Sacked DepressioNet Employees Urged to Join Creditors Meeting
18 March 2010 at 3:58 pm
The former CEO of the now defunct online DepressionNet service has urged the organisation’s sacked employees to attend a creditors meeting on Friday 19th March in Melbourne.
Former DepressioNet CEO, Terry Houguet-Pincham has encouraged his former colleagues via the social networking site Facebook to come along to the creditors meeting on Friday and complete the creditor forms as soon as possible listing their entitlements including annual leave entitlements and superannuation. The meeting will be run by PKF, the chartered accountants appointed as administrators.
DepressioNet, an online resource for people living with depression, was forced to close its doors on March 9th due to the perceived costly implications of legal action being taken against the Not for Profit.
DepressioNet sent out a notice to all its supporters on Thursday (11/03) saying the organisation had been placed into Voluntary Administration due to legal proceedings.
It says the administrators had spent the previous 24 hours trying to negotiate with the claimant but they were unsuccessful, forcing DepressioNet to close its doors.
Houguet-Pincham says 25 valuable employees are now unemployed and 80 volunteers are without an organisation to support and wonderful donors, academics and a service delivery organisation have been abandoned.
He says that as for the people DepressioNet helped he feels incredibly sad as they are now without a valuable resource.
In December, the Australian Privacy Commissioner launched a formal investigation into DepressioNet after ABC News revealed that private conversations and transcripts of counselling could be accessed through the internet.
The Privacy Commissioner Karen Curtis told Pro Bono Australia News that the apparent release of people’s health information through the DepressionNet website last year is a matter of concern.
Curtis says her Office is currently investigating the issue.
