What Is My Workflow for Responding to Privacy Requests?

Optacy automates several steps; others happen in your systems or with your team. A typical response workflow:

1. Review the request

You receive an email when a request arrives. Open View Request to see the Details screen.

• For toll-free number (voicemail) requests, listen to the recording and categorize rights by checking the appropriate boxes. Checking a right writes to the Audit Trail and can fire a webhook.
• For webform requests, Details already shows the rights the consumer selected. You can still trigger webhooks on receipt for automation.

After review, you may set status to Pending and add a compliance note naming who owns the request.

2. Acknowledge the request

Many laws expect acknowledgement within a short window (for example CCPA’s 10 days).

• Webform: Optacy can send acknowledgement automatically.
• Toll-free number: Enter the requester email on Details and send the verification email. When the consumer verifies within the allowed window, Optacy marks Acknowledged and records it in the Audit Trail.

If automatic acknowledgement does not complete, document your manual steps and check Acknowledged yourself.

3. Verify the requester’s identity

Required for most rights except typical Do Not Sell / general “tell me more” responses that disclose no personal information.

If email verification is your method, mark Verified after verification (or let Smart Actions do it). For other methods, handle identity outside Optacy and include the Request ID in consumer communications. For agent-submitted requests, follow your internal authorization process and attach documents to compliance notes as needed.

4. Extend the deadline (optional)

If you need more time, inform the consumer why, then check Extended in the dashboard so Optacy updates the due date per your Jurisdiction Rules.

5. Complete the request

Fulfill via Optacy automation/integrations or manually in your systems. Always include the Request ID when emailing the consumer. For data access, use a secure delivery method (for example an encrypted archive with a one-time password channel).

6. Document disposition

Set Completion Status (Fulfilled, Spam, Withdrawn, Unverifiable, Other, and so on). Add a short compliance note describing what happened, and attach documents when you need a fuller record.