FundRaising Standards Board

FRSB News

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

17 June 2010

British Heart Foundation

How the BHF handled a stage 2 complaint from a member of the public using the FRSB complaints process.

Background

In early April 2007 British Heart Foundation (BHF) handled a complaint from a member of the public which was referred to stage 2 of the FRSB process when a resolution could not be reached at stage 1.

The complainant, Mr Y, complained to BHF, after being contacted as part of a telemarketing campaign to recruit new supporters to volunteer as collectors or to set up a direct debit to support them. He was registered on the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) and felt that BHF should not have contacted him because they didn’t have permission to do so. BHF’s campaign was carried out through a third party supplier which had sourced the names and addresses of individuals who had expressed a wish to potentially support the charity gathered through a lifestyle survey.

Mr Y also complained that he was contacted five times by BHF. He also found it difficult to register his complaint through the third party supplier because when he called the supplier’s number using the call back service on his home phone it did not give the option to speak to someone directly and there was only a recording saying someone would be in contact with him shortly.

Mr Y has not previously supported the British Heart Foundation.

The Issues

• Mr Y stated he was registered with the TPS and had not given BHF permission to contact him
• BHF’s data supplier claimed the data provided was of individuals who expressed a wish to potentially support the charity through a lifestyle survey.
• Mr Y was concerned about the number of times he was called, however, BHF’s telemarketing supplier said its record of events differed from that of the complainants.

FRSB Investigation at Stage 2

• The FRSB asked BHF to source a copy of the actual lifestyle survey completed by the complainant to see if he had given consent to being contacted.
  • It showed that although he had answered questions about charities he did not tick the box giving permission to share his details with third parties.
• The FRSB asked the charity to provide a hard copy of the supplier’s call log to Mr Y’s number so they could review how many times his number had been called.
  • It showed that Mr Y had been contacted twice.

BHF Action

BHF is always working to improve their processes and, in response to this complaint and their discussions with the FRSB, they have implemented the following:

• An audit of supplier’s data inputting
• Periodic random checks of records to ascertain data entry is correct
• Review of caller training (with supplier) on a regular basis
• Sought clarification with supplier on best practice amongst other charity clients in respect of screening data from bespoke survey questions against the TPS

“We have learnt some valuable lessons from Mr. Y’s complaint - the outcome of which is that we will provide a better response to our supporters in the future. The Fundraising Standards Board were helpful in advising the best course of action and this contributed to our improvement. We believe that being a member of the FRSB scheme has helped improve our approach in this instance.”

Aneesha Moreira, Director of Fundraising, British Heart Foundation

Relevant Institute of Fundraising Codes of Fundraising Practice

• Data protection
  • This code has been updated since this complaint was resolved
• Telephone fundraising
  • This code has been updated since this complaint was resolved
• Telephone recruitment of collectors

Return