Guest benjymous Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 Since I moved into a new house 9 months ago, we've regularly had lots of marketing calls. We registered with the BT's privacy thingy, and got caller display enabled, which stopped all the UK based callers, but we still get lots of calls that seem to originate from overseas call centres (typically India, judging by their accents) The phone displays "Out of Area" when we recieve such calls, so we at least know what to expect, but it's very annoying when we can get up to 7-8 calls per day. This evening my fiancee answered the phone, and immediately asked who the caller was representing. The reply was T Mobile / "Moco Direct" I've checked them out online, and they seem to be a perfectly legit phone reseller, with no obvious bad vibes about them on the google searches I've done. Is there anything we can do to get removed from their database? Are they breaking UK laws, or is using an overseas call centre a nice little loophole for them? I'm wondering if they're also in breach of the data protection act, as we have told them on numerous occasions that we're not interested, and requested to be removed from their database, but the calls continue. I'm guessing the D.P.A. wouldn't apply either as the callers aren't in the UK. Does anyone have any suggestions? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest fluffcat1 Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 Does BT privacy include membership of the Telephone Preference Service? Register all your numbers with them, and if you get a cold call after their database has been distributed they will take action for you against UK call centres. With the Foreign ones, get the name of the company they are calling on behalf off, the time and date of the call, the reference for the list they obtained your details from and if possible the name of the marketing company making the call and kickup a stink with their UK office mentioning the TPS and Ofcom. Richard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest benjymous Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 Does BT privacy include membership of the Telephone Preference Service? Yup - it's just TPS + free caller ID. With the Foreign ones, get the name of the company they are calling on behalf off, the time and date of the call, the reference for the list they obtained your details from and if possible the name of the marketing company making the call and kickup a stink with their UK office mentioning the TPS and Ofcom. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yup, that's pretty much what I'd presumed. I've got an 0800 number for their UK customer service department, so we'll be in touch with them Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest rickt Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 I used to get loads of these marketing calls ,some on a Sunday at 9-30am , others as late as 10-00 pm . I was given two numbers to ring ,both free call and automated .I registered my number and I can honestly say I've only had two calls since [both american]. I registered last Jan [2005] , I'm supposed to register once a year , but still have had no marketing calls,so , I'll wait awhile before ringing them again. The services are Telephone Preference Service and the other Silent Call . I have the numbers somewhere on this Pc. If you need them let me know . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hotphil Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 Some'll still get through even if you take the steps above. I have two responses to them, either just scream "NO" at the top of my voice and hang up as soon as it's clear who they are, or (if I have the time) let them give me their little pitch and then say "hang on, let me get a pen" and just put the phone to one side (not hang up, just leave them listening to nothing until they hang up). Oh, and there's this too: http://www.xs4all.nl/~egbg/counterscript.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Samsonite Posted January 30, 2006 Report Share Posted January 30, 2006 Some'll still get through even if you take the steps above. I have two responses to them, either just scream "NO" at the top of my voice and hang up as soon as it's clear who they are, or (if I have the time) let them give me their little pitch and then say "hang on, let me get a pen" and just put the phone to one side (not hang up, just leave them listening to nothing until they hang up). Oh, and there's this too: http://www.xs4all.nl/~egbg/counterscript.html <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Once my mate has sussed its a sales call, he passes the phone to his 4 year old son - who proceeds in telling the salesschmuck about Action Man and his spiderman superloop car track!!! we registerd with TPS and Silent call and havent had a marketing call in years - prior to that it was at least a dozen a month!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest rickt Posted January 31, 2006 Report Share Posted January 31, 2006 In responce to hotphil ,the first step would not be of any good to most of my calls as they were recorded messages. Most of these started "congratulations , you've just won a holiday or car".If I just put the phone down , would you believe two or three minutes later if I picked the phone up , their recorded voice was still rabiting away . Anyway , the 2 numbers I rang really stopped these sort of calls. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest drblow Posted February 1, 2006 Report Share Posted February 1, 2006 I have a part-time job in a call centre for a well known 'market research' company. We do not sell anything, wew merely conduct research ... the fact that the research is often used to sell you stuff at a later time is not our responsibility! :D I have a fair bit of experience with data protection & that, so here's my 2 cents ... The reality is your phone number (& nearly everybody's), address, mobile number, post code, age, occupation, eductation history, etc etc is a valuable commodity. Nearly every compnay in the world from the biggest to some of the smallest, uses cold calling for sales & 'market research'. Often in research, companies are only really interested in finding out people's occupation & address in order to target various levels of society based on income - eg. tesco will often do research based on area codes known to contain a larger amount of council/rented housing. Companies want to know your phone number so they can ring you to sell you stuff, they want your address so they can send you ofers for stuff, they want your age & occupation so they can sned you the RIGHT stuff, stuff that you REALLY want because demographics suggest that you are interested in stuff!! :D In order to get this information people need phone numbers, adresses etc. and they pay big bucks to get 'em. My company does 'Market Research'. The data protection laws have been slightly bent in favour of research companies because we do research for govt & local authority (sometimes :D ). Our phone operators often have to deal with irate people who have registered with TPS & what have you. As we are a 'research' company under data protection law we are allowed to use what is known as Random Digit Dialling. We buy a certain amount of randomly generated telephone numbers based on area codes (research is often split into dialling code regions for eg. local council research etc). We do not have access to the numbers in a written format on paper or on a computer, they are simply fed into our automated dialling system & sent to a room full of people attached to headsets (I use the term 'people' in a general sense! :) ). These people do not see your name/number/address/postcode/ etc etc - they see a screen with an introduction written on it & a button to press if you say yes to the research! The reason for all this is as follows ... market research companies of all kinds do all kinds of research, most of which is sponsored by govt/local authority ... ultimately on behalf of some company or other. Because the govt is the biggest single user of market research statistics it was decided that under data protection law 'research' companies could do the above in order to be able to carry out what the market research society calls 'proportional representation' - that means we are obliged to present statistics broken down into area/age range/occupation/etc etc. In order that we do not EXCLUDE anyone from important govt/local authority research which may be of relevance to them, we are allowed to dial random numbers, but we cannot get physical access to them as a database or anything. What we are also obliged to do under data protection law is to keep a copy of a person's signature if we are to keep their name/telephone number etc etc in ANY kind of a database. Therefore, if we dial your number ... and you answer saying that you are registered with TPS, and where did we get your number etc etc :), then we are required to get you to WRITE to us with your name & phone number & SIGNATURE, so that under the law we CAN KEEP YOUR DETAILS - this enables the other program which the numbers run through before they hit the automatic dialler that removes numbers held in our database of 'people who don't want called ever again'!! Get it??!!?? To put it simply ... we don;t HAVE your number. It;s RANDOMLY generated by a super-computer then sold to us in batches ... its then out into our AUTOMATED dialing system & connected to little tiny phone people who CANNOT see your number or name or anything ... in order for us to NOT contact you again we need to have your SIGNATURE saying that it's OK for us to KEEP your number so that we can check it against our RANDOM numbers before we start dialling them. I know, it's a daft law ... but that's the reality & I'm not entirely sure how that affects companies that are actually trying to sell you stuff. So, to get back to the actual question, what you should do is register with TPS. It's free & fairly quick. Then, when somone rings that you dont want to ring you back you can politely inform them you are on TPS. If they are purely a sales company they should back off insantly. If not, then they should offer you something like I have mentioned above. If not, then ask for a supervisor & tell them to remove your number. They have to under law. No legitimate company will ever refuse & it should be rarae to get any that do. But do me a favour ... everybody ... :D ... the next time the phone rings & its a research company ... just listen to them for a moment ... just a moment ... you never know, there could be a time when your local authority actually does ask questions about an issue that is important to you. I know it sounds crazy but its true! :D There is nothing more frustrating than working on a survey that was about the road I lived on, and the park I walked my dog in, and listening to people talking in the local about the council closing it down & selling the land etc etc, and then come the actual survey about it on the phone ... 72% of the local area code refused to take part saying they 'weren't interested in doing a survey'. Needless to say the park closed soon after. So go on ... just listen to them for a wee moment ... you can always say no once you hear that it's a "lifestyle" survey about "topical" issues. :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest benjymous Posted February 1, 2006 Report Share Posted February 1, 2006 In reply to drblow, we did register with the TPS, about 6 months ago, yet still get a constant barage of marketing calls, all from overseas (which we presume is a handy loophole if they don't have to comply with UK laws) However, we think we've had a result. Yesterday my fiancee phoned up "Moco Direct" and ended up speaking with their head of marketing, who was very appolgetic, and said he'd do everything he could to make sure the calls wouldn't continue (and was shocked when he was told that we *had* registered with TPS yet their marketing calls were continuing) He made sure we've got his name and a direct phone number to him, and told us to let him know if the calls continue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest drblow Posted February 1, 2006 Report Share Posted February 1, 2006 Phoning from abroad does not exempt companies from following UK data protection/privacy laws, so don't let anyone tell you otherwise. I'm glad you have managed to sort it out with a manager, and I am also suprised that you were still being 'baraged' with calls after TPS registration - it is usually very good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest rickt Posted February 1, 2006 Report Share Posted February 1, 2006 interesting reading drblow, I always knew about the automated dialers ,I didn't know about the data protection bit. cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hotphil Posted February 1, 2006 Report Share Posted February 1, 2006 Phoning from abroad does not exempt companies from following UK data protection/privacy laws, so don't let anyone tell you otherwise. I thought the DPA only applied to UK data? Surely randomly dialling someone in the UK from a number outside the UK can't be subject to the DPA? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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