Record Fine Issued to Green Energy Company for Nuisance Calls
Phone calls can be a great way of getting yourself in front of potential customers. They can tap into a huge market that you may not otherwise have had access to. However, if handled badly or recklessly they can also land you in hot water.
Recently the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) handed out its largest fine to date for nuisance calls. The green energy company, Home Energy & Lifestyle Management Ltd (HELM), was fined £200,000 for its campaign advertising free solar panel installations.
The huge scale of this fine represented numerous failings from the company. Including making 6 million automated calls to numbers without obtaining permission, as well as repeated messages to single households. This was all done without providing a way to speak to a live agent or request an end to the messages. It also turns out that the information in the messages may not have been entirely factual.
When confronted about these violations, HELM claimed that they were unaware of the regulations surrounding marketing calls. This, and the 242 complaints made from the public led to the record fine, showing how important it is for firms to get up to speed with the rules.
How to avoid breaking the law
So what can call centres and other organisations do to avoid these problems in the future, whilst still taking advantage of the marketing benefits? The golden rule here is to stay within the law. If you keep within the right boundaries you will not only avoid the fines, but you will provide a better service for your customers as well.
The ICO itself provides a lot of great information on the law, as well as guidance on how to stick to it. For example, its guide to Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations should be the first point of call for marketers.
If you as a business place importance on compliance, which you should, it’s in your interest to use a call provider that maintains the tools to protect you from fines, and your customers from any nuisance calls. Nexbridge Communications provides free TPS compliance on all of its services. TPS cleansing from Nexbridge allows businesses to ensure that they do not make sales and marketing calls to telephone numbers that are registered with the TPS. Thus protecting your company from potentially having to pay a fine of up to £500,000.