Safestyle UK fined thousands of pounds for unsolicited marketing calls

Safestyle UK has fallen foul of authorities once again, this time for making unsolicited marketing calls to customers.

The Information Commissioner’s Office, which deals with data protection, privacy and freedom of information matters, received hundreds of complaints about the calls, and fined the Bradford-based window manufacturer for breaking the law when they called people who were registered the opt-out service.

The ICO said that the company was repeatedly warned and placed on formal monitoring three times – but the complaints continued.

Between May 2015 and December 2016, 264 complaints were made to the Information Commissioner about unsolicited direct marketing calls.

Some complainants said their opt out requests were being ignored, or were still receiving calls years after they had had work done.

The Commissioner reportedly wrote to Safestyle in January 2016 warning them of their infractions, but even after a three month monitoring period, the watchdog said it was still receiving “unacceptable” levels of complaints.

It fined the company £70,000 for the nuisance calls, to be paid by the end of August 2017.

This is not the first time that Safetstyle has been in hot water with authorities. It had an advertisement banned in June this year by the Advertising Standards Authority after 12 complaints, and rulings have been made against their advertisements 2015, 2014 and 2011.