FundRaising Standards Board

FRSB News

• Latest News
• Events
• FRSB in the News
• Member Case Studies
• Keep in Touch

29 March 2010

Post Event Note: Telephone Fundraising Symposium

Post the telephone fundraising symposium, jointly hosted by the Institute of Fundraising and the Fundraising Standards Board on 4th March 2010, a written note of the clarification issued by David Evans, Senior Data Protection Practice Manager at the Information Commissioner’s Office, at the event has now been published.

• Administration calls are not prohibited by the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations. However, such calls should not be used as a way of disguising a marketing exercise. The ICO’s view is that administration calls can include making sure that any previously expressed preferences (either opting out or opting in) remain valid. However, this should not be interpreted as a green light to make administration calls that would not otherwise have been made.
• TPS regulations - any person registered on the telephone preference service (TPS) cannot be called unless they have advised the calling party that they are happy to receive calls. In practice, a charity might judge that, given the nature of the relationship between them and the supporter, they might be able to make a marketing call to that subscriber despite TPS registration. An obvious example would be where an existing supporter has been receiving calls for some time, has never objected to those calls but has recently registered their number with the TPS. In this case, the charity might reasonably assess that the supporter would be unlikely to object to calls they have not objected to in the past. If, on making that first ‘post-TPS’ call, they find that the supporter does wish their TPS registration to be respected then the charity should cease making marketing calls. For more information see the ICO’s guidance note on the TPS .
• Contacting donors whose details have been secured via a third party - TPS Regulations do not require consideration of the source of the number but the source is a clear factor for consideration when making judgements whether or not to call donors. It is also relevant when deciding whether the processing of personal data is likely to be in breach of the fairness requirements of the first data protection principle. Where a supporter has chosen not to divulge their number to the charity and has registered on TPS, then this should weigh heavily in any decision whether to call. The risk of causing inconvenience or annoyance to the supporter by using a number obtained in this way for marketing purposes is far higher than in the scenario briefly outlined above.
• Assessment of complaints - When assessing any complaints concerning TPS registration, the ICO takes into account the context in which the call was made, any factors used by the charity to demonstrate that they reasonably believed that the supporter would not object to the call, the nature of the call itself and whether the supporter’s wishes have been respected. The ICO’s enforcement powers might well be engaged at the point at which a charity has made a deliberately or unreasonably careless judgement on whether to call, whether the nature of the call was particularly insensitive or whether the complainant has been ignored in favour of continued marketing call. Charities should also have complaints processes in place within their own organisations.

Return