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Ofcom welcomes increase to silent calls financial penalty
Ofcom today welcomed Parliament’s decision to increase the financial penalty available to Ofcom to combat silent and abandoned calls, from £50,000 to £2 million.
Ofcom believes that the increased maximum penalty should pose a greater deterrent to companies using automated diallers (which can cause silent and abandoned calls). It will also enable Ofcom to more effectively tackle the serious problem of silent calls, strengthening the level of sanction of those in breach of Ofcom’s rules. The increase to £2 million is also more consistent with Ofcom’s existing fining powers in other areas.
Ofcom Chief Executive Ed Richards said: “Ofcom welcomes the decision to increase the maximum penalty to £2 million for companies breaching rules on silent and abandoned calls.
“The increase reflects the potential seriousness of the harm caused to consumers by the unsolicited and intrusive nature of silent and abandoned calls and enables Ofcom to regulate these activities more effectively.”
Call for stronger powers
Last year Ofcom Chairman Colette Bowe called for stronger powers to clampdown on silent and abandoned calls.
Speaking before a Parliamentary Committee on 16 January 2009, Colette said silent calls were a ‘serious abuse which causes untold concern to older people who are very, very disturbed by silent calls, and it is an unacceptable face of the industry and we need stronger powers to tackle it’.
Enforcement programme
Ofcom has an open monitoring and enforcement programme that seeks to address consumer harm created by silent and abandoned calls. This programme monitors complaints and actively engages with stakeholders. Where informal enforcement action is not effective, Ofcom proceeds to a named investigation and notification and/or fine. This has resulted in action against nine companies to date resulting in financial penalties, including the then maximum of £50,000 to Barclaycard in October 2008.
The increased fine could also be imposed for other forms of persistent telephone misuse such as:
- number scanning;
- withholding calling line identification facilities;
- using systems for dishonest gain; and
- misusing allocated telephone numbers.
- Addressing repeat silent calls
Ofcom is currently consulting on amending its policy on tackling abandoned and silent calls including introducing new rules to address repeat silent calls and will publish a statement shortly.
Ofcom’s research found that where the frequency of calls was mentioned in a complaint, over 70 per cent of consumers complaining about silent calls stated that they received two or more silent calls per day from the same company, often over a period of days or weeks. Ofcom believes that this is mainly due to technology used to detect answer machines which can mistake a live consumer for an answering machine and cut off the call without the person hearing anything, resulting in a silent call.
The proposed new rules would limit the number of times companies which use answer machine detection are able to call consumers within a certain period.
Commenting on the statement today on enforcement action on silent calls from the Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS), Communications Consumer Panel Chair, Anna Bradley said:
"BIS has listened to our advice and we are delighted that Ofcom can now fine companies up to £2 million for making persistent silent calls. Consumers will now be better protected from the anxiety and annoyance that silent calls bring."
