LBM Direct Marketing Complaints and Correspondence:
August 2008
This page represent some of the emails we've received
about LBM Direct
Marketing, almost all of which are complaints. You
can read the full story here.
11/8/08
- "A" managed to get off the list:
I
am just writing to you about LBM, they have been
ringing me for the past few months and they i came
across your website and they rang me whilst i was
reading the Ex employee's email. It worked like
a treat. They said they were calling from Orange
and asked me what network i was on and how much
it cost, to which they said they could do better.
then they kind of lost interest when i said they
i had over 12 months left on my line rental, they
asked if they could contact me when i was going
to upgrade, to which i declined and i asked where
they got my info from they said they got it from
a database so i asked it to be removed and they
said it would be done. so hopefully no more nuisance
calls from them. thanks
21/8/08
- "L" comes up with a suggestion
that we don't really recommend:
Another
tactic, especially useful to mobile customers who
would otherwise have to pay to opt out is to fax
them over the internet.
You can do this free
from a web page at http://www.tpc.int/sendfax.html
They
have their fax number 0161 929 4983 which needs
to be entered as an international number i.e. 44161
929 4983
You need to give an email address
and it needs to be valid, so use one of theirs such
as christineh @lbm.co.uk (enquiries@, paceyk@, Townsendv@,
batesm@, or beamishn@ would probably work too)
22/8/08
- "D" is an ex-employee who clarifies
things:
Hi, I have just quit my job with
LBM, where I worked for almost [redacted] weeks.
I was told that even if someone was registered
with the TPS, then they could have been opted in
to market research calls again since they registered,
making their TPS registration somewhat invalid.
We were told that the data was filtered and used
legally and that we would have been breaking the
law if we rang people who had not opted in at some
point. Someone was fired whilst I was there for
trying to sell to people whose numbers he found
in the Yellow Pages etc.
When it came to
people who objected to having been called, it was
sometimes the case that we had the wrong details,
and hence the wrong number. There also seemed to
be a pattern whereby if the number ended in 111
or 999, then the details were wrong, which made
me suspect that people had deliberately changed
part of their own number in order to avoid getting
marketing calls whilst still entering competitions
etc with their Email address or whatever.
I
didn't like telling people that we were from O2
when we were not, however that is the script we
were given, and the clients (Orange, O2, AOL etc)
who were outsourcing their marketing needs to LBM
most definitely approved of this practice. All calls
were recorded, and there were a number of things
we were not allowed to say, as directed ultimately
by the clients, true things that nonetheless we
had to omit, else we would have had our bonus canceled.
Examples being: you can change from paper billing
(extra charge) to paperless via email if you chose
to later; you can cancel 30 day contracts by giving
30 days notice with no penalties.
Anyway,
we were under pressure to get regular sales, and
lying to the customers was common practice, approved
of and endorsed by the management. Examples being
- we will see if we can get approval from our manager
to give you this or that, when the deals were set
in stone by the client and could easily be arranged
in exactly the same way by the customer by visiting
the client's website; telling customers that they
are only getting offered the deal because they were
loyal customers of the clients, when they were clearly
open to all.
Not the most heinous of lies,
but still deceptive and sneaky in most ordinary
people's opinions.
Funny things that happened:
Customer says 'Oh this is the O2 scam isn't it?',
'If you put this number in to Google, it comes up
with O2 Scam, Goodbye!'; another customer says 'I
went down to the O2 shop and asked if the company
did phone people up to sell to them, and they said
they definitely didn't, so on that basis I will
not be talking to you'. Technically, the guy in
the shop was correct, but O2 do pay LBM to do it.
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