It’s good to talk: meeting to find ways to reduce nuisance calls

The Scottish Government will discuss ways to reduce the number of nuisance calls received by people in Scotland with industry organisations today.

Following on from the first meeting of the commission, which focused on empowering consumers by raising awareness and helping them protect themselves, and the successful Nuisance Call Summit in June last year, Economy Secretary Keith Brown will chair the second meeting of the Nuisance Calls Commission which will focus on empowering and supporting companies that want to do the right thing, whilst finding effective ways to tackle persistently offending companies or individuals. This follows a Which? Report that found Scotland receives a higher number of nuisance calls compared to the rest of the UK.

Last week, telecoms giant BT announced it recorded more than 31 million nuisance calls in a single week before Christmas. The company, which supplies 40% of the landlines in the UK, said more than 12 million of those were about accident claims.

Speaking ahead of today’s meeting, Mr Brown said: “I set up the Nuisance Calls Commission to tackle the growing problem of Nuisance Calls which are disproportionately affecting Scotland with three of our main cities receiving the highest level of calls within the top five in the UK.  By bringing together key stakeholders the Nuisance Calls Commission seeks to develop a range of effective ways to protect consumers and reduce the impact of unwanted calls.

“The Scottish Government is determined to make the most of our new consumer powers to take positive steps to reduce the impact nuisance calls have on the lives of people in Scotland. However, with regulation of nuisance calls and texts reserved to the UK Government, I once again appeal to them to recognise the severity of this problem and to prioritise this by working closely with my officials to find solutions to this epidemic. Too many people are being plagued by nuisance calls in Scotland and enough is enough. I will be bringing forward an joint action plan outlining the Commission’s proposals and progress made prior to summer recess.”

Research published last November found that Scotland’s cities have the highest rates of nuisance calls in the UK.

Which? teamed up with call blocking provider trueCall and analysed over nine million phone calls made to their customers between January 2013 and September 2016.

Glasgow came top of a table ranking 18 UK cities according to the percentage of nuisance calls that trueCall users in those locations received. Edinburgh was second and Aberdeen fourth.

The research found that in Glasgow, over half (51.5%) of all calls received on trueCall users’ landlines were classified as a nuisance, positioning the city above Edinburgh, where the figure was 47.8% and Aberdeen, where the total was 45.6%.

The analysis also found that the number of nuisance calls to trueCall customers in Scotland has increased over the last six months. They received an average of 42 nuisance calls per month between April and September this year, up from 35 per month between October 2015 and March 2016.

Calls to vulnerable trueCall users in Scotland increased even further, up an average of 11 a month (from 41 to 52), with 41% receiving over 60 nuisance calls a month.