Rabo "sell out your friends" spam!

RaboDirect said:

People opt in to receiving electronic communications from RaboDirect, ie, ezines and eflashes. We do not send unsolicited email to people. Recipients to our communications can unsubscribe from receiving further communications. The key point here is that people have made a decision to receive communications from us and as a commercial entity it is not unreasonable to expect to receive commercial messages.

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I opted out but started getting emails again without choosing to!

Very interesting thread indeed. I would like to add my thoughts on this...

1) I do not like campaigns like these that ask other people to enter 'my' email address. People do not realise that an email address is private, and I would never want my address being entered into random online forms by my 'friends'. Any opportunity for them to do this is something I frown upon. I have recently been plagued by spam mails from a website because one of my friends thought it was a good idea to enter my address. Very annoying.

2) I also dislike what I consider to be 'sneaky' tactics by websites to get your email address on to their database. If you are filling out an online form, you should have to tick a box to receive further communications, and not untick in order to not receive them. This type of sneaky behaviour is irresponsible in my opinion.

3) With particular reference to the campaign being discussed here, I have to agree with the posters who point out that speaking to customers/potential customers in this manner does not fill me with confidence. As one poster mentioned, it's as if the company is being 'run by teenagers'. It reminds me of a particular ezine I receive from an online gambling site which at times is appalling in the language used.

ButtermilkJa said:

Very interesting thread indeed. I would like to add my thoughts on this...

1) I do not like campaigns like these that ask other people to enter 'my' email address. People do not realise that an email address is private, and I would never want my address being entered into random online forms by my 'friends'. Any opportunity for them to do this is something I frown upon. I have recently been plagued by spam mails from a website because one of my friends thought it was a good idea to enter my address. Very annoying.

2) I also dislike what I consider to be 'sneaky' tactics by websites to get your email address on to their database. If you are filling out an online form, you should have to tick a box to receive further communications, and not untick in order to not receive them. This type of sneaky behaviour is irresponsible in my opinion.

3) With particular reference to the campaign being discussed here, I have to agree with the posters who point out that speaking to customers/potential customers in this manner does not fill me with confidence. As one poster mentioned, it's as if the company is being 'run by teenagers'. It reminds me of a particular ezine I receive from an online gambling site which at times is appalling in the language used.

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Buttermilk - in the specific "Member-Get-Member" promotion RaboDirect does not keep the email address of the friend and nor do we sign up the friend to our email database. The friend must subscribe to the database him/herself. Accordingly the friends who receive the promotion will not receive spam, ie, unsolicited communication, as they are not registered on the database.

In your second point above - we completely agree. In the RaboDirect site you must opt in to receiving communications, ie, you must tick a box to say that you do want to receive communications. The tick box is not pre-ticked (which is often another trick that disreputable companies use).

Regarding the Member-Get-Member campaign, it is quite a straightforward promotion - you can send the promotion to 5 of your friends. If your five friends sign up you get €100 (€20 per friend) and your friend receives €20 when they open their account, ie, when the person has sent in the appropriate proof of ID and address documentation and the account has been activated.

Again we reiterate that we only send emails to those people who have deliberately chosen to receive communications and we make no secret of the fact that these can include commercial messages. A lot of companies abuse people's data protection rights and it is grossly unfair to tar RaboDirect with the same brush.

Again we reiterate that we only send emails to those people who have deliberately chosen to receive communications and we make no secret of the fact that these can include commercial messages

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This is just not true. I got Rabobank spam through other people. They were paid by Rabobank to send Unsolicted Commercial Email to me.

Brendan

RaboDirect said:

Buttermilk - in the specific "Member-Get-Member" promotion RaboDirect does not keep the email address of the friend and nor do we sign up the friend to our email database...

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Ok, that's fair enough. It's good to know.

RaboDirect said:

In your second point above - we completely agree. In the RaboDirect site you must opt in to receiving communications, ie, you must tick a box to say that you do want to receive communications. The tick box is not pre-ticked (which is often another trick that disreputable companies use)...

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But, from a previous post...

RaboDirect said:

...
"We'd like to keep you informed about our special offers and what's happening at RaboDirect through our monthly eZine and occasional eFlashes.

[] If you don't want us to contact you, please tick this box.
...

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So, you must tick if you don't want to receive communications? I'm confused on this. The way I see it, if I miss that particular small print, then I don't tick the box, and Im automatically signed up. As far I see this is the same as 'pre-ticking' an opt-in box. So, is it "another trick that disreputable companies use" or not?

I had a Rabo account for a good while and had opted out of receiving marketing etc. emails. I recently opened two new accounts - one for my wife and one for our child. In both cases I used the same email address but also opted out of receiving emails etc. However following on from opening these accounts I started receiving such emails again. When I log into these accounts I can see nowhere obvious to opt out of such mailing lists. There is an unsubscribe link in the emails that they send so I will try that.