The 69,000-member, $1.6 billion Technology Credit Union is using tracking technology in emailsit sent to members about its proposed conversion to a bank at therequest of two members opposed to the proposed change.

The San Jose, Calif., credit union informed members in October 2011 that is was considering a conversion. A membervote is expected in September.

NCUA regulations require a credit union considering such achange to facilitate communications from members opposed to thechange to the rest of the membership.

Two members of Technology Credit Union, Robert Marinace and Carlos Rodriguez, elected to respond to therequirement and sent Technology Credit Union email to be sharedwith other members.

Rodriguez and Marinace said they were shocked to discover theiremail arrived in members' mailboxes with tracking technology,called servlets, that allows the credit union to identify and trackmembers who click on links for further information contained in theemail.

Thus, Marinace and Rodriguez said, a member who clicked on alink to a Facebook page belonging to a charter change oppositiongroup could have both the fact they have done so as well as theiridentity collected by Technology Credit Union.

Servlets allow the credit union to collect both the numbers ofmembers that click through to targeted links as well as their emailaddresses, but it is not clear how much information Technology isactually collecting. The credit union has not yet commentedon the servlets.

Servlets have been used as an email marketing tool for years,Rodriguez acknowledged, but added that using them violates creditunion culture which, he contended, generally strives to be moreconsiderate of member privacy. He also argued that thecontext of these particular emails would have argued against theiruse.

“Using a tool like this might be somewhat understandable andappropriate for marking auto loans,” Rodriguez said. “But thesecommunications are not about auto loans. If members whoreveal an interest in preventing their credit union from becoming abank later receive additional materials in favor of the conversion,it puts them at a serious disadvantage.”

Rodriguez also pointed out that NCUA regulations would appearnot to allow servlets to be included in these emails. The relevantpart of NCUA regulations allows a credit union to include aone-paragraph message with their member materials, but nothingelse, he said.

In addition, Rodriguez noted that including the servlets in theemail made them more likely to have been blocked by members' mailprograms which incorrectly identify them as spam because of thenumber of servlets the emails included.

The NCUA has not yet commented on whether its regulations wouldallow the use of servlets and Technology Credit Union has not yetsaid whether it consulted the agency prior to including thetracking software.