Plans to share energy customers’ details are ‘illegal under EU law’
CONTROVERSIAL plans to share the contact details of households who fail to switch energy supplier with rival companies could be illegal under new EU rules, Centrica, the owner of British Gas has claimed.
The database was proposed by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) earlier this year as a flagship recommendation to boost competition following its two-year investigation into the energy sector. But the plans, which could see the addresses of millions of households shared with almost 40 energy suppliers, have been called a “spammers’ charter” amid fears they would see families bombarded with marketing mail.
Now it has emerged that, according to Britain’s biggest energy supplier, the data-sharing plan could soon become illegal.
Documents published by the CMA show British Gas’s parent company Centrica warned that “the proposed remedy was potentially incompatible with the new EU General Data Protection Regulation, which placed more emphasis on gaining explicit opt-in customer consent for the sharing of data”.
Under the CMA’s proposals, families who had not switched from their supplier’s default tariff for three years would have to opt out if they did not want their details shared.
The new EU regulations, which are due to be turned into UK law within the next two years, suggest that consent for data sharing should be “given by a clear affirmative act”. “Silence, preticked boxes or inactivity should not, therefore, constitute consent,” the regulation says.
A spokesman for the CMA insisted it had “designed the proposed remedy so that, if implemented, it will comply with all existing and currently foreseeable data protection legislation”.
“Centrica appears to have misunderstood the proposed remedy and the application of relevant data protection legislation,” he said.
He said the CMA was looking at the other concerns ahead of publishing its final recommendations, which are due in the week of the EU referendum.
Consumer group Which? has warned that the database “could lead to a rise in unwanted marketing, therefore, further undermining consumer trust in the energy market”, while Age UK said it feared the elderly “may be overwhelmed by offers, causing paralysis and distress”. The CMA spokesman said: “If we do press ahead with the proposal, we will include safeguards to address the concerns expressed.”