TELECOMMUNICATIONS (TELEMARKETING AND RESEARCH CALLS) INDUSTRY STANDARD 2017 (DRAFT)
Submission lodged by Bruce Bebbington, RMB 313a Bridgetown WA 6255.
How many people do you hear gleefully saying " I really look forward to getting telemarketing calls during dinner"?
On the other hand, how many people complain about the calls, their timing, the attitude of the caller, trying to get off call lists, failure of the "do not call register" to work and unfortunately the all too common statement regardless of the location of the caller- "another Indian call centre"
I am aware the scope of this review does not cover the "do not call register" however; it is that legislation which most Australian's would say needs revising, and sensibly, that should be done prior to reviewing the standard.
8 PROHIBITED CALLING TIMES-WEEKDAYS CUT OFF
As the standard impacts on the public, who may have limited understanding of the standard, why have a differential in the calling times for research calls and telemarketing calls?
The weekday cut off should be 8pm or earlier for all calls, rather than 8.30 for research calls. This would simplify the matter.
Research calls are generally longer than telemarketing calls, so should not be allowed to go later.
8 PROHIBITED CALLING TIMES- SUNDAYS
Under the draft research calls can be made for 73.5 hours of a 168 hour week, whereas telemarketing calls can only be for 63 hours a week (due to the Sunday exclusion and weekday variation).
If it was thought appropriate and respectful enough that telemarketers cannot ring on a Sunday, then why can't research calls be treated the same?
Many research calls are actually telemarketing disguised as research. They only need to meet the requirement of the standard for research under the definitions of the standard, and once they ask one or two questions to satisfy that requirement, proceed to say "one the basis of your answer, I can offer you..."
Accordingly a prohibition on all telemarketing and research calls on a Sunday would be appropriate to provide respect to consumers, remove any doubt as to telemarketing occurring and reduce complaints.
CALLS TO BE COMPLETED BY PROHIBITED TIMES
It is common to receive 'research" calls and be told there is a short survey that only takes 3 minutes or 5 minutes.
How often do people find themselves in a survey that was 5 minutes that is still going in 20? All because the caller gave misleading information to the recipient about the true length of the survey.
This is because they know that if a caller at 8.29pm on a Friday night said it would take 20 minutes there will be a significant decline rate.
A lot people would decline research calls if they were given the true duration and that duration was lengthy.
The standard does not require honesty by the caller in regard to the true duration of the call, survey or poll, yet the caller and those involved in the call, survey or poll know exactly how long it will take.
The standard shall be required to include the honest and accurate maximum time required to complete all facets of the poll, based on all combinations of answers and "additional questions derived from those answers".
Further, rather than the standard saying that calls can not be made after certain times, it should state that calls "must be completed by the times of prohibitions" based on their known duration.
It is unreasonable and disrespectful for a caller to be able to ring a household with young children at 8.30pm on a weeknight, falsely claim it will be a two minute survey, knowing full well, the call is unlikely to be finished within 20 minutes.
8 PROHIBITED CALLING TIMES- SHALL NOT MUST
The standard outlines prohibitions, clearly things that cannot occur; yet the wording is "a caller must not make..."
As this refers to prohibitions, then the wording should be "a caller shall not make" to reinforce the prohibition.
8 PROHIBITED CALLING TIMES- PUBLIC HOLIDAYS
The draft lists national public holidays upon which calls cannot be made, allowing for weekday public holidays in lieu.
The standard lists seven days that are "national public holidays" and uses the example that if Christmas fell on a Saturday, the standard would prohibit calling on Christmas day and the public holiday in lieu.
The intent appears to be that on those seven days plus any associated national public holiday in lieu, consumers can get relief from telemarketing calls.
However, the standard does not specifically preclude a call on those days if it is not a declared national public holiday, for example if Australia Day public holiday was held on a Monday, January 26 may not be a national public holiday, only a day of observance.
Under the wording of the standard, in that instance a call could be made on Australia Day.
The same would apply if Western Australia elected not to observe a national public holiday, (more likely for New Years Day, Boxing Day and Australia Day), it could be argued that it is not a national public holiday as it is not observed in all states and territories, and therefore the prohibition would not apply and could even be extended to the rest of the country, as it is not a national public holiday.
South Australia declares Boxing Day as Proclamation day, which could mean that this could be used to claim it is not a national public holiday.
More appropriate wording would be to delete the wording in (3)(a) of the draft "a day that is any of the following national public holidays", so that it became " (a) followed by the list of the seven prohibited days" followed by "(b)" in the wording shown in the draft.
Therefore there can be no excuse or confusion as to whether it was or was not a public holiday- the seven days are specific exclusions nationally, with the additional exclusion of the national or state public holiday in lieu.
8 PROHIBITED CALLING TIMES- ENTIRE OF EASTER
Do Australian's really want to receive a telemarketing call on Easter Sunday?
Is it really appropriate that one of the three most significant days on the calendar (Easter Sunday, Christmas Day and Anzac Day), being Easter Sunday, should be a permitted day?
Calls should be prohibited from and including Good Friday until Easter Monday.
8 PROHIBITED CALLING TIMES- ALL STATE PUBLIC HOLIDAYS.
Callers, or those arranging calls, are required under the standard to ensure calls only occur during the permitted times in the state or territory for the usual place of residence of the recipient, and if they become aware it is outside those times, must terminate the call.
If they can establish the time in the various time zones around Australia, particularly during daylight saving, then why can't they be required to respect public holidays in all states at all times?
If they can program their automated dialling systems with times in different locations, then they can also program public holidays and show respect to all Australian's.
PROHIBITED CALLING TIMES- WHERE EXPRESS CONSENT HAS BEEN GIVEN IN ADVANCE.
Can a call be made on Anzac Day if express consent has been given in advance?
I hope the intention is that those prohibited days can not be overridden, however the wording is not clear as subsections 3 and 5 appear to allow that if express consent has been given, under subsection 3 a call could make a call at a consented time on a public holiday.
No call shall occur, regardless of any consent offered and no consent should be sought, that allows calls to be make on the public holidays and days in lieu specified in subsection 3.
9 PROVISION OF INFORMATION DURING TELEMARKETING CALLS OTHER THAN RESEARCH-BUSINESS NAME AND CONTACTS.
The standard should specify that the caller should give an Australian business name, Australian company name, Australian company number, Australian business number, an Australian physical address, an Australian postal address and an Australian phone number.
No overseas contacts shall be permitted, which would allow them to get around Australian laws.
No overseas contacts should be permitted which cause undue cost for the public to access.
Recipients shall not have to ring an overseas number at their cost, nor should they have to ring a premium service number.
10 PROVISION OF INFORMATION DURING A RESEARCH CALL
The same applies for the comments above about requiring Australian business and contact details.
For research calls, an additional point (e), stating the maximum duration of the research call, should be required.
This would be an honest, factual figure of the duration that the "two minute" survey will take and shall be declared before commencing the research component, to ensure that the current practise of deliberately misleading recipients on the time required, discontinues.
11 Contact details
Subparagraph (b) shall, in addition to specifying an "Australian number" shall require all details in (i) and (ii) shall be Australian addresses that exist.
Further, as mention above the contact number should be one for which no significant cost is incurred such as a premium service, or contain a lengthy recorded message that incurs unnecessary landline and mobile call costs.
13 TERMINATING A CALL- EXAMPLE 2
Unfortunately those examples have little affect on most callers.
"I'm on the do not call register" is the least effective, particularly since the register does not prohibit charitable organisations, politicians, political parties and do not apply for business lines, specifically a farm with a listing under 'FARMER, or 'GRAZIER' in the phone book as we are rung as a businesses.
DO NOT CALL REGISTER
As I outlined at the start of this submission, the problems stem in the main, not from the standard, but from the do not call register.
It is the number of calls, type of calls and attitude of the callers that people object to.
Politicians, political parties and their callers are exempt, and should not be. It was inappropriate for the politicians to grant themselves an exemption simply because they could.
Charitable organisations and their callers are also exempt, which may have been given with the right intent, however, increasingly nuisance calls are coming from charities using this exemption.
Businesses should be able to receive protection from the register, other than for those lines used exclusively for faxes.
For rural Australians, whereby a farm may also be the basis of a trading name for their farm, they can not get relief with the register, as the callers simply call the farm or business name.
Those who are in a rental situation should also be able to gain protection from telemarketers offering them products like government subsidised solar panels, particularly when no such scheme exists.
In particular, renters of government housing, should be able to nominate that they are in government housing so that they do not receive telemarketing calls for house products such as solar panels, hot water systems, insulation or fencing.
This could also apply to those in employee provided housing.
I primarily focus on the issues whereby Australians are impacted by the calls not covered by the do not call register and the standard, however, for the callers and those paying for the calls and staff, would see benefits in not ringing an old age pensioner on the third floor of a twenty storey housing commission building to offer them solar panels for their roof.
The time it takes to update and be removed from lists is also no longer relevant, with computerisation of records. It should not take 30 days for someone to remove you from a list, since technology exists to download and synchronise data.
The onus should be placed on the caller to ensure they comply at all times.
The register should be reviewed, expanded and made more relevant.
If I can click an unsubscribe button on an email from someone I have never heard of, dealt with or want to deal with- then surely in 2017 we should be able to do the same with phone calls.
If I can block an email address, why can't I block a phone number or group of numbers by being on the do not call register.
Charities and political parties should be the same as all other callers.
Just like the internet, it should be I have to knowingly consent to subscribe to or knowingly consent to allow third party access and the other parties shall be disclosed, not to create an infinite resell of data.
Bruce Bebbington
77 Carbunup Brook Road, Sunnyside WA 6256
RMB 313a Bridgetown WA 6255
Phone 08 97617535