January 23, 2017

A Bognor Regis firm broke the law because it called people registered with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS). IT Protect Ltd has been fined £40,000 by the ICO for the offence.

It is the first fine for nuisance calls issued by the ICO since it took over management of the TPS.

Steve Eckersley, ICO head of enforcement, said: “Ironically, this firm was making nuisance calls to people to sell them a call blocking device. But by phoning people registered with the TPS it broke the law and that’s why we’ve issued this fine.

Our investigation was aided by members of the public reporting the nuisance calls they’d received from IT Protect to us. They told us the firm had preyed on the elderly and misled people by giving the impression they were working with BT”.

IT Protect told the ICO it had purchased a list of people and phone numbers from another firm. The ICO’s investigation, which involved support from West Sussex Trading Standards, found IT Protect had not carried out sufficient checks to ensure that the people on the list had given consent to receive the calls.

Regulation 21(1) of the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003, which covers unsolicited calls for direct marketing purposes, states that:

“A person shall neither use, nor instigate the use of, a public electronic communications service for the purposes of making unsolicited calls for direct marketing purposes where—

• the called line is that of a subscriber who has previously notified the caller that such calls should not for the time being be made on that line; or
• the number allocated to a subscriber in respect of the called line is one listed in the register kept under regulation 26”.

In the UK, this means that calls should not be made to anyone who has registered with the TPS unless they have told the caller that they wish to receive such calls from them. Companies failing to screen against the TPS, who then call people without consent, can expect enforcement action by the ICO.

Mr Eckersley said: “Firms must take reasonable steps to ensure the law is followed when they’re buying lists of people’s personal details. IT Protect did not do this, resulting in distress for people receiving the calls – and an ICO fine”.

Nuisance calls can be reported via the online tool on the ICO website, which also details the rules organisations must follow when carrying out direct marketing.

The ICO took over responsibility for overseeing the TPS from Ofcom in December 2016. At the time, Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham said time: “Transfer of the TPS to us will mean complaints to it about rogue cold callers will be passed even more efficiently to our enforcement officers. That will give us more information about the culprits and help in our bid to come down hard on the law breakers and stop nuisance calls”. To read the ICO’s press release in full and for a link to the monetary penalty notice, click here.