Understanding the UK's mail, phone, fax and email preference services

The regulations about who you can and cannot call or send direct mail, faxes and emails to can appear confusing. As a result, there is a danger that you could stray into breaching the regulations, with potentially damaging consequences. So we have written this fact sheet to summarise the regulations for you.

Four areas of making contact with customers and potential customers are covered by legislation or voluntary codes:

Mail

The Mailing Preference Service (MPS) is a voluntary, self-regulatory service from the Direct Marketing Association (DMA). You do not have any legal requirements in respect of the MPS, but it is good practice to follow the DMA's suggestions, even if you are not a member.

The MPS gives consumers the chance to register that they do not wish to receive unsolicited mail. Many of the people who register have suffered bereavement and they simply want to stop commercial mailings from being sent to the deceased. Others register to stop receiving mail sent to previous occupants at their homes.

So all in all, if you often contact private individuals by post it makes sense to check your database against the MPS register. The MPS does offer a service where you can access a list of addresses registered with them but this is perhaps suitable only for larger companies to use.

We spoke to the MPS and they say that for small and medium businesses it would probably be easier and cheaper for you to use an independent list cleanser. All you do is send your mailing list to the cleanser and they check it against the MPS register for you. There is a directory of list cleansers on the MPS web site (www.mpsonline.org.uk) as well as more information about the MPS itself.

Phone and fax

The Telephone Preference Service (TPS), Corporate TPS and Fax Preference Service (FPS) are at the centre of important legislation.

To summarise, the rules say that:

• You cannot make a sales or marketing call to private individuals, sole traders, partnerships or other organisations who told you that they do not want to receive such calls from you.
• You cannot make sales or marketing calls to any individual or organisation that has registered with the TPS or Corporate TPS.
• You can call customers or prospective customers who have previously indicated that they do not object to you calling them.
• The rules for faxes are a little tighter: you must not send faxes to individuals, sole traders, partnerships or businesses unless they have consented to receive them.

So if you make sales and marketing calls or faxes to anyone other than businesses, you need to subscribe to the TPS and check that the people on your list have not registered with them.

Unlike the MPS (above), the TPS, Corporate TPS and FPS websites do offer a convenient screening service. You just need to register as a subscriber and then enter the telephone/fax numbers in question. You'll then get a clear indication whether or not the numbers are registered. This service costs from as little as £50 per month.

Visit www.tpsonline.org.uk (from there you can reach the Corporate TPS and FPS websites too) for more information about your obligations and how to have your database checked.

As well as using the TPS/FPS service, we advise that you have a system to record when people say they do or do not wish to be called or faxed by you.

Email

There is an Email Preference Service - organised by the Direct Marketing Association - but for all practical purposes this no longer applies to emails sent within the EU. Instead, the rules you need to know about and adhere to are those arising from the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2004.

The rules say that:

• Your business cannot send unsolicited emails to private individuals unless they give their consent (the rules don't apply when you contact businesses).
• So you must obtain consent and keep accurate records in case you need to show that consent was given.
• However, consent is not needed if you obtained the contact details during a previous transaction or negotiation - as long as the email you send relates to similar products and services.

Whether your email is to a business or an individual, you must:

• Clearly identify yourself as the sender.
• Include simple instructions about how recipients can opt out of future e-mails.

Please note that we have attempted to give a quick summary of the mail, telephone, fax and email rules as we understand them. We don't claim that this fact sheet covers every related issue and we urge you seek professional legal advice where appropriate.

How can you turn all this guidance and legislation to your favour?

We can complain about the rules but that won't change them: we should instead think about how to work with them. The Chartered Institute of Marketing is doing a good job in helping its members use 'permission marketing' to their advantage. This is a view we agree with.

Here are some suggestions:

• Consider the use of non-invasive marketing, such as advertising to drive people to your web site for more information.
• Work hard to get the best results from search engines so that you generate a stream of interested potential customers.
• Make it a matter or course to obtain contact details of people you meet or who contact you. Always ask if it's OK with them for you to mail, call, fax or email them.

Good marketers have always known that targeted campaigns often work better than mass mailings. But in the current climate of legislation and customer preferences, there's even more reason to fine-tune your targeting.

© Titman Firth 2005