Financial services company fined £50k for spam text messages

Financial services company LADH Limited has been fined £50,000 by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) for sending tens of thousands of spam text messages, in breach of Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR).

Over a six-week period from March to April 2022, LADH sent more than 31,000 text messages without valid consent. Most of these unwanted text messages did not offer an opportunity for the recipients to opt out, which is also unlawful.

The ICO served LADH with an enforcement notice to stop sending direct marketing messages without valid consent and issued a fine of £50,000.

Examples of the text messages sent by LADH Limited include:

“Free Debt Help can consolidate your unaffordable payments, write off up to 85% of your total debt Check if you qualify text HELP or Stop2Stop.”
"FREE Government Debt Help can consolidate your unaffordable debt and write off up to 85% of your total debt. Check if you qualify by texting help."

There were 106 complaints made to Mobile UK’s Spam Reporting Service by people who had received these unwanted text messages.

During the investigation, LADH claimed it had received a verbal assurance that the data it had received from a third party contained details of people who had consented to being contacted, though it did not have any written confirmation of that consent.

Andy Curry, head of investigations at the ICO, said: “Sending unsolicited direct marketing messages is illegal and can be frustrating and distressing for people. All organisations using direct marketing messages are responsible for ensuring they have valid consent to contact every recipient. Relying on third-party claims of consent, without undertaking checks, leaves organisations open to our enforcement action if it turns out that people have, in actual fact, not given valid consent to be contacted."