we do not allow access to any social networking sites such as Facebook, MySpace and MSN, partly because we believe it's better to prevent staff from getting into trouble by spending a long time on those websites. We know they can be engaging and time-consuming.”

Many trusts have social networking groups on the Facebook website. A search of the keyword NHS brings up over 500 groups, including one for Connecting for Health.

Connecting for Health told EHI that it was up to individual trusts to decide which sites they allow staff to view and how they monitor internet usage.

A survey by online security firm SurfControl found that companies were losing an estimated £2bn through poor productivity due to use of sites such as Facebook.

The figure was calculated by looking at the theoretical cost if one employee in every company spent an hour on Facebook each day instead of working.

In Medway, staff who try and log onto Facebook.com will be greeted with an ‘access has been denied’ message.

Almost 80 staff members have joined a Facebook group campaigning for the website to be allowed again.

The TUC trade union said employers may be over reacting to social networking sites by banning them from using the site at work.

A survey of 1,000 people by the union found that the vast majority of Facebook users do not log onto the site at work at all, with only 17% of people saying that they access the site from work.

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development told EHI that the issue was a large bone of contention with different employers having different opinions on the benefits and problems that sites such as Facebook could present in the workplace.

A series of forums are live on the institute's website where members have been thrashing out the pros and cons of the use of social networking sites.

Readers Comments

Large bone of CONTENT?

18 Sep 07 09:07

Sounds more contentious at Medway ;-)

As it should be

18 Sep 07 10:56

"Almost 80 staff members have joined a Facebook group campaigning for the website to be allowed again."

Proving they have nothing better to do than waste all night and day looking at a website. Maybe the trust should contact the group and offer free counselling for their addiction :)

The Medway 80 ...

18 Sep 07 11:38

I wonder what the breakdown of the "80 staff" is? Doctors, nurses, managers? Or possibly IT staff idly waiting for CfH to deliver something for them to work with?

80 IT staff

19 Sep 07 12:35

That would mean Medway is in a parallel universe then.

Lucky Staff!

19 Sep 07 14:46

At our Trust we have never been able to log into social networking sites. Even Friends Reunited is barred. I think shopping is banned even after your normal working hours. All internet activity is closely watched. Medway Staff were very lucky to have been able to use the site at all. If my name can be taken off of this comment that would be best as I am being watched!

No wonder we are getting nothing for NHS billions

19 Sep 07 21:36

My company recognised the occasional use of the internet for 'personal' activities as acceptable, as it did for telephone usage. One might imagine that checking a bank account, making a doctors appointment etc. were what was envisaged. Rules on unacceptable use were clearly stated. The technical backup to this policy meant that 'questionable' sites were blocked. Whilst this had the annoying side effect of making it impossible to arrange corporate hospitality at either Arsenal F.C. or Scunthorpe F.C. it did ensure that the company and its shareholders were not employee's 'out of office' activities. As a taxpayer I am horrified that any Trust should have left 'social networking' sites open to access by its people. As a taxpayer I would have also expected that this would not be left up to individual Trusts, it should be implemented at the most economical point possible, i.e at the level of the NHSnet / N3 Internet gateway.

Facebook

20 Sep 07 11:31

I have just joined facebook at the invitation of someone else. I am now thinking of unsubscribing as I haven't the faintest idea what most of them are on about, and the little I do understand is, frankly, puerile. I'm amazed that any Trust / NHS body would allow the use of this and other social sites at all, and equally amazed that 80 people at Medway would admit to using Facebook. Sensible use of shopping, on-line banking, personal email, wikipedia etc. yes. "Social" sites no.

A Dilbertesque scene!

nhstechie@btinternet.com

20 Sep 07 23:31

"Almost 80 staff members have joined a Facebook group campaigning for the website to be allowed again."

Surely this is tantamount to declaring yourself a friendless, narcissistic, under-employed, work-shy, loser who is ripe for severance?

Facebook

david.hawes@pmuw.wales.nhs.uk

21 Sep 07 11:22

To be fair to NHS organisations (and any employer for that matter), I think the unions and staff are onto a loser on this issue... and quite rightly so.

When you are paid to do a job, and access to a site is likely to lead to staff wasting PAID time, in my opinion the employer has absolutely every right to block access to a specific website.

I've worked in the NHS for 7yrs now and have just moved to a new employer in S.Wales. Both my current and previous organisations banned these sites and, to be totally honest, I couldn't give a monkeys. I access them out of office hours - nothing that happens on them is so essential that I would need access during office hours.

Before the these sites (and the internet) existed, these arguments were non-existent. Funnily enough, people just got on with their jobs as they were supposed to!! ;-)

Not my fault, Gov!

21 Sep 07 11:33

"The TUC trade union said employers may be over reacting to social networking sites by banning them from using the site at work." This comment in the story struck a cord - in the news today was the item about staff at Neath PT Council being sacked for spending hours on e-bay. Trade Union there said it was management's fault - "for putting temptation in the way of staff by allowing them access!" Whatever happened to people taking responsibility for their own actions?

N3 / Facebook

steve4home@hotmail.com

21 Sep 07 15:19

To the taxpayer : Many Trusts have implemented their own direct Internet links due to the abysmal performance of the national gateway and the inability to apply any control / prioritisation to business traffic. I am not aware that there is any filtering at a national level, as a result there is massive inefficiency in virus control, web filtering, patch and virus updating - these latter 2 allegedy accounting for more than half all traffic via the national gateway. Provided the local firewall allows access N3 will provide access to ANY website be it pornography, hacking, fraud et al.

Regarding personal use of internet. In a 24/7 hospital environment what is "out of hours" ? or are you going to allow night shift staff priveleges you dont allow during the day ?

The only sensible attitude is to educate workforce to the fact that internet acess is monitored by enforcing a policy that restricts the activity of serial offenders, which is generally a known hard core alla the Medway 80 :-).

After all there is no more morality in the Chief Executive checking the Rugby World Cup results than the lowliest employee arranging their social life for the coming weekend.

Grumpy old man

22 Sep 07 17:00

I don't believe it! Paying NHS salaries to people not working!! No wonder the money in hasn't produced commensurate performance outputs and trusts have budget deficits. Every employee skyving on the internet diminishes the resources available for patient care. Where's your conscience?

We are not alone...

23 Sep 07 08:49

Interesting that Kent County Council initiated the same policy. Well I can understand the decision but the trust has some way to go in demonstrating a policy that uses the full power of the internet to enhance its business. The trust intranet is very poorly designed and this has an impact on the sharing of information on best practice throughout the trust. No wonder colleagues turn elsewhere to network. Talking of which....Anoyone for LinkedIn? Or will that be banned too?