eNOISE

Epic Fail

And so, the Mutual Consolidated Savings Saga continues.

I received a call mid-meeting this afternoon on my cell phone, that had me revisit my less than pleasant initial experience with this questionable organization that supposedly strives to help customers save time and money through their debt reduction products and services.

While I know very little about their service offering and what they actually do for their customers – I have very little desire to find out. I may have a bit more respect for their organization if they conducted themselves in a manner deserving of respect in how they go about attracting and obtaining new business.

Much like my first exchange with Mutual Consolidated Savings, today the same (or an eerily similar) automated message was broadcast to me, claiming to be from the “cardholder services department” with the insinuation of representing my financial institution of choice.  The message presented me the opportunity to lower my interest rates if I were gullible interested enough to push the #1 on my Blackberry’s keypad – the whole while, the message never indicated which company it was that was calling, or that would ultimately speak to me upon pressing the magic button.

As a bit of seemingly divine intervention, when I pressed the ‘1′ my call was subsequently dropped (I assume a misfire between the call center taking calls and the system (or other firm) responsible for the automated broadcast).

While I was spared another opportunity to have another one of my phone numbers placed in the MCS DNC registry, the call reminded me of my previous ordeal, the status of my inquiry with the Better Business Bureau, and eventually led me to further research.

Here’s an excerpt of the response I received to my earlier complaint.

To Whom It May Concern:

Our response to this case is clear and final. The client, Scott Thornton, certainly has the full attention of our corporation. MCS has heard and understands the concerns related in this case.

Mr. Thornton’s phone number has been added to our internal Do Not Call list.

MCS has and will continue to be at the forefront of DNC compliance, and will continue in this compliance with all due diligence. This corporation has also taken further steps to increase the ease and ability by which any consumer can be added to our own internal DNC list. You may find this ability as www.mcsdnc.com.

We follow all National, State, Regional and Local laws regarding these Do Not Lists. Furthermore, it is our enforced corporate policy to “scrub” these lists against both our own, and our subcontractor’s lists, once weekly, although we are required to perform this action only every 30 days. We have and will continue to adhere to this policy in the future without exceptions.

MCS will continue to hold our current associates to nothing but the highest if standards of compliance with both new and existing policies.

[...]

Very Truly Yours
Penny L Fishbec
Administration
Mutual Consolidated Savings

While I don’t disagree with their assessment over being over-compliant on the DNC regulations (over-compliant may be an overstatement, as it was my feeling that they were flagrantly offering the DNC list as a means of avoiding speculation), I don’t quite have the warm and fuzzy feeling I was hoping to receive regarding not announcing the name of the caller’s organization.   In my initial filing, I had suggested it may be in violation of CRTC regulations in Canada.

On the subject of unsolicited telephone calls the CRTC states that:

among other things, the Telemarketing rules require all telemarketers to identify who they are and, upon request, provide customers with a fax or telephone number where they can speak to someone about the telemarketing call.”

They also stipulate that for solicitations driven by automated messaging systems or call announcing mechanisms, lovingly referred to as Automatic Dialing-Announcing Devices (ADADs);

A telemarketer shall not initiate, and a client of a telemarketer shall make all reasonable efforts to ensure that the telemarketer does not initiate, a telemarketing telecommunication via an ADAD unless express consent has been provided by the consumer to receive a telemarketing telecommunication via an ADAD from that telemarketer or the client of that telemarketer.  For greater certainty [...] this prohibition includes telemarketing telecommunications via an ADAD [...] for the purpose of requesting a consumer to hold until a telemarketer is available.

Additionally,

such telecommunications shall begin with a clear message identifying the person on whose behalf the telecommunication is made. This identification message shall include a mailing address and a local or toll-free telecommunications number at which a representative of the originator of the message can be reached. In the event that the actual message relayed exceeds sixty (60) seconds, the identification message shall be repeated at the end of the telecommunication;

And so, on my limited understanding of legalese, it appears there may be a violation of Canadian telecommunication legislation. To offer a benefit of a doubt, this may have been an oversight, considering that MCS is headquartered out of Tacoma, Washington. After all, they may have simply been unaware of the legislation and standards of business conduct that their Canadian prospective audience might expect.

For curiosity’s sake, let’s compare to the standards set forth by the FCC.

According to the FCC;

• The rules regarding automatically dialed and prerecorded calls apply whether or not you have registered your home phone number(s) on the national Do-Not-Call list.
• Calls using artificial or prerecorded voice messages - including those that do not use autodialers - may not be made to home phone numbers except for:
  - emergency calls needed to ensure the consumer’s health and safety;
  - calls for which you have given prior express consent;
  - non-commercial calls
  - calls that don’t include or introduce any unsolicited advertisements or constitute telephone solicitations
• All artificial or prerecorded calls must state, at the beginning, the identity of the business, individual, or other entity that is responsible for initiating the call.
• Except for emergency calls made with the prior express consent of the person being called, autodialers and any artificial or prerecorded voice messages may not be used to contact numbers assigned to any other service for which the person being called would be charged for the call.

By the FCC’s standards, today’s call was an Epic Fail on a couple counts.  Again, there’s no identification of the business responsible for initiating the call… and the call was even delivered to a service for which I’m charged for the call, charged by the minute, as well as for long distance charges.

It baffles my mind.