Telephone number

I have discovered in the last few days that Sky have passed my Ex Dir telephone number on to a 3rd party, namely Domestic & General who have since rung me asking if I want insurance for my 5 week old Sky equipment. I am assuming that without my permission they, under the Data Protection Act are not allowed to do this and it would appear that a couple more of my friends who recently migrated from O2 have had similar phone calls.
Is there anyone else who has had similar calls as it would be reasonable to assume that mine and my friends numbers are not the only ones that have been passed on....

www.skyprotect.com the approved provider of the Sky box insurance

As for DPA, have you checked whether T&C's mention passing onto approved suppliers etc

Yes I have read the 18 pages of T&C's and it says nothing about passing info to 3rd party. They can use your info for debt recovery purposes and marketing but it states nothing about passing it to 3rd parties. I was advised that D&G are an approved provider but as they are not part of the Sky organisation they are classed as a 3rd party.
I tried for 2 days to get an answer out of Sky without success so I have advised them that I have submitted a claim to The Information Commissioners Office who will now deal with it.
It does beg the question if it is found that they have broke the DPA regulations how many other peoples telephone numbers have been passed on and to how many Companies ?
One other point is my Sky equipment is only 4 weeks old why would I want Sky Protect..!

Edited by deleted (Sat 13-Jul-13 14:23:29)

Being going on for years so either compliant or no-one has ever complained

I suspect the latter..

Little surprise how some of these companies get your number when you have ISP's passing on/selling phone numbers and details about you to 3rd parties,

If they mention marketing purposes then you should be able to opt out of this, and that goes for any company ,why should they be able to sell your details to other companies without your knowledge or agreement ? A bit like talk talk, they had my details some 5 yrs after i had left tiscali uk(before they purchased it) which they used for unsolicticted marketing (junk mail) through the letter box,

Well it will be interesting to see what comes out of my claim to the Information Commissioners Office and also with my complaint to Sky as I understand after 2 days of asking has been passed to the Data Protection Dept.

Is this for Sky dish and box or just telecomms equipment or both?

I migrated over from O2 with phone and broadband and Sky threw in a Sky HD+ box with the Entertainment Extra+ package free for a year all to pay was line rental, so everything with Sky Now.

I dropped an email to the Data Protection department to make sure my complaint had been passed to them and got this automated reply...

"Thank you for contacting the Data Protection team at British Sky Broadcasting Limited.

If your query relates to Data Protection or a third party warranty provider please rest assured we will deal with your query and respond where appropriate. If your query does not relate to one of these, please redirect your query to the Contact Us section within our Help Centre at www.Sky.com."

It would appear from this that third party warranty provider is not a new problem and I'm surprised that not more readers haven't come across the problem of their telephone number being passed on without their permission.

I've recently had to contact the Executive Office at Sky in regards to this and other issues.

Sky come up with an excuse that you opted in during sign up but I ALWAYS opt out and it's top of my list when signing up to services.

It's a known issue and no matter what your preferences, they still pass on your details. DomGen are the only company who the official Sky Insurance. I'm sure Sky get enough money without the need to sell our data when we've told them not too!

I would complain and if you get no success then contact the Exec Office...

I to opted out of Sky marketing but this wasn't marketing from Sky it was from D&G so I will await the outcome from my complaint to the Information Commissioners Office who deal with companies breaking the rules of the Data Protection Act...

I opted out but Sky still passed my info onto DomGen (Domestic & General). If Sky hadn't of sold my data to them, then they wouldn't have called...

A quick search on Google will show you that this is an ongoing issue and many are complaining but as always, nothing is done!

I was getting calls 3-4 times a day, even when I called the number to opt-out, it didn't stop until I spoke to the Executive Office and they contacted DomGen. What is odd is that DomGen said 'we haven't got his details in our database'. How strange is that when it was them calling (1471 and dialed back to be greeted with a message about opting out and saying it was DomGen calling in behalf of Sky) and it stopped once Sky spoke with them....

I'm glad it's stopped for you but my concern is that it happened in the first place and I shall pursue this issue to it's conclusion, as far as I am concerned Sky have broken my contractual agreement and I shall leave and go somewhere else if that is proven.

There certainly used to be a clause that stated they could pass details to selective 3rd parties but I couldn't spot it in their current T&C's.

But you do seem to be getting a bit worked up about something that isn't really such a big deal. Just ask whoever calls to remove your details from their database and if they don't THEN you can complain to a higher authority.

Looking at your website you seem to spend a lot of your day receiving calls and logging them. Surely you must have better things to do. Victor Meldrew seemed to have less to moan about.

Edited by broadband66 (Mon 15-Jul-13 12:37:35)

In reply to a post by FraserSoft:

as far as I am concerned Sky have broken my contractual agreement and I shall leave and go somewhere else if that is proven.

I suspect proving this allegation one way or another is going to be well nigh impossible.

Proving that you have never, ever, given SKY permission to pass your contact to any other organisation is effectively impossible. If SKY are required to prove that they have been given permission to pass your contact details then this is sometimes possible (if they can produce the paper form) but assuming it is online or by phone - no chance.

And sometimes the check box "click here if you wish to reviive contacts from SKY and associated companies" and "click here if you don't wish to receive contacts from third parties".

Lots of people clear both or check both. Presumably SKY and other companies do use software to generate contact lists from this?

Thanks for your comments and you might be right when it comes to proving things but from day one a few weeks ago I had opted out of all marketing from Sky which was fine but this marketing was from D&G and has nothing to do with my Sky account and the only way they got my telephone number was if Sky gave them it.
As stated in my earlier post I will await the results from my claim to the Information Commissioners Office which I have been advised could take 4-6 weeks..

In reply to a post by FraserSoft:

Thanks for your comments and you might be right when it comes to proving things but from day one a few weeks ago I had opted out of all marketing from Sky which was fine but this marketing was from D&G and has nothing to do with my Sky account and the only way they got my telephone number was if Sky gave them it.
As stated in my earlier post I will await the results from my claim to the Information Commissioners Office which I have been advised could take 4-6 weeks..

You say you opted out of all marketing from Sky but did you opt out of Third Party Marketing? Opting out of all Sky Marketing doesn't opt you out from Third Party Marketing as they are seperate...

DomGen have clearly got your details from Sky and proving it is going to be very difficult... I think the best way around this is to file a complaint with Sky, get some compensation by way of package reduction and make sure they remove your info from any mailing lists inc. third party databases.

Keep your complaint with the ICO going but it's unlikely it will go anywhere. You may as well try and get something back for there wrongdoing....

In reply to a post by shaneosborne:

In reply to a post by FraserSoft:

Thanks for your comments and you might be right when it comes to proving things but from day one a few weeks ago I had opted out of all marketing from Sky which was fine but this marketing was from D&G and has nothing to do with my Sky account and the only way they got my telephone number was if Sky gave them it.
As stated in my earlier post I will await the results from my claim to the Information Commissioners Office which I have been advised could take 4-6 weeks..

You say you opted out of all marketing from Sky but did you opt out of Third Party Marketing? Opting out of all Sky Marketing doesn't opt you out from Third Party Marketing as they are seperate...

DomGen have clearly got your details from Sky and proving it is going to be very difficult... I think the best way around this is to file a complaint with Sky, get some compensation by way of package reduction and make sure they remove your info from any mailing lists inc. third party databases.

Keep your complaint with the ICO going but it's unlikely it will go anywhere. You may as well try and get something back for there wrongdoing....

I have filed a complaint with Sky and the ICO and I can't find anywhere in my contract instructions for opting out of 3rd party junk but the contract does state. "BSB group may use and share withing that group, the information you provide"
No statement about sharing my Ex Dir telephone number with a 3rd party, anyway as stated I shall await the outcome of my complaints....

In reply to a post by shaneosborne:

Opting out of all Sky Marketing doesn't opt you out from Third Party Marketing as they are separate

There is no such thing as separate 3rd. Party Marketing. The OP has no commercial or contractual relationship with DG.

A supplier, such as Sky, will ask you to opt in/out of marketing by themselves and by any 'specially selected third parties' under a single banner. Indeed, my bank says 'rest assured that any third-party messages will always be coming from us',

I definitely opted out during sign up and I never had these calls.

I have had sky in 3 houses at one point previously - all as different accounts and never had a single call.
I think the operator or somebody you spoke to didn't do their job properly and opted you in / did not opt you out.

I doubt they will get to where the mistake was made but I've definitely never had this in my 10+ years with Sky, with various accounts at various houses.

I would firstly point my finger at customer services who are probably just opting people in unknowingly.

I am starting to get the feeling that it is recent O2 customers who are getting these calls as two of my friends who were with O2 have had similar calls recently and all 3 of us have only been with Sky for a matter of weeks.It may be that the O2 customer Database that Sky have inherited has been passed to D&G recently and this is why Ex O2 customers are getting calls.

Whether you are Ex Dir or not would not preclude them from divulging the number. I'm assuming that you have to have your line plugged in to the Sky box and therefore you had to supply your number to Sky.

My telephone line is not and has not been plugged into the Sky Box, as I am not using multi room or the box as a Freesat box there is nowhere in my contract that states I have to have the Sky Box connected to a telephone line.

Certainly used to, for minimum contract period, to obtain the reduced cost of installation, etc. Obviously they've changed that.