Emerging Best Practice in Do Not Call Registers (8 September 2009)

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2.5. United Kingdom

The United Kingdom established a national Telephone Preference Service (TPS) in 2003.[16] The register is established by legislation[17] and is administered by a series of private sector operators, overseen by the Information Commissioner’s Office.

The UK register covers home phones and mobile phones. In 2004 the register was expanded to include businesses numbers through a separate service known as the Corporate Telephone Preference Service (CTPS).

More than 14.5 million home telephone numbers and 1 million business telephone numbers have been registered.[18] This represents over 60 per cent of UK households and more than 55 per cent of businesses.[19]

Individual residential numbers registered on the databases do not require renewal. However, numbers registered on the Corporate TPS require annual renewal.

The TPS is considered a success, with a very high number of registrations and regular enforcement action by both the industry itself and the Information Commissioner’s Office. The effectiveness of the Corporate TPS is less clear and is the subject of considerable debate. Although the number of registrations is extremely high, the annual renewal requirement may become a burden.

The UK register does not cover SMS, however, unsolicited SMS marketing is already prohibited in the UK without a company having established prior consent.

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[16] <http://www.tpsonline.org.uk/tps/>

[17] The Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003 (UK), <http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2003/uksi_20032426_en.pdf>.

[18]PR Leap, Over 60% of UK phone numbers now registered with the Telephone Preference Service, 12 November 2007, <http://www.prleap.com/pr/102600/>.

[19] Marketing Services Talk, TPS signs up 60 per cent of UK phone users, 12 November 2007, <http://www.marketingservicestalk.com/news/sel/sel101.html>.

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