Instead of “will be without undue delay,” I would use “will immediately.” As the GDPR is a legal norm of European law, the terms it contains must be interpreted autonomously (ECJ, judgment of 10.01.1980 – C-69/79; ECJ, judgment of 07.02.1979 – C-11/76). No definition in the legislation of the Member States can be used as a congruent definition of the term in question in European law. On the basis of a review of general and legal dictionaries and case law, it is very difficult to argue that a particular expression that does not use certain units of time has a precise meaning that should be used in a particular situation to the exclusion of other expressions. For example, legal dictionaries tend to treat “promptly” and “immediately” as the same meaning. Another factor that adds to the confusion is the use of variations of expressions that may convey the same meaning. For example, there are the terms often used “as soon as practicable”, while the phrases “as soon as practicable” and “as soon as reasonably practicable having regard to the circumstances” have been used. 1. Shortest time frame: In this category, what needs to be done must be done before anything else. In order to meet a requirement that sets this period, it is necessary to stop the activities in progress in order to do the thing. No delay in the execution of the required element is allowed. “as soon as possible”: While there are many instances where this term has been interpreted as “within a reasonable time”[2], there is also a general perception that it means “immediately”.

2. Something must be done quickly – taking into account the circumstances: in this category, what needs to be done must be done quickly, but other things can be done first if the delay is justifiable in the circumstances. The nature and importance of the thing to be done and other objective and subjective factors are factors to be taken into account in determining the speed with which the thing should be done. The trader must send the consumer a bank statement without delay at the end of each period. With regard to Article 34(1) of the GDPR, the European Data Protection Board comments on the term in its WP 250 adopted by the Article 29 Working Party on Guidelines for the notification of personal data breaches under Regulation 2016/679: The GDPR states that notification of a breach to individuals must be made “promptly”, that is, as soon as possible (p. 20). The use of the phrase “as soon as something happens”, for example, a person must do something “as soon as he or she becomes aware of a factual situation” is problematic. This expression is usually meant to mean that the thing must be done immediately after something else has happened. The problem with this approach is that it literally requires the thing to be done at the moment the sentence condition is met. The problem can be avoided by inserting an “after” and using one of the recommended terms for this category. In other words, a person must do something “immediately after becoming aware of a factual situation.” However, there may be instances where adding “immediately after” may increase the complexity of the sentence to an undesirable degree. In these cases, the use of only “as soon as” would be acceptable.

Immediately following registration as a limited liability company in Manitoba, a partnership must send a notice to all existing clients informing them of the registration and explaining generally any changes in partners` liability arising from registration. The recommended terms to describe this period are “as soon as possible” and “as soon as circumstances permit”. “As soon as possible” is also an alternative, but keep in mind that it is a term rarely used outside of legal texts. The GDPR mentions the term “without delay (unreasonable)” in several places. This term is found, inter alia, in Article 5(1)(d) GDPR, according to which data that are inaccurate in relation to the purposes for which they are processed must be deleted or corrected immediately. In addition, Article 12 para. 3 GDPR, that requests for rights from data subjects must be processed immediately, but in any event within one month of receipt of the request. In addition, a processor shall inform the controller without undue delay if it considers that an instruction infringes the GDPR or other Union or Member State data protection provisions (Article 28(3) of the GDPR) and the notification of a personal data breach to the supervisory authority must in principle be made immediately (Article 33, paragraph 1 GDPR).

In accordance with Article 34(1) of the GDPR, the controller shall, without undue delay, notify the data subject of the personal data breach. The case law of the Court of Justice of the European Communities does not provide for clear time limits for the term `undue delay`. As this is an implementation decision in another area of law, the CJEU considered that the term “without delay” was not compatible with a period of several weeks or, as in the present case, several months because of its usual meaning in everyday language (CJEU, judgment of 05.09.2019, C-443/18, consideration 38). In another judgment, the Court held that the use of the expression “without delay” does not set a specific time limit within which measures must be taken. Although it requires swift action, it leaves room for interpretation (ECJ, judgment of 18.11.1999, C-151/98 P, recital 25). The recommended terms to describe this period are “immediately” and “immediately”. These words should only be used when immediate action is possible. If customer service allows the person who has the obligation to meet the deadline to do other things before complying with the obligation, the terms should be used in the following category. It is clear that the concept of `without delay` requires a case-by-case assessment, taking into account the individual circumstances and conditions of the individual case, and is not the subject of a strict conceptual definition defining specific absolute time limits within which an action must take place. I just saw your tweet where you prefer “will be immediate” to “will be without undue delay.” .