Companies have to face a real challenge with the entry of the new Informant Law. The decisive influence on the way of managing information that the norm will have will have important consequences throughout the Spanish business fabric and, not only, in companies with more than fifty workers, which are required by law.
The standard will also be mandatory for any company that already has a complaints channel in operation within its compliance program (called an “information system” by the new law) to prevent criminal liability of legal persons or prevention of money laundering.
Likewise, the new regulations stipulate that any company, regardless of the number of employees, must comply with the most innovative issues in terms of reporting channels outlined in the whistleblowers directive and that details the new law.
Faced with this new scenario, the experts from Report@, a Spanish company that offers a comprehensive management service for reporting channels, recall the importance of having all the necessary information to avoid possible fines. With this, five key aspects stand out that all companies must take into account when dealing with the new regulations:
1. Anonymity of the complainant
The rule establishes the obligation to accept and process complaints anonymously, as well as any non-anonymous complaint, as long as the confidentiality and privacy throughout the investigation. Both the directive and the Informant Law reinforce this obligation, non-compliance with which can be sanctioned with fines of up to one million euros.
2. Need for complaint management software
The law imposes on the person in charge of the complaints channel the obligation to keep touch with the complainant anonymously. This contact can only be made through a computer system that generates an anonymous and confidential user, with which complainants can access the follow-up of their complaint.
3. Advertising of the complaints channel on the company’s website
The new regulations not only require training to be provided to employees on the purpose, content and scope of the whistleblowing channel, but also establishes the obligation for the information system to be accessible from the home page of the company’s website, also including its operating protocol.
4. Open to third parties
The complaints channel must be, following the law, open not only to any employee, but also to clients, suppliers, including third parties who are aware of the commission of any criminal, administrative or labor offense and want to communicate it to the company through the information system.
5. Prohibition of retaliation against the whistleblower
This is one of the fundamental issues of the standard. This element tries to avoid any attempt to retaliate against the complainant; be it an employee, supplier or a third party, with the imposition of high fines.
These developments will undoubtedly generate more work for companies’ compliance and legal advisory departments. Given the foreseeable exponential growth in the number of complaints after the approval of the Law, it provides in article 6, for any entity, the external management of the channel by specialized companies, in order to guarantee compliance with the norm that set deadlines and requirements extremely strict and, also, as a guarantor of independence in the course of investigations.
