The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has fined yet another marketing firm for nuisance calls which broke privacy and communications laws.
The UK’s data protection watchdog also enforces the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR), which govern the use of marketing emails, calls, texts, faxes and other aspects.
It has levied a £100,000 fine against East Sussex-based AMS Marketing, which made the calls to tens of thousands of individuals who had specifically opted out by registering with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS).
It claimed to have received over 100 complaints about the calls, which were made between October 1 2016 and December 31 2017.
An ICO investigation found that AMS bought lists of prospects from third parties but made no attempt to check whether they were on the TPS list.
“Firms that buy in lists of data are duty-bound to check whether people are registered with the TPS,” a spokesperson for the watchdog said.
“Firms that fail to make the proper checks, do so at their peril. The ICO can and will take action.”
The announcement is the latest in a long list of similar financial penalties levied by the ICO against nuisance calls companies, amounting to some of the largest fines ever issued by the watchdog.
In September last year Welsh marketer Your Money Rights was hit with a £350,000 fine after being found guilty of masterminding a campaign which made 146 million illegal automated calls to the British public.
A few months earlier in May, Keurboom Communications was fined £400,000 for nuisance calls made over an 18-month period, but its director placed the firm into liquidation before the money could be recovered.
The government is said to be planning a new law which will allow the ICO to fine the company directors behind nuisance call firms, hopefully putting an end to this practice.
In January this year the fines kept on coming, with Miss-sold Products UK forced to pay £350,000 after co-ordinating 75 million nuisance calls in just four months.
In this case its director applied to strike it off the Companies House Register — a move the ICO blocked in a bid to help it recover the money.