Death knell for cold calling as TPS reaches 22 million

Outbound telesales are all but dead and buried in the UK with new figures showing nearly 22 million people have now signed up to the Telephone Preference Service, equivalent to about 3,000 people a day opting out of receiving calls.
And with about 25 million landlines in the UK, according to Ofcom, that leaves just 3 million landlines which companies can now target.
Information Commissioner’s Office rules state that all companies must now run their data against the TPS before embarking on outbound telemarketing campaigns.
John Mitchison, DMA head of preference services, reckons the rate of sign-ups – at over 1.2 million a year – is unlikely to slow any time soon, meaning that within two years nearly all landlines will be registered with the TPS.
He said: “The TPS is there to help people manage the live marketing calls messages they receive. The popularity of TPS is down to the unfortunate proliferation of rogue marketers who do not respect people’s wishes.
“Now the Information Commissioner’s Office has stronger powers to prosecute those who breach the TPS rules, and has been issuing more and more fines, we anticipate more people signing up to the service.”
Over the past few years, there has been a sharp increase in sign-ups; in 2012, there were 17.9 million people on the do-not-call database.
By contrast, figures for the Mailing Preference Service have remained steady; the MPS contains just over 6 million households out of a potential 26.7 million.