Internal reporting office under the Act for the Better Protection of Whistleblowers
Kontakt
Beauftragte der Internen Meldestelle
The legal basis for the processing of personal data by the Internal Reporting Office of the University of Oldenburg is Art. 6 para. 1 sentence 1 lit. c GDPR in conjunction with §§ 10 and 12 HinSchG.
Please also note the data protection information for whistleblowers in accordance with Article 13 GDPR.
External reporting centres
- Federal Office of Justice
Adenauerallee 99–103
53113 Bonn
Telephone: +49 228 99 410-40
Visit the website
- Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin)
Graurheindorfer Straße 108
53117 Bonn
Telephone: +49 228 / 4108 – 2355
Email:
To the reporting system
To the website
- Bundeskartellamt
Kaiser-Friedrich-Str. 16
53113 Bonn
Telephone: +49 228 9499 386
Go to the reporting system
Go to the website
Internal reporting office under the Act for the Better Protection of Whistleblowers
What is the Whistleblower Protection Act?
The Act on the Improved Protection of Whistleblowers (Whistleblower Protection Act – HinSchG) governs the protection of natural persons against detriment arising from the reporting or disclosure of information regarding breaches, in accordance with the provisions of this Act, which occur in connection with their professional activities or in the run-up to such activities.
Furthermore, the Whistleblower Protection Act protects from discrimination those who are the subject of a report or disclosure, as well as any other persons affected by such a report or disclosure.
To implement whistleblower protection, internal reporting offices must be established within companies and public authorities to which employees can turn (see Section 12 HinSchG).
The University of Oldenburg’s internal reporting office is organisationally based within the internal audit department.
Staff from the Internal Audit Department are entrusted with the duties of the Internal Reporting Office (see Section 13 of the HinSchG) at the University of Oldenburg.
The staff of the Internal Reporting Office are independent in the performance of their duties (see Section 15 of the HinSchG). They are subject to the duty of confidentiality (see Section 8 of the HinSchG), under which the identity of the whistleblower, the persons who are the subject of a report and any other persons affected by the report are protected.
The identity of the whistleblower is not protected if they report false information about breaches through gross negligence or wilful misconduct (see Section 9 of the HinSchG).
Whistleblowers and persons not covered by the definition of ‘employees’ (see Section 8 of the HinSchG) may contact an external reporting body (see Section 7 of the HinSchG).
The external reporting bodies (see Sections 19–23 of the HinSchG) are established at:
Which offences are covered by the Whistleblower Protection Act?
The Internal Reporting Office is responsible for reporting information on violations, i.e. unlawful acts or omissions that are related to professional or official activities at the University of Oldenburg and fall under the material scope of application in accordance with Section 2 HinSchG. The material scope of application includes offences (cf. Section 2 HinSchG) which
- are punishable by law, e.g. corruption, theft, fraud and similar offences
- are subject to fines if the violated regulation serves to protect life, limb or health or to protect the rights of employees or their representative bodies.
Examples that fulfil the offence of § 2 No. 3 to No. 10 HinSchG are
- Statements made by civil servants that constitute a breach of the duty of loyalty to the constitution,
- Violations of regulations for contracting authorities regarding the procedure for awarding public contracts,
- breaches of regulations on the protection of personal data.
The reporting of information on violations may include ongoing or completed processes.
Please note
- The Internal Reporting Office does not process the following reports of information relating to breaches:
- Reports of information regarding breaches that have no connection to employment
- Reports concerning information on breaches that are work-related but do not fall within the material scope of the Section 2 of the HinSchG .
- The Internal Reporting Office is not responsible for information regarding private misconduct unrelated to professional activities, complaints of a general nature, or reports without a specific legal breach.
- The Internal Reporting Office is not intended for the prevention of emergencies or hazardous situations.
- The disclosure of incorrect information regarding breaches is prohibited (§ 32(2) HinSchG).
The whistleblower is obliged to compensate for any damage arising from a report made with intent or through gross negligence, or from the disclosure of incorrect information (see § 38 HinSchG). - The Internal Reporting Office expressly does not replace other points of contact, representatives or designated officers, such as the relevant line manager/, higher-level bodies, the Staff Council, the equality officer, the Representative for Employees with Disabilities, the staff units responsible for data protection or health and safety, the human resources department or similar bodies.
For matters that do not fall within the scope of Section 2 of the HinSchG, the aforementioned bodies should be contacted. A non-exhaustive overview can be found at https://uol.de/beschaeftigte and https://uol.de/verwaltung.
FAQs on the Whistleblower Protection Act
Who can report information?
The Internal Whistleblowing Office at the University of Oldenburg accepts reports from employees of the University of Oldenburg.
In accordance with Section 3(8) of the Whistleblowing Act (HinSchG), employees are:
- employees,
- who, as part of their professional training, are employed by,
- civil servants,
- judges, with the exception of lay judges,
- soldiers,
- persons who, due to their economic dependence, are to be regarded as persons in a position similar to that of an employee; this also includes home-based workers and those treated as equivalent to them,
- people with disabilities who are employed in a workshop for people with disabilities or by another service provider in accordance with Section 60 of Book Nine of the Social Code.
How can tips be reported?
Reports (see Section 16 of the HinSchG) must be submitted via the official reporting channels to the University of Oldenburg’s Internal Reporting Office:
- verbally, i.e. by telephone or in a face-to-face meeting
- in writing, i.e. or post
- in German and English.
Please refer to the guidance and details provided in the contact information for the Internal Reporting Office.
What should a notice contain?
A notice should contain the following information:
- A precise description of the facts of the case
- Information on the persons involved,
- Date (and time) of the incident,
- Communication of background information and related facts
- Orientation on the W questions (Who did what, when, where, how and why?)
If there is knowledge of evidence and/or documents relating to the facts of the case, these should be made available to the internal reporting centre.
What happens after a report?
Confirmation of receipt
The reporting person receives a confirmation of receipt via the reporting channel within 7 days of receiving a report(see Art. 17 HinSchG).
Preliminary review
The preliminary review includes checking
- the responsibility of the internal reporting office,
- whether the report falls within the material scope of the Whistleblower Protection Act(see Section 2 HinSchG) and
- the validity of the report(see § 17 HinSchG).
If further information is required for clarification, the FIU will contact the whistleblower and ask them to submit further information if necessary.
Follow-up measures
Appropriate follow-up measures(see Section 18 HinSchG) are determined based on the preliminary assessment. These are in particular
- internal investigations and enquiries into the facts of the case,
- refer the whistleblower to another competent body
- the procedure for further investigations
- hand over to a work unit responsible for internal investigations at the employer or respective organisational unit
- hand over to a competent authority
- discontinue the proceedings for lack of evidence or other reasons(cf. Section 18 HinSchG).
Within three months, the whistleblower will receive a re-registering student regarding the planned and/or taken follow-up measures(cf. Section 17 HinSchG).
Exceptions to this are regulated in Section 17 para. 2 HinSchG.
What is the confidentiality requirement?
In accordance with the confidentiality requirement(cf. § 8 HinSchG), the Reporting Centre shall protect the identity of
- the person making the report,
- the persons who are the subject of a report, and
- the other persons named in the report.
The identity of these persons may only be disclosed to the persons responsible for receiving reports or taking follow-up measures and persons who support them in the fulfilment of these tasks.
Protection of the confidentiality of the identity of a whistleblower is excluded if the whistleblower reports untrue information about violations through gross negligence or intent(see Section 9 para. 1 HinSchG).
Further exceptions to confidentiality are regulated in Section 9 HinSchG .