ICO fines call blocker seller £190,000 over 758,053 TPS calls
Elderly Aids Ltd sold devices to stop nuisance calls and made 758,053 of its own, every one to a number on the opt-out register. The regulator's reasoning reads like a checklist of how to get fined.
The Information Commissioner's Office has fined Elderly Aids Ltd £190,000 for making 758,053 unsolicited marketing calls between May 2024 and February 2025.
Every one of those calls went to a number registered with the Telephone Preference Service, the official register for people who have opted out of marketing calls.
The company sold call-blocking devices. The ICO said it deliberately targeted elderly people, on the stated basis that it was protecting them from nuisance calls.
Twenty complaints reached the ICO and the TPS during the nine-month campaign. The regulator said those complaints described callers who were aggressive, misleading and often did not identify themselves.
One complainant said their father was persuaded to sign up to pay £139 upfront and £6.99 a month, and accused the firm of "overcharging for call blocking services that they aren't authorised to sell".
The penalty came with an enforcement notice ordering the company to stop making unlawful calls and to comply with caller identification rules.
The ICO said the firm repeatedly ignored requests for information during the investigation and kept calling, which generated further complaints. Once it knew it was under scrutiny, it tried to strike itself off the Companies House register, and it is now registered at a default address.
The rule at the centre of the case applies to any business that picks up a phone to win customers. A live marketing call to a TPS-registered number is unlawful unless that person has told the specific organisation calling that they do not object.
Consent given to a lead vendor, a partner or a previous employer does not transfer. It has to be consent to you.
Enforcement has been building. The ICO has previously issued £495,000 in fines over millions of intrusive marketing messages, and call centres making PPI calls without checking the TPS register were fined £225,000 in an earlier case.
Russell Roach, Director of Preference Services at the Data & Marketing Association, said firms should screen calling lists against the TPS and its corporate equivalent, the CTPS, before running any sales or marketing campaign.
For a founder running outbound, that is the practical takeaway, and it is cheap. Screening happens before the dialler starts, not after the first complaint.
The aggravating factors here are worth reading as a list of things not to do: calling people who had opted out, callers who did not say who they were, ignoring the regulator's requests, continuing to call during the investigation, and an attempted dissolution. Each one made the number at the end larger.
A £190,000 penalty would end most seed-stage companies. The compliance step that avoids it takes a morning.