Toronto-Dominion Bank (TD) has told some members of its financial crimes and risk management team that it will roll out software to track how they spend time on work applications, according to a recording of a team call reviewed by Reuters and an internal document the bank provided to staff.
The program, provided by ActiveOps and called WorkiQ, will collect information on time spent in web browsers and in the bank's internal chat and meeting tools, the recording indicates. TD officials said the tool is intended to restore visibility into workflows and team capacity in an environment where many colleagues continue to work remotely or on a hybrid basis since the pandemic.
TD responded to questions from Reuters saying the move is "standard practice across the industry." In a statement the bank said: "In various parts of our business, we use automated solutions to improve insights and better allocate resources. This is not AI and not specific to any business or matter, the tool allows managers to more accurately manage workflows, team capacity and performance. Where deployed, colleagues are informed about where they are used and for what purpose." The bank added that it has safeguards in place to protect colleagues' privacy.
On the call, Deanna Pacitti, TD's associate vice president of high-risk investigations, said the tool will highlight operational "pain points" and areas where staff spend excessive time. "The idea is it’s going to show pain points, where do we spend too much time ... We know we have a lot of pain points across our systems," she told the group.
Pacitti said WorkiQ "is running in the background and it did go through privacy review." She addressed questions about whether the software would listen to conversations during meetings by saying the tool would not record meeting audio. Instead, it would indicate whether an employee was active in a meeting. She later clarified that "being active" referred to participation in a meeting. As another example, Pacitti said the application will note when a user is working in Excel but will not capture the contents of spreadsheets.
Employees on the call raised several concerns, including how the system will define and report activity, whether colleagues will be asked to consent to monitoring, and whether the data could be applied to performance evaluations. One participant suggested the resources used to monitor activity might be better deployed to reduce manual processes that currently consume staff time. Pacitti agreed the team spends too much on manual work and expressed hope the tool could provide evidence to justify process improvements.
An undated Frequently Asked Questions document shared with employees says TD expects WorkiQ will help managers recover transparency that was lost when teams shifted to remote work. The FAQ answers questions such as "Can I use the Internet during my lunch hour?" and "How much time is a colleague expected to have accounted for during the day?" The bank wrote that there will be an acceptable amount of unaccounted-for time and that it is working to define those expectations.
Reuters was not able to determine how many employees will be affected by the rollout or whether the deployment would be limited to staff in Canada. A source who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter said approximately 90 to 100 people were on the team call; Reuters could not independently verify that number.
ActiveOps describes WorkiQ on its website as a solution for "employee and wellbeing intelligence." The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment made through the channels available to Reuters.
TD has expanded its financial crimes and compliance unit in recent years following a record fine related to money laundering breaches in the United States, the largest such penalty paid by a major Canadian bank, the internal discussion noted. The bank's broader effort to modernize and allocate resources more effectively underpins the stated rationale for introducing automated monitoring in parts of the business.
The rollout at TD occurs amid growing scrutiny of employee monitoring practices across industries. The Financial Times reported in March that JPMorgan was beginning to monitor hours of junior investment bankers, with the bank saying it was intended for staff well-being. Separately, Meta has scaled back aspects of a plan to collect mouse movements, keystrokes and other actions for use as AI training data after staff pushback, according to reporting seen by Reuters.
On the TD call, colleagues asked whether consent would be sought and how the collected metrics would be used beyond capacity planning. TD's FAQ and Pacitti's remarks emphasized that colleagues are notified where such tools are used and for what purpose, while asserting that the deployment is not AI and is intended to inform managers' allocation of work.
Summary of what TD says the tool will and will not do:
- Will track time spent in browsers, internal chat and meeting applications.
- Will indicate whether an employee is active in a meeting, but will not record meeting audio.
- Will register when a user is working in applications such as Excel, but will not capture the contents of spreadsheets.
- Has undergone a privacy review and will be accompanied by safeguards, according to TD.
The announcement and subsequent employee questions underline tensions between efforts to improve operational efficiency and concerns about monitoring and privacy in hybrid work arrangements. TD says the tool's intent is to provide managers with better visibility to manage workflows and team performance, while staff are pressing for clarity on consent, data usage and whether monitoring resources might be better spent automating manual tasks.