Job References and Data Protection: What Was Said About You
22 April 2026 · Mary Molloy Solicitors
The reference is a strange document: nobody has to write it, everybody fears it, and the subject traditionally never sees it. Data protection law has changed that last part more than employers realise — and negotiated exits have changed the rest.
The baseline rules
Irish employers generally owe no duty to provide a reference, which is why many give bare statements of dates and role. Where a reference is given, duties attach: it must be accurate and fair, honest but not gratuitously damaging — a document that torpedoes a candidacy with unfounded commentary generates liability in several directions at once, defamation and data protection among them.
Seeing what was written
A reference about you is your personal data. Requests can be directed to the new employer who received it (where the balancing usually favours disclosure to you) and to the old employer who gave it — where confidential-reference arguments arise and are weighed rather than absolute. The practical result: employers should write every reference on the assumption its subject will read it, because increasingly, the subject can.
The negotiated answer
In settlement and severance negotiations the reference stops being a risk and becomes a term: an agreed reference, worded and scheduled to the agreement, with all enquiries directed to a named person who provides it verbatim. It costs the employer nothing, removes the employee's largest practical anxiety, and eliminates the data protection and defamation uncertainty on both sides. There is rarely a good reason to leave an exit without one — and we do not.
Read more in our main guide: GDPR in Employment Disputes · or back to the blog.
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