Government’s move on nuisance calls doesn’t go far enough

Fuss Free Phones, a mobile network recently launched across the South West, which makes phones designed for older people and those who struggle with technology, has branded the government’s new proposals on nuisance calls as half-baked.

“It's a step in the right direction but so many call centres rotate the numbers they display so it won’t do much to protect the old and vulnerable,” says Simon Rockman, founder of Fuss Free Phones.

Baroness Neville Rolfe, minister responsible for data protection, has announced that from Monday 16 May 2016, direct marketing companies registered in the UK will need to display their phone numbers when making unsolicited phone calls, even if their call centres are based abroad.

Rockman is urging the Government to go further and force companies which make a high volume of sales and “survey” calls to lodge the numbers they use with the ICO which can publish a list allowing people to block the numbers.

Fuss Free Phones provides a service that blocks nuisance calls from companies which rotate their numbers and those which are completely based overseas and don’t have to comply with the new regulations. This uses technology originally developed to protect undercover police, look after key witnesses and forces charged with anti-terrorism.

Fuss Free Phones is a mobile network which makes using a mobile phone easy for people who have trouble with modern technology. With a team of friendly telephonists to place calls for customers, it harks back to the days of an operator switchboard.

Customers just press a big button on the back of an easy to use phone and are connected to the telephonist in a UK call centre. The customer can then ask for the person they want to speak to by name and the telephonist will look up the number on the customer’s Trusted Callers List which is held securely in the cloud.

But the secret weapon is the way this list is used to protect customers from nuisance, spam and scam calls. While other systems simply block numbers which are known to be associated with nuisance calls, Fuss Free Phones only allows incoming calls from numbers on the Trusted Callers List to call directly through to the customer. All others are diverted to the telephonists who will determine the intentions of the person who is calling before either ending the call or putting them through to the Fuss Free Phone owner.

While there are a large number of virtual networks in the UK, very few possess the ability to handle calls in this way. The technology was developed in partnership with GOS Systems which provides telephony services for law enforcement, homeland security and government agencies. This gives Fuss Free Phones an unprecedented level of control over how calls are handled: something only the major networks could match.

Simon, who devised the system, says “I love the smiles on the faces of the techies who are used to developing services aimed at fighting drug busts, organised crime and terrorists, when we talk about protecting pensioners and the vulnerable.”