BT - aggressive junk mailer - very disappointed

Called BT a couple of months ago to find out if they offered broadband only deals and if yes what that price would be. Was asked for my details. Two weeks later started receiving Infinity junk mail (no prior permission was obtained).

Called the number again. Asked to remove from the mailing list. Promised. Still getting junk mail.

Does anyone know who I need to log an official complain with, Ofcom or someone else?

Does the email not have an unsubscribe option? It would be odd for a marketing email from a large UK company to not have that. Are you 100% certain they are actually coming from BT?

Not email. Proper Royal Mail delivered snail mail.

Ah, sorry. Misunderstood. I don't know if the Mail Preference Service could do anything about this as it isn't directly junk mail but potentially off the back of a contact to them.

The other option I would suggest may be the Information Commissioner's Office as they are likely breaking DPA by using your personal details for marketing when you have specifically asked them to stop?

Thanks for your suggestions. I'll investigate this but wanted to find out if anyone knew the sure route. I have registered with the mail preference service about 10 years ago, so don't get any junk mail, only once in a blue moon.

Edited by deleted (Wed 10-Jun-15 09:01:39)

Thanks again, ian72, for pointing in the right directions.

According to this - https://ico.org.uk/for-the-public/junk-mail/ - I need to write to them. Will send an email now and see what is going to happen.

Very disappointed with BT.

Looks like the right one. I had a feeling it was ICO but didn't have time to find the specific page. Good luck.

Email sent. Got the reference number. Let's see what's going to happen.

In reply to a post by ian72:

I don't know if the Mail Preference Service could do anything about this as it isn't directly junk mail but potentially off the back of a contact to them.

The preference services do not apply to situations where you have established some sort of relationship with an organisation that has led to you being opted in to their marketing.

The correct approach is, as you suggested, to tell the organisation in question to update your marketing preferences to indicate that neither they nor any third parties they might share their marketing lists with have permission to send you mail (and, if you wish, call you on your landline, call you on your mobile, send you SMS and/or send you e-mail). If your request to update your marketing preferences is not acted on in a reasonable time, report the situation to the Information Commissioner's Office.

Thanks, David. My only issue is how I could have possibly established a relationship by making a single phone call with an enquiry.

I no longer have line rental with BT and I believe they shouldn't have kept my details on their database for "longer than necessary" as advised by the Data Protection Act.

This is definitely not unaddressed junk mail, pushed through everyones' door?

Edited by Oliver341 (Wed 10-Jun-15 13:27:20)

No, it is addressed to a correct name not to an occupier, for example. I am keeping the latest letter for now.

I am guessing my call triggered a check through their database that revealed that I have left BT 20 months ago or so, and therefore the latest envelope has words "Reconnect with BT" on it. The thing is, should they have kept my details that long after I left? I don't think so.

Edited by deleted (Wed 10-Jun-15 13:16:34)

A simple enquiry phone call does not constitute a legal relationship.

Otherwise every phone call we make to a firm or walk in a shop, leaving our contact details, would leave us liable to receiving junk mail.

And here is the second principle of the Data Protection Act taken from this guidance, page 5, that is applicable to my situation I believe:

Organisations must only collect personal data for specified purposes, and cannot later decide to use it for other �incompatible� purposes. So they cannot use people�s details for marketing purposes if they originally collected them for an entirely different purpose.

I am sure there are plenty of other principles that can be applied here too.

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

A simple enquiry phone call does not constitute a legal relationship.

It is not possible to make such a sweeping statement. It depends on the context of the call and what sort of permission is sought by the company for following up after the call.

Agree, but no permission was sought at any time and no warning was given that they might use my details for marketing.

From the guidance above:

Organisations will need to be able to demonstrate that consent was knowingly
given, clear and specific, and should keep clear records of consent.

They wouldn't have a record of my consent.

They asked for my details in order to establish, allegedly, what price I would get for broadband only deal.

Edited by deleted (Wed 10-Jun-15 18:45:29)

Have you previously had any dealings with BT Retail? If so, they might have taken your request for a price as an indication that they could reactivate an old marketing permission they had on file for you.

If you have had no previous dealings with BT Retail and merely asked for a price, I would consider complaining to the Information Commissioner on the basis that you were opted into marketing communications without your permission.

Ok, an update. Received an email from BT Residential Services and I have no idea what to make of it.

The CS adviser either misread my email or didn't read it at all but she said that she requested to stop all marketing CALLS. For goodness sake. I have asked to stop MAIL, although I am guessing it's better to stop something then nothing. A reply now has been sent.

Overall, the email was written in a way to is impossible to understand with a substantial number of spelling mistakes.

Additionally, she managed to include a reply to another person with a different problem in my email as well, so now I have two replies for the price of one.

I think I've got now a good understanding of the BT customer service. Dear me!

Oh, yes, it is. How often do firms say 'If you leave your name & phone no, we'll call you back when the item's in stock and, by the way, we'll use your details to also call you with attractive marketing offers that we think you may like'?

And if they don't say the latter, then they have no right at all to call you with them.

We only had a line rental with them that we stopped 20 months ago. No permissions were given previously too, as far as I am aware.

We had online billing only and I made sure all communications boxes were ticked / unticked appropriately as not to receive any comms from them.

Edited by deleted (Wed 10-Jun-15 20:52:40)

Just stick the junk mails in the recycling and forget about it. There's far more important things to worry about in life.

Unlike with electronic communications, there is no legally backed opt-out register from marketing via postal mail. It is good practice for organisations not to send to people on the Mail Preference Service register, but they do not break the law by failing to respect MPS registration.

However, the Data Protection Act 1998 says, in essence, that organisations must make fair use of your personal data. If you ask an organisation to stop sending you marketing communications via postal mail, it must do so. If you brought a complaint against BT Retail, BT Retail would have to show that they did not use personal data for purposes other than it was collected for, also that you did not have an opt-out from receiving postal marketing in force.


It would appear difficult for an organisation to claim successfully that a previous explicit opt-out from postal marketing had been cancelled by a new enquiry that did not explicitly rescind that opt-out.

However, I haven't checked whether there is case law or guidance about how the Data Protection Act 1998 requirement to keep personal data for no longer than necessary applies to marketing opt-outs from people with whom the company has no ongoing relationship. I think it is very difficult to argue against "as long as necessary" meaning indefinitely in this context, on the basis that there should be no need to renew an opt-out and only an explicit opt-in should cancel an opt-out. In any event, respecting obsolete opt-outs will prevent a company wasting resources on sending information to people who have moved or died. However, there is an argument that opt-out information eventually goes out of date, so there could be circumstances in which an opt-out can reasonably be discarded.

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

Oh, yes, it is. How often do firms say 'If you leave your name & phone no, we'll call you back when the item's in stock and, by the way, we'll use your details to also call you with attractive marketing offers that we think you may like'?

And if they don't say the latter, then they have no right at all to call you with them.

As I've explained elsewhere in the thread, postal mail (which is what the original poster is complaining about) and electronic communications are subject to different rules.


If a UK company uses personal data for purposes other than which it obtained that data, it has almost certainly broken the fair use provisions of the Data Protection Act 1998. However, a UK company may coincidentally start unsolicited telephone marketing to an individual at the same time as it receives personal data from that individual for other than marketing purposes, so long as:

• the number was not registered with the Telephone Preference Scheme more than 28 days before the date of the call, and
• the company can show it obtained the name and number via a legitimate route (such as a list of names and numbers sold by a company who has obtained permission to share your details with "carefully selected third parties" for marketing purposes), rather than from misusing the personal data from the enquiry about the out of stock item

Contrary to your assertion otherwise, a UK company does not have to obtain opt-in permission before starting to make marketing calls to an individual. Any act is lawful unless prohibited by law.

Very sensible advice.

I just wanted to bring attention to underhand practices of BT customer service staff.

Thanks again, David, for all the useful information and advice.

Another reply from BT Residential Services asking me to call the billing team at 0800800150 to stop marketing adverts, the number, I believe I called before, but will check when I get home. A potential step back to square number 1.

The positive thing so far is that they are, at least, replying fairly quickly to my emails.

Have you tried posting it back saying return to sender.. Probably quicker than trying to call up etc.
I have done in the past and all of a sudden I stopped getting that junk.

We too don't like junk mail, far too much personal info being trawled for commercial use (and worse) and the junk fills up our letter box, advertising our absence when we are not at home.

Some years ago we received a steady flow of junk from a holiday company which we had used a couple of times, even though we always declined 'marketing offers'. I phoned, emailed and wrote to them on six occasions but the fat brochures kept coming, often in duplicate. David's excellent advice posts confirm my own impressions of the problems of stopping it.

After a year of this I wrote recorded delivery to the company secretary asking them to desist and advising that there would be a £20 disposal fee for any further junk, and by sending it they would be deemed to agree to this fee. Another brochure arrived the next week, by which time the secretary found our name had been listed twice, once by Christian names, the other by initials.

We would certainly have gone to Small Claims to recover the money, simply to obtain publicity. Companies and now certain charities are at last realising the annoyance they cause by this behaviour. As for the nuisance phone calls ...

Sensible advice too. I also believe it worked for me before and might do it additionally.

The thing is we haven't been receiving any junk mail for a while since we signed up with a Mail Preference Service some time ago and put sticker "No Junk Mail" on a letter box, so this was such a blatant violation of trust.

I am now using this exercise to assess the BT's customer Services as they are a major broadband provider and I was considering using them as a possible future provider.

Thanks. All good advice.

I think I'll be sending it back for now and after a couple of months log a complaint with the Information Commissioner, if it doesn't stop.