Last week it was reported that the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) had handed out a £300,000 fine to a Liverpool based company, after they were found guilty of making 8.7 million unsolicited automated marketing calls over a nine-month period.
Holmes Financial Solutions Ltd sent the recorded messages, which mainly promoted PPI compensation claims, to millions of individuals between October 2015 and July 2016, none of whom had opted in to receive direct marketing over the phone.
The story, reported last week by ‘Which?’, also stated that evidence was found to suggest the firm may have been behind more than 26.6 million nuisance calls, although ultimately they were fined for 8.7 million.
Whilst these statistics may appear shocking on first viewing, they are in line with our own YouGov research that we have regularly conducted in recent years. Last year our research showed that 90% of people in the UK receive between 5 and 30 nuisance calls each week with a fifth of UK adults admitting they had been victims of a telephone scam.
Luckily there are several ways in which you can help put a stop to nuisance calls impacting on your life:
- Purchase any device from our range of call blockers
- Sign up to the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) to register your wish not to receive unsolicited sales and marketing calls.
- Ensure your phone number is taken off directories and look out for tick boxes on all marketing correspondence to ensure you are choosing the correct option to prevent your details being passed on to third parties.