The Information Commissioner’s Office has battered a Glasgow-based company with a £160,000 fine for making over 700,000 unsolicited marketing sales calls to numbers registered on the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) and Corporate Telephone Preference Service (CTPS), in a clear breach of law.
Energy Prices Direct, which describes itself as one of the UK’s largest energy-buying consortiums, made the unsolicited calls to individuals and businesses between January 2024 and January 2025 – resulting in over 30 complaints being made to the ICO, the TPS and CTPS.
The investigation revealed that in some cases, employees failed to identify themselves as being from the company when making calls.
In a call transcript, one recipient said that an Energy Prices Direct employee claimed they were from “what sounded like the ECB”. They went on to deny they were making a sales call saying: “No, this is not a sales and marketing call, I just wanted to share our electricity prices with you.”
Another business owner said that despite having subscribed to the TPS, they were still being “bombarded” with daily calls about switching energy suppliers or using a meter.
The ICO investigation discovered that data used to make calls had been purchased without establishing whether the numbers had been screened against the TPS or CTPS. There were also instances where the firm could not identify the source of the data they were using.
In what is a highly unsual move, the company has already paid the fine.
ICO head of investigations Andy Curry said: “Energy Prices Direct showed a blatant disregard for laws designed to protect people and businesses from nuisance marketing. Not only was the company careless with its caller data but employees were, in some cases, deceptive about their reasons for calling. They made an exceptionally high volume of unsolicited calls over a 12-month period, often in a persistent manner, in an attempt to sell services.
“This case highlights the importance of robust compliance checks when buying and using marketing data and we expect all organisations to have proper systems in place to prevent this level of unlawful marketing activity. Compliance with TPS and CTPS requirements is a legal obligation for all organisations conducting marketing calls.
“Companies must understand that if they ignore the law and continue to bombard people with unwanted sales calls, we will not hesitate to take enforcement action.”
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