2013-04-12

Tackling junk calls (ePetition, please sign)

One of the issues with junk calls is that the enforcement is by ICO who seem rather ineffective at discouraging junk calls.

There is one other measure in the legislation - people who are the victim of junk calls (when registered in the TPS) can sue for damages in the county court. But what is the damage for one junk call or even a couple from the same caller. Bugger all. So it is (a) nor worth sending a bill or suing, and (b) likely to be hard to justify any damages you do sue for if it goes to court.

What I think would be effective is if thousands of victims of junk callers were able to do something worthwhile against the junk callers - death by a thousand cuts.

So I have made a proposal and put it in to an ePetition - please sign if you agree.

Amend The Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003 adding a new clause:-

"30(4) Where such procedings make a claim for damages not exceeding £50 the claimant will not be required to justify the value of the claim, only that they have suffered some damages, inclding mere inconvenience, as a result of a breach."

Doing this will allow anyone suffering junk calls to invoice the caller, and then pursue a county court claim, for £50. The callers will have to settle without court as they know they would lose, so no burden on the courts.

I feel that thousands of victims of junk calls invoicing £50 would be very effective, as well as satisfying for the victim.


Update: Don't forget that this would have the same effect for junk emails as well.

11 comments:

  1. Yes, it says "Closing: 12/04/2014 13:03" which makes no sense, and was showing 1 signature, and then 0, which makes no sense. WTF.

    ReplyDelete
  2. A year for the petition to be open is somewhat bizarre.

    Now showing one signature. It might show mine later once they have checked my email address, but why might it take hours to do this? It is almost beyond belief. And while grumping, why on earth is the Town a required entry on the form while street address and postcode is all that the GPO needs to deliver a letter? If they want to analyse the geographic spread of signatories, that information resides in the postcode. Also, why is the default country Afghanistan?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Signed.

    hhmb: default country was UK for me

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Interesting. Just tried again and Afghanistan is once again the default. I am using Firefox under XP

      Delete
    2. At the time I signed it, I was using Firefox/Win7. Checking here using Chrome/Mac I also see UK

      Delete
  4. Signed! Default country was UK for me too, although google briefly decided I was Spanish whilst submitting this comment! (In the petition, "inclding" should be "including"?)

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  5. I don't think I ever got the email confirmation...

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  6. Just had a response to my Final demand before Legal Action notice to the company who junk called me last month:

    "Dear Sirs

    This invoice will be paid on our payment schedule on Friday of this week,
    this invoice is being paid as a goodwill gesture for bringing a failure in
    our marketing company's compliance procedure to our attention.

    We no longer use the company in question and while this payment is not an
    acknowledgement of guilt we would like to apologise for any inconvenience
    caused to you on our behalf.

    Regards

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Odd that they admit a "failure in ... compliance" but say they don't admit guilt. It is one or the other :-)

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  7. These are a firm of lawyers. What else do you expect?!

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  8. Signed. Let us hope this gets passed. My girlfriend could make a lot of money!

    ReplyDelete

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