The District Court of North Holland has declared inadmissible a request by a pensioner to inspect personal data held by the General Civil Pension Fund (ABP). This means that the court will not assess the substance of the request. The applicant should first have asked the ABP to provide the data, which he failed to do.
The applicant wanted the court to order the ABP to provide personal data. In doing so, he invoked the right of access under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). He was interested in all calculations for his pension benefits. He also wanted these calculations to be explained and their accuracy and completeness to be confirmed. In addition, the applicant wanted ABP to provide a calculation of his pension in ten years' time, after the introduction of the new pension system.
The court finds that, based on the relevant legal provisions, the applicant should first have requested the ABP to provide the personal data. He failed to do so. The request cannot therefore be assessed on its merits and is declared inadmissible.
Even if the request were to be assessed on its merits, the court ruled that it must be rejected. This is because the request does not concern access to personal data, but rather information about pension calculations. The GDPR is not intended for this purpose. Pension calculations are not personal data as defined in the GDPR. Furthermore, the applicant has no objection to the personal data recorded by the ABP.
The ABP is required to inform him about his pension, but the ABP has done so.
Now that the request has been declared inadmissible, the applicant must reimburse the ABP for the legal costs of €2,120. During the proceedings, the applicant stated that he had been advised by a foundation to submit this request, but that he had not been informed of the risk of being ordered to pay the legal costs. The court finds it particularly unfortunate that the applicant was not sufficiently informed about this, but that is no reason to reject the legal costs.
