⚖️ Payments company PAYONE GmbH says it cannot “properly prepare” for October 2026 trial. The appeal court says both sides should prepare!

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A long-running employment claim against PAYONE GmbH, the German payments company within the wider Worldline group, remains listed for a final hearing in October 2026 after a UK appeal court took urgent case-management action.

The case, valued at £1.1 million by Payone’s opposition, is listed for a 7 day trial following successful 2024 and 2025 appeals..

PAYONE had argued that the October hearing was no longer workable because of a pending appeal process concerning the final List of Issues for the trial. The company’s position was that the parties could not “properly prepare” until that appeal process had been resolved.

However, the appellate court has now expedited the appeal hearing so that it can take place before the October trial. It stated that both parties should proceed on the assumption that the October 2026 final hearing will take place and should prepare accordingly.

PAYONE’s lawyers have since written to the lower court to say that the October trial remains unworkable. As things stand PAYONE will have to attend and defend the claim or risk losing the claim.

📌 Why this matters

This is not just a timetable dispute.

The claim has been running since 2021. It concerns serious allegations spanning a four-year employment period, including a lengthy period of alleged race-related mistreatment and injury.

There is also a wider context.

Before the October 2026 trial has taken place, PAYONE has pursued aggressive litigation and enforcement steps against its former employee. Mr Logo told Loopline Media that PAYONE should attend the October trial and defend the claims openly. He said:

“I may not succeed. That is for the court to decide. But the trial should happen. Once the evidence is heard, the parties will have a much clearer view of who owes what amount.”

At the first 2023 trial, eight PAYONE witnesses were flown into London from Frankfurt to defend the claims. It now appears that witnesses may again be required to give evidence likely from the officces PAYONE’s lawyers. Decision attached.

Follow Loopline media and keep up with updates on this important case.

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Post-Brexit: data protection
Card processor sends sensitive data to wrong address
24 August 2022

Worldline SA subsidiary Payone GmbH has been accused of breaching data protection rules after it sent sensitive employee payroll information to the wrong address by accident. The Worldline Group holdS a 60% stake in the Frankfurt based company who have a small UK market presence.

In June 2021, one of Payone GmbH’s ex UK employees (the data subject) received a “potential data breach notification” from the firm advising him that his salary, National Insurance data, nationality (Special Category Data) was amongst various bits of information sent to an incorrect home address.

This included personal information such as the former employees name, age and address.  It also included details such as the date of birth and the amount of annual work bonus he received in his bank account amongst other identifiable data.

Payone GmbH confirmed that this document was sent out in error following an employee making a mistake when re-entering data processed by their third-party payroll provider.  The error arose when the employee was fulfilling an Article 15 GDPR request. The error was spotted by the data subject when he noticed in an email version of the document that the postal address was incorrect. An attempt to notify Payone GmbH of the error went in vain as the document was already irretrievably despatched.

The data subject was alarmed with the incident which exposed him to the possibility of fraudulent activity, amidst reasonable fears his data could end up on the dark web and used by criminals.  Habitually resident in the UK he complained to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) in June 2021. He similarly raised the concern in Germany via The Hessian Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information (HBDI).

The ICO reprimanded Payone GmbH for the error in their final decision letter.
Similarly, the HBDI cited a violation of Article 5(f) of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) relating to integrity and confidentiality.

The ICO stated in their July 2021 findings that Payone GmbH, “should take steps to ensure that all personal data records are accurate and up to date. Holding inaccurate information, such as addresses, does increase the risk of personal data breaches and poses risks to the security of information”.

The HBDI confirmed in their October 2021 findings that Payone GmbH had taken remedial action. They concluded that a monetary fine would not be imposed on Payone GmbH as they had taken technical and organisational steps in response to the data breach. Data subjects could now request their data in an autonomous portal.

The GDPR, which came into effect in 2018, gave the Information Commissioner’s Office greater powers to tackle data breaches. The new ‘UK GDPR’ charts its own course after Brexit whilst seeking to maintain EU GDPR adequacy.  In extreme scenarios, organisations face penalties of up to £20m or 4 per cent of their global worldwide turnover, whichever is more.

In the years prior to GDPR, the ICO fines were capped at £500,000.

The data subject said: “I am just glad I spotted it; they were going to resend the document again to another wrong address. Prior to Brexit the process would have been commenced via the ICO who in turn would liaise with the HBDI on the data subjects’ behalf; but I found myself communicating with both authorities separately which was an additional step but in the end was surprisingly
effective. Unfortunately, Payone GmbH again sent my incorrect address to the
Workers Pension Trust in January 2022, and documents yet again went to the wrong address. In my opinion they have not learned from the first time and my complaint is sitting with the ICO yet again”.

The former employee is pursuing a remedy under Article 82 UK GDPR via
the Court’s of England & Wales.

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