A SCOTS firm which flouted data regulations by making more than 100,000 nuisance cold-calls to people has been fined by an information rights body.
Glasgow-based Xternal Property Renovations has been fined £80,000 for making nuisance phone calls to more than 109,000 people registered to an opt-out service.
The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) says there had been complaints about calls from early in the morning to late at night.
They say they broke the law by making the calls to people who had registered with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) to opt out of receiving marketing calls.calls.
The ICO said the firm should have screened the list of people it planned to call against the details of TPS subscribers and made sure its telesales staff knew how to comply with the law.
ICO said one complainer about the Glasgow firm said: “I get these calls from early in the morning until late at night. I’m disabled and I worry about these calls.”
Another said: “I was concerned about how this company got my details – particularly my name. My number is TPS-registered and has been ex-directory for more than 30 years.”
Xternal Property Renovations has also been issued with a legal notice compelling it to stop instigating the unlawful marketing calls.
ICO also fined PRS Media, trading as Purus Digital, £140,000 for sending about 4.4 million spam texts.
The ICO found the company - based in Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire - did not have the consent of the people it sent marketing texts to.
The information it used to send text messages had been obtained from its own competition website, where people were required to agree to marketing as a condition of entering competitions on the firm's website.
The ICO, however, said this did not amount to consent as the law states people must have a genuine choice over whether or not to consent to marketing.
Ken Macdonald, head of ICO regions, said: "Nuisance marketing, whether it's by calls to people's landline or mobile, or through spam texts, causes disruption, annoyance and, in the worst cases, serious upset.
"We issue fines like these to firms behind nuisance marketing to send a clear message that such action will not be tolerated.
"The ICO is looking forward to the commencement of our new powers, announced by the government last year, which will allow us to fine the directors of nuisance marketing firms as well as the companies themselves."
Xternal Property Renovations were approached for comment.
Alex Neill, Which? home services managing director said of the fines: “Companies that pester people with unlawful nuisance calls and spam texts are rightly being held to account by the regulator.
“The Government has promised further powers to fine directors who allow this to happen. These proposals should come into force as soon as possible to crack down on this modern menace.”
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