£500k bill
Record penalty for firm that clogged up lines 193m times, often at risk to safety
A SCOTS firm has been fined £500,000 for plaguing homes and businesses with nearly 200million illegal cold calls.
The investigation by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is thought to have uncovered the largest number of nuisance calls recorded by one firm.
The company, CRDNN Limited, based in Clydebank, Dunbartonshire, continued to make nearly 1.6 million calls per day while it was being probed.
Watchdogs said calls made to Network Rail’s Banavie Control Centre, near Fort William, Inverness-shire, put lives at risk by clogging up the line for drivers and pedestrians at unmanned level crossings, who were calling to check whether or not it was safe to cross the rails.
According to the ICO the calls, which contain recorded messages, often falsely claimed to be working in line with both Scottish and UK Government energy saving schemes as well as nonexistent initiatives.
Most were unsolicited calls about window scrappage, debt management, window, conservatory and boiler sales between June 1 and October 1, 2018.
Andy Curry, head of investigations at the ICO, said: ‘This company affected the lives of millions of people, causing them disruption, annoyance and distress.
‘The volume of calls was immense and to add to people’s frustrations attempting to opt out of those calls simply compounded their receipt of further calls.’
He added: ‘The directors of CRDNN knowingly operated their business with a complete disregard for the law.’
CRDNN came to the attention of the ICO when more than 3,000 complaints were made about the nuisance calls.
The company’s offices were raided by the ICO in March 2018, and officials confiscated computers and documents.
The calls were all made from ‘spoofed’ numbers, which meant that people who received the calls could not identify who was making them.
The firm broke the law by not gaining consent from the phone
owners to make those calls and by not providing a valid opt-out.
In total, more than 193million automated nuisance calls were made by the firm.
The company has now been fined £500,000 – the maximum penalty the ICO can impose.
When the Mail visited the registered office of CRDNN, a female receptionist said she had never heard of either the company itself or the firm’s registered director, Stephen Foot.
Mr Curry added: ‘They did all they could to evade detection, from changing and not updating address details to transferring their operation abroad and attempting to go into liquidation.
‘That’s why their conduct called for the maximum fine possible under the law.
‘But through the cooperation of the public who brought their complaints to us, we were able to identify those responsible and take action against them.’
CRDNN has also been issued with an enforcement notice ordering it to comply with the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations laws within 35 days of receipt of the notice.