Speak Up FAQ
Answers to the questions people ask when raising a concern through Speak Up,
handling one as an adviser, or setting the channel up.
For what the app is and how the pieces fit together, see the
Speak Up Overview.
Reporting a concern
Is my report really anonymous?
Yes, if you choose Anonymous — no identity is stored, you keep a reference code. No account, name or user reference is saved against the report, and the app refuses to store one. Every reply you send is stored with no author, so nobody can work out who wrote it later.
I lost my reference code — can I get another one?
No. The code is shown once, on the screen immediately after you submit, and it cannot be re-issued or looked up. Copy it somewhere safe at that moment. If you lose it on an anonymous report, submit a new report and say in it that an earlier one exists.
Who actually reads what I write?
Only the designated adviser panel your organisation has named, plus anyone a panel member explicitly grants access to that single report. No administrator screen opens a report. Every time someone opens a report body it is recorded, including who and when.
If I choose Confidential, who sees my name?
Only the adviser panel. A panel member can bring someone else into your report — an investigator or a specialist. That person sees the report but not your name; they are shown “Confidential reporter”. Choosing Open — your name is also shown to anyone the panel brings in to help investigate is the only option that shares your name more widely.
How long before someone responds to my report?
Your organisation must acknowledge it within its acknowledgement window, at most 7 days. It must then give you feedback on what is being done within at most 3 months — that feedback can come while the investigation is still open, and the report then shows Feedback given. Both clocks start automatically and the panel is alerted when either is missed. Check progress any time with your reference code.
I reported anonymously but nothing shows under My Reports — is it lost?
It isn’t lost. My Reports lists only reports you filed while signed in under Confidential or Open, because those are the only ones that carry your identity. An anonymous report deliberately has no link to your account, so use Check a Report and your reference code instead.
Can I attach photos or documents to my report?
Yes. Under Files (optional) you can add photos, videos, audio or PDFs — up to 10 at a time and 200 MB in all, 20 MB each, videos up to 50 MB — to your report or to a reply in its follow-up thread, in Workforce, on a phone or on the public reporting page. Only the adviser panel and anyone they give access to your report can open them. Photos are stripped of their location, time and device details before they are stored; videos, audio and PDFs keep their content and lose the location and device details saved inside the file where the file allows it, and a fillable PDF form is kept exactly as you send it. On an anonymous report nothing links the files to you, and unless your report is Open their file names are replaced. You cannot change or remove a file once it is sent; the panel, or an investigator it brings in, can remove one, and your report then says so.
Can I report if I’ve left the company or I’m a contractor?
Yes, if your organisation has switched on its public reporting page. That page needs no account and takes anonymous reports only. You get a reference code the same way, and return to the same page to read replies. Ask the organisation for the address, or look for it on a notice at your site.
Handling a case
This report seems to be about me — what should I do?
Step away from it using Recuse on the case page. Recusing is immediate and permanent: you lose the case, its thread and its evidence, and it disappears from your Cases list. If you are the last adviser who could still handle that case, the app refuses the recusal rather than leave the report with nobody. If the panel later changes so that everyone on it has recused from a report, the people named under Who is told when the Speak Up channel stops working (by default, Speak Up’s app admins, or every business administrator when none are designated) are told that one report has nobody who can handle it — never which one — so they can add an adviser.
Can I bring a colleague into one case without adding them to the panel?
Yes — use Case Access on the case page to grant that one person access. Viewer can read the case and its thread and take no action; Investigator can also post to the reporter’s thread as the panel. You can set an expiry date, and you can revoke a grant at any time.
Why can’t I close this case?
Because it has already been referred, or already closed. A case referred for handling elsewhere reaches its final state at the moment of referral, so closing it afterwards would record the outcome twice. The refusal message on the case page names which of the two applies.
Why can’t I attach evidence to this case?
Because the case is no longer open, or its content has already been removed under the retention policy. Evidence can only be added while a case is open — on the case page by panel members and Investigator grantees, and by the reporter with their report or a follow-up reply. Photos have their location and camera details stripped automatically, so an anonymous reporter is never exposed by a file.
Why did a case disappear from my Cases or Shared with Me list?
Three things remove it: you recused yourself, your per-case grant was revoked or expired, or you left the adviser panel group. Recusal is the only one that cannot be undone. If a case you expect is missing and none of those apply, ask an administrator whether the panel group has changed.
Setting up the channel
I turned Speak Up on, but reporters are told it isn’t accepting reports — why?
Because no usable adviser panel is designated, and the app deliberately refuses reports it has nobody to give them to. The usual causes: no Panel group chosen, the chosen group has no members in it, the group reaches too much of the company, or the group picks its members per location. Open Speak Up settings — the panel card names which one applies.
Why can’t I choose “All Employees” as the adviser panel?
Because a panel that is most of the company is not a panel. It would give nearly every employee read access to every disclosure, including its subject. A group of 10 people or fewer is always accepted; above that, it must reach fewer than half the active people in your business.
Can administrators read reports?
Not through any administrator screen — case access comes only from panel membership or a per-case grant. The honest caveat: choosing the panel group is an administrator setting, so an administrator who designates a group containing themselves becomes an adviser. Choosing the group, and editing its member list, are recorded in the audit log. Someone who joins a role- or attribute-based group because their own role changed is not, so review its membership just as carefully.
How do I open the public reporting page for contractors and ex-employees?
It is on as soon as Speak Up is enabled and the adviser panel resolves: anyone with the address can file an anonymous report with no account. The address is on Speak Up settings under Public reporting address; to close it, switch the Speak Up portal off in your tenant’s portal catalogue. Switching it off closes new submissions only: the status page at /speak-up/status keeps working for anyone holding a reference code, including employees who filed inside Workforce and have since left the organisation.
What are the limits on the clocks and the retention period?
| Setting | Accepts | Default |
|---|---|---|
| Acknowledgement window (days) | 1–7 | 7 |
| Feedback window (days) | 1–90 | 90 |
| Retention after closure (months) | 1–240 | 60 |
A value outside a range is pulled back into it rather than honoured. The feedback deadline is additionally capped at three calendar months from the acknowledgement, which can be a day earlier than 90 days.
What happens to a report when the retention period ends?
An automatic purge clears the report text, the whole message thread and any attached evidence, and switches off any remaining per-case access. What survives is the minimal register row an auditor needs: reference code, category, dates, status and outcome. The record of what happened and when also stays, with its details blanked. Nothing that was removed is recoverable afterwards. To keep a case’s content past its retention date — for a tribunal or a regulator — a panel member places a legal hold on it from the case page; a held case is never purged until the hold is lifted.
More help
- Speak Up Overview
- Check a Report in Speak Up — follow any report with its reference code
- Speak Up settings — panel, reporting modes, clocks, retention and the register
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