June 14, 2016

The £180,000-monetary penalty was issued to Advanced VoIP Solutions Ltd as a result of an ICO investigation prompted by 6,381 complaints from the public.

Complainants described receiving recorded messages relating to personal protection insurance, packaged bank accounts and flight delays.  Some even described calls being repeated, sometimes up to 50 per day to single households, even though they had followed instructions in the message to opt out of the calls.

The ICO’s action was part of a wider investigation into a complicated network of companies that included an ICO raid on a call centre in south Manchester.  At the height of the automated call campaign, two phone network providers claimed their services had been disrupted by the large number of calls being made by the business.

Earlier this year an ICO enforcement notice ordered Advanced VoIP to stop making nuisance calls or face legal action.  Investigators suspected the leads generated would have been used by the network of firms involved to make sizable profits.

The ICO reminds readers that the law on making automated calls playing recorded messages is stricter than on other marketing calls.  Organisations can only make automated marketing calls to people who have specifically consented to receiving them.

Steve Eckersley, head of enforcement at the ICO said: “The number of complaints in this case is just a drop in the ocean compared to the millions of calls we think this company has made.  We have sent out a clear message to companies who behave in this way – however much you try and dodge the law, it won’t work, and we will act”.  To read the ICO’s press release in full, click here.