I wonder if you can trade mark a phone number

So, my latest rant, regarding a telephone number (how unusual for me?!).

This web site (here) lists information about UK companies. I note they have a crown on their web site, which I thought was a regulated symbol and not allowed, but that is beside the point.

My gripe is they list the contact number for A&A as 01344 400 888, as well as some our other companies.

Well it is not! That is a number on the web site specifically for press contact. We are often contacted by the press for a comment or interview, and not always during office hours. That number gets through to me and someone else so we can address press calls quickly if needed. Our web site is very clear that it is not for sales or general contact, and that we offer a call recording service on it for £50 if you call it and are not press. It is TPS listed.

Annoyingly, because of that annoying web site listing it as our contact number, apart from junk calls, I am starting to get calls directly from customers when I am not even near a computer or able to help them, and they would be far better calling the normal sales / support / accounts numbers we publish.

So, I am going to have the nuisance of changing that to a different number to avoid both junk calls, and calls I am not the best to handle.

Unfortunately I am not sure I have any legal recourse in this case. If it was "personal information" I could expect them to correct it. The only option I seem to have is to change the number, which we are doing.

Which led me to thinking, can you trademark a number, and so have legal controls over its use I wonder? Silly idea I am sure.

But it also occurred to me how much times have changed - one used to, by default, have numbers listed in the phone book - you paid extra to ensure you number was easy to find. These days phone calls can be more of a nuisance, at least from a personal point of view. How times change!

This is one of the recent junk calls, to the press number, from someone that did not check TPS even...

What a "dick head" (his words): NRG Installs Ltd

Wow, I get some dodgy sales calls, but this takes the piss.

It took me ages to find he was calling from NRG Installs Ltd.

• He could not say who he was calling from, just "NRG Installations"
• He did not know the company number, and thought his phone number was the "company number" no matter how hard I tried
• He did know his web site, but thought that the web site/domain was actually the "company name"

So then we have the fact he called a number on the TPS...

• He told me the number he called, which I presumed was one of my numbers, I have a few. It is a number on the TPS!
• It turns out he made the number up (i.e. lied), but then rants at me for lying about it being one of my numbers!
• He refuses to say which number he actually called - to be a "dick head" (his words)!
• He has no idea how to say a phone number, i.e. area code, pause, number
• When I did track down which number he did call, from the incoming call logs from our PSTN gateway, he is adamant that is not the number he called. Now, in theory it could be some sort of re-direct but that is unlikely (I don't recall setting one up and would not have to that specific number), but we normally see redirection headers on the incoming logs in that case.
• The number he actually called is in the TPS and has been for a long time.

But it gets worse, I mean really bad!

• He says the TPS gives them numbers and they call them
• He actually has no idea who the TPS are even
• He thinks we should sue the TPS and not NRG Installs Ltd for the PECR breach
• "I thought we were meant to call the numbers that the TPS give us"

I have muted the number he called from the recording here... It is well worth listening to...

Sadly there is little point in talking to the ICO on this, they don't care.

We need something better than TPS and current legislation

I really wish, like late payment penalties, there was a simple defined civil charge one could make, sue for if necessary, for someone wasting your time with an unlawful unsolicited marketing call. It would be death by a thousand cuts as people, like us, would simply make claims. The courts would not be involved much, just the couple of times to prove the point to the idiots, and then they have to cough up for each claim without the threat of court.

We got one today that shows the problem quite well.

This is the call: mp3 (note this is stereo, one person on each ear).

The caller was, apparently, Black Sheep Utilities Ltd, selling water supply. They have been in business around 7 years, so really should know better. They called us, FireBrick Ltd.

So, some things wrong with the call...

• Claims not aware he called a TPS registered number, but later says he could not have made call if we were.
• Says they check data with TPS, which clearly they do not! That suggests he is just lying.
• Says you have to re-register every six months, which is wrong. The TPS say every 12 months, but actually the legislation does not require re-registration. We are registered permanently (as I threatened to sue them and OFCOM if they de-registered us again, many years ago) and I double checked and the number he called is still registered even now.
• He suggests that if you go on line, your number will be "attached to your IP" somehow.
• He suggests we may have left a "your data will be shared" tick box ticked on the Internet.
• No remorse whatsoever!
• He says if we were on the register he would not be able to call us, clearly that is a lie.

This all seems a bit confused. If they screen for TPS and don't allow calls, then how is having a "your data will be shared" tick box relevant. Clearly they don't in fact check against TPS as we are on it.

Until there is proper action against such people, they will just waffle their way through such calls and ignore their responsibilities. We all pay the price in huge amounts of wasted time.

Also, he seems confused over "details being shared" and the unlawfulness of unsolicited marketing calls. It does not matter how much our number is shared, and I would not be surprised if the number is shared, it is on our web site even, and companies may know it. I have no problem with the number being shared to people that may be interested in buying FireBricks. That is why we have a number, so potential and actual customers can call us. What matters for this is that we have not given him permission to call us for marketing. Even if we gave permission to someone else, and gave them permission to share our details, unless we gave Black Sheep permission then his calls are unlawful.

What can be done to sort this, really? The ICO will not be interested, I am sure.

Junk calls, TPS and DPA

If you want to avoid marketing calls, the "right" way to do it is to register the number with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS). They have a web site where you can check the number and register. Simple enough...

There are, however, a few problems. I am looking at this as the new number I recently obtained (my old home phone number from 20 years ago) got another junk call. I checked, and it is no in the TPS.

Now, this should be simple, but it is not.

The TPS web site does not just want the number, which is all they actually require to maintain the register, they also want:-

• Name
• Full postal address
• Email address
• Agreement to their privacy and cookie policy

Well, half way through the web site filling in a form, it is a tad late to ask for agreement to the cookie policy, but what if I do not wish to agree? I cannot register.

As for the privacy policy - it looks rather iffy to me. Again, what if I don't agree?

First part of the privacy policy that seemed odd was "You should be aware that if you subsequently give any personal information to another company, the uses to the Telephone Preference Service privacy policy will no longer apply." I am not trying to be thick here, but they seem to say that if I give any personal information (at all?) to another company (any company?), then their privacy policy no longer applies. Well, of course I have given some personal information to some other companies! My employer for a start, and, well, loads of companies. Does that really stop the TPS privacy policy applying. Maybe I am misreading it. Seems a pointless policy if it stops applying so easily.

The other issue is they can give my personal information to other parties. They do say the uses are limited to "suppression purposes or to incorporate onto suppression software". So if the software wants email and postal addresses, it can be incorporated in to that software. That is one valid use of the data. The suppression software does not have the restriction on use (note the "or" in that statement). The TPS can also use for "research and statistical analysis".

It seems to me a great way for my phone number and postal address and email address to leak, and be given to the unscrupulous companies involved in direct marketing. That could mean I am actually giving my data to the very people I do not want calling me. Saying "unscrupulous" may seem harsh, and is my opinion, but is an opinion based on the fact we even need laws on this matter in the first place, that I get junk calls to TPS listed numbers all the time, and that the ICO have fined companies, so I feel it is not an unfounded assertion, at least for some of them.

I have now contacted OFCOM to add the number, and advised that they are not to store email or postal addresses or disclose that to third parties. If they want to validate my request they can call the number! We'll see what they say.

Interestingly, OFCOM themselves were promoting (on twitter) a text based TPS listing saying "Calling all mobile users...text ‘TPS’ & your email address to 85095 to reduce #nuisancecalls http://ofcom.in/295yXjW" so again asking people to provide email address when not needed to maintain the register.

I believe one of the Data Protection principles is you don't collect data you don't need. As my requests on twitter went unanswered, I have asked OFCOM to tell us more (FoI request). We'll see what they say.

ICO is total waste of time

I am getting a lot of junk calls, and have reported around 5000 calls to the ICO now, and they have chosen not to take any action in relation to these calls.

It seems that even the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman agrees that they do not have to do anything if they don't want to.

What the hell is the point of a law that bans something if NOBODY will take any action on it.

The Ombudsman said I could take civil action, but I know from personal experience a judge will consider the nuisance of calls and emails to be insignificant and not valid as a cause of such action.

Just to give some idea how totally pointless this regulation is, today, we got a call at the office from a company calling themselves Media Planet. Listen (MP3)

The call was to our "press" number, published in one place on our web site, which is where we also make it clear that we are listed in the TPS and that we do not want junk / marketing calls.

To our surprise this is a company that has apparently been in business 12 years and never heard of the TPS - they had no idea that they were meant to check their calls against TPS, and no idea that what they were doing is unlawful (Alex went a tad far saying criminal we think, but that is beside the point).

What is the point of these laws? They are a total and utter waste of time and need fixing.

An incredibly simple change would be to make it possible to take civil action for some minimum amount without justification, e.g £50, just based on the fact that you are the recipient of the nuisance call or email. That would allow civil action to work, and if the ICO really are so inept and uninterested, that would allow some real action on this from people affected. It would not be a burden on the courts as those breaking the rules would soon learn they have no defence, and pay up without need of court action. With any luck they would then change their behaviour.

We also need any contract formed as a result of such a call to be void, allowing people to "play along" in order to identify the caller properly so that they can sue them for the £50.

We need the law fixing!