Hi, I suspect I am far from being alone with this problem but I am utterly sick & tired of receiving at least one call a day, always from a different geo number regarding, which is an "urgent" recorded message re PPI (which I've NEVER had!)   I have checked on "who calls me" & each one has appeared on there, I have reported one to the ICO but have not even received an acknowledgement yet and the form is so long I really cannot be bothered to do it with each and every one.   I have caller display and NEVER pick up "out of area", "private" or 084/087 calls, I suspect many others do the same so these unscrupulous riffraff have started using this way round it.  The most recent, this afternoon, had a number similar, at first glance, to a family member so I answered.   I was so angry I then tried calling the number (withholding mine) & one gets a message "the number you have dialled is not in service" so it must be an organisation which has access to lists of numbers not currently in use & somehow substitutes these for their own giving themselves a cloak of anonymity.

Has anyone found any way of stopping these calls which are nothing short of harrassment and are illegal as I'm on TPS (who won't do anything as they're not "live" calls"!!)?

Any advice would be gratefully received.

Any call for "marketing purposes" which consists of a recorded message is illegal, whether or not one is registered with the TPS, unless one has given explicit consent to being contacted in this way.

The ICO offers the following guidance on this topic:

http://www.ico.gov.uk/for_the_public/topic_specific_guides/marketing/calls.aspx
http://www.ico.gov.uk/for_organisations/privacy_and_electronic_communications/the_guide/automated_calls.aspx

There is no question that calls such as those described represent a breach of regulation #19 of the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (2003). The ICO assures me that they are doing all they can and have had some successes. I have to respond that the prevelance of this nuisance and the reaction of those whom I speak to (by using the press button x to speak option) suggests that the ICO is not being at all effective.

It is likely that efforts on this issue will fall within the scope of the Campaign for Fair Telecoms - more on which will be revealed shortly.

Thanks for that SCV, I had thought it rather a forlorn hope that anyone had discovered a way of dealing with this or that the ICO was making progress, it's the fact that these probable scammers have realised many people will only answer geo numbers and so are using different geo numbers for each and every call that amazes me, but then I'm not technical.   The Campaign for Fairer Telecoms sounds interesting - will further details appear on this site?

In the last week I have been inundated by these calls (all from different numbers) and none before this date. Having moved some 6 months ago and having a new telephone number it dawned on me that I'm now not TPS protected and that my new number has just probably filtered through the system to these people.

I immediately TPS registered my number. It will be interesting to see what happens over the next few weeks, however Barbara's post gives cause for concern.

SilentCallsVictim wrote on Mar 27^th, 2012 at 8:16am:

There is no question that calls such as those described represent a breach of regulation #19 of the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (2003). The ICO assures me that they are doing all they can and have had some successes. I have to respond that the prevelance of this nuisance and the reaction of those whom I speak to (by using the press button x to speak option) suggests that the ICO is not being at all effective.

Where the ICO takes steps to prevent parties in engaging in the practice of playing recorded messages, theoretically many more people/organisations/scammers could start-up employing the same tactic. There will therefore be a net increase in the number of instances of this practice. Does the fact that others start up mean that the ICO is not effective?



Keith wrote on Mar 27^th, 2012 at 9:04am:

I immediately TPS registered my number. It will be interesting to see what happens over the next few weeks, however Barbara's post gives cause for concern.

At the end of the day, the TPS does not stop or prevent any calls. It maintains a list which marketing organisations must not call.

It is therefore those organisations that are the active element. They must ensure that they don't ring anyone on the list.

Where individuals or organisations are engaging in illegal practices, then I would imagine that they won't be too concerned about the illegal practice of non-compliance with TPS.

Yep familiar with how it works Dave.

Interesting that it went from none* to half a dozen per day overnight 4+ months after being allocated a new number (nearly all ppi). I assume it has taken this time for the number to filter through.

* ignoring the obvious illegal ones.

For calls consisting of a recorded message, TPS registration (or rather the lack of it) makes no difference whatsoever to the legality of the call.

The original purpose of the TPS was to avoid telemarketing companies wasting their time by calling people who would not be inclined to respond positively to the practice. This principle still applies, so what looks like compliance with regulations is nothing more than self interest. That is however not to say that all companies judge it to be worthwhile to only call non-registered numbers.