Being pestered by UPC Zevas. Receiving calls from the number 021 4852700.

I got this email today from the Data Protection Commisioner who seems to be on the ball.

I got nothing from the ComReg who seems to be a complete waste of space.

Firstly, UPC inform us that you are an existing customer. They explained that the reason they have started calling you this year, when as you say they had not attempted to call you in recent years, is that up to the end of 2009 the only products which they could supply to your residence related to TV. More recently, however, UPC has upgraded its systems in the area and they are now able to supply other products such as Broadband and VOIP services. As a result of the new services coming on stream, they have started to contact existing customers in the area to inform them. Your UPC account was marked 'yes' to marketing and, as a result, your number was passed on to their call centre for outbound calls. This explains why they attempted to call you.

I should point out, for the avoidance of any doubt, that even where a person's number is recorded on the national opt-out register, companies with whom you have an existing customer relationship are entitled to call you for marketing purposes until you specifically tell them that you do not consent to receiving such calls. Therefore, service providers such as your phone supplier, electricity supplier, bank, etc are all allowed to phone you for marketing purposes unless you have asked them not to call you.

With regard to the fact that the number showed up on your phone as missed calls, we established that the calls were made by an automated dialler. The dialler could dial up to thirty six numbers at the same time and if those calls are answered at the other end, the automated system transfers it to an available agent. However, if all the agents are already on other calls, the call is abandoned by the system. This resulted in what appeared to be silent calls when a person picked up their phone. Obviously, the settings were set too high on the automated dialler as there were a number of complaints about this matter. As a result of our intervention, management in the call centre has been changed and new procedures have been adopted to include a more sensible time line on the dialler. They have also more stringent monitoring systems in place and they have adopted better information technology resources into the area to avoid a repeat of this problem. Needless to say, we will be watching that space closely in the short term to ensure that the new procedures are actually working.

Finally, UPC has confirmed that your account is now excluded from further marketing and, consequently, within a short period of time you should not receive any further marketing calls from them.

Brendan said:

Ieven where a person's number is recorded on the national opt-out register, companies with whom you have an existing customer relationship are entitled to call you for marketing purposes until you specifically tell them that you do not consent to receiving such calls.

Click to expand...

I never knew this. Anyway at least you got the reply and the complaint is lodged, fair play for following up on it Brendan

Yea, well done Brendan,
I too was unaware of the rules concerning existing customer relationship marketing, it explains a lot.
Fair play indeed.

I've had several calls from these guys over the last couple of weeks, should I answer it or just ignore it? So far I've missed the calls...

M

Thanks for this thread, I started getting calls on Friday evening. I've emailed them and have requested to be removed from all marketing lists.

I find it hard to believe that they require 28-40 days for this to be processed. Is this legal? I'm going on holiday soon and with O2 you can't divert all calls (you could with Vodafone so you were not charged for messages left on your voice mail when abroad).

So if they persist in calling me every other day it will cost me a fortune. Is there any come back on this with the DPC or ComReg?

Don't crucify me for this but... I worked there for a 3 weeks for extra bob about 2 years ago. It is basically a garden shed with a few computer stations set up, and all the staff are students, including the Supervisors. There is one main man there who is in charge of the operation but is not there all the time and is only sales focused - if your not selling you don't get paid.

We were told to sit down at a station and sign in - the computer automatically dials customers numbers and when they answer, up comes their name, contact number and address. Hence how they have your name. The only way for us to stop the computer automatically dialling people is to change the setting to "bathroom break" or "Lunchtime". They monitor the amount of bathroom breaks you take and if they feel it is excessive (which they always do) they dock your wages for it. So you basically cold call for 4 hours at a time. Each sucessful call is approx 5 minutes, thats 12 calls an hour, thats a minimum of 48 peoples evenings ruined in one sitting.

Believe me, its degrading working there and I lasted all of 3 weeks part-time before the shame of interrupting peoples Sunday dinners, evening time, etc became too much for me. No job is worth the amount of abuse you get on the phone, despite how much you need the money.

When people I contacted wanted to be removed from the list, you select DNC (Do Not Contact) from a dropdown list - this stops the machine from automatically dialling you again. Some of the staff sometimes don't do this, and I have had the (awful) pleasure of receiving them at the end of the phone weeks later - not pleasant.

Advise I would give to those receiving these calls is to very strongly insist on being removed from the listings. Flip the lid if you need to, but please dont get personal with the people calling you - they have a job to do too. Believe me, not one person there liked the job but there's so little going at the moment for students it's all they could get. These people will literally hire anyone.