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The Advertising Protection Agency

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Comments

  • LizaM
    LizaM Posts: 51 Forumite
    Sorry Dimar - think we might be at cross purposes here. Not quite sure what you mean? If its about blocking posts - what I'm saying is TAPA can't block your posts about them unless they have been abusive or defamatory. I contacted the whocallsme site when my name and address appeared because this was a breach of the Data Protection Act. They removed the post when I asked them to. However, nobody has been abusive or misleading in any posts recently, so nobody can complain and have posts removed. Am I explaining myself or making it even more confusing?!!
  • LizaM
    LizaM Posts: 51 Forumite
    It would seem that a large chunk of the whocallsme thread has been removed - 25 pages are down to 22. Nobody can think of any good reason to remove any posts - there was no abuse, libel, defamation that anyone can remember. Just a heads-up in case this thread disappears....again!
  • katejo
    katejo Posts: 4,023 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    LizaM wrote: »
    It would seem that a large chunk of the whocallsme thread has been removed - 25 pages are down to 22. Nobody can think of any good reason to remove any posts - there was no abuse, libel, defamation that anyone can remember. Just a heads-up in case this thread disappears....again!

    I assume that you have had no reply with an explanation for the removal of the harmless comments on Whocalledme?
  • LizaM
    LizaM Posts: 51 Forumite
    Hi Katejo - no, none at all. Its just so strange as posts seem to have been removed randomly.
  • LizaM
    LizaM Posts: 51 Forumite
    We have had an explanation about the removal of posts on whocallsme. Apparently they pick up when people try to manipulate the thread by posting under several names, but from the same base. I think its good they do that - I feel more confident that others on the forum are genuine.
  • LizaM
    LizaM Posts: 51 Forumite
    At last!! Finally!! There is an upheld complaint against TAPA on the ASA website. Here's how you get to it http://www.asa.org.uk/ASA-action/Adjudication ... ADJ_172523.aspx. Is that enough evidence for you TAPA?
  • PhylPho
    PhylPho Posts: 1,443 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts
    edited 30 January 2012 at 1:56AM
    Hi Lisa: don't quote me on this, but I recall someone saying about putting links in posts and that they were only 'active' if the poster had been an MSE member for a particular length of time or with a particular post count total. I could be wrong (I often am!) so apologies to bth you and MSE if I am, but it seemed an effective way of stopping scammers and spammers from manipulating this site.

    Anyway . .

    The link in your post doesn't work, so I've placed it here in mine:

    http://www.asa.org.uk/ASA-action/Adjudications/2012/1/The-Advertising-Protection-Agency/SHP_ADJ_172523.aspx

    Fascinating reading, by the way. A business calling itself an "agency" (why?) also claims to be "An Associate Licensee of the Telephone Preference Service"????

    And that description of itself is intended to convey to the average consumer. . . precisely what?
  • PhylPho
    PhylPho Posts: 1,443 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts
    . . . just to add, from this business's own website:

    "The Advertising Protection Agency is not a legal practice and does not act in any legal capacity or is qualified legally. The Advertising Protection Agency is a profit-making private firm and does not work under contractual agreement or is licensed by any government department to carry out its day-to-day practice duties. The Advertising Protection Agency is not an advertising regulatory body or marketing watchdog. The Advertising Protection Agency is not associated and does not work in partnership with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS), the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), Companies Investigation Branch (CIB), Trading Standards, the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the Office of Communications (OFCOM), Citizens Advice or the Charity Commission. The Advertising Protection Agency is not a limited company. The Advertising Protection Agency is not a charity and has no association, link, partnership or involvement with any charity and does not donate any money to any charity. The Advertising Protection Agency is a Partnership firm."

    So. Just to clarify:

    1) The business is not a Limited Company so is not registered at Companies House and does not have Company Directors;

    2) The business trades as a partnership of unnamed unidentified individuals;

    3) This small business, then, is not "an agency" acting for or on behalf of any statutory body;

    4) This business is not a law practice whose partners are solicitors nor does it employ solicitors on whatever staff there happens to be;

    5) This small business is, to quote the text above: not associated and does not work in partnership with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS)


    Yet this business describes itself thus throughout its website:

    TAPA is an Associate Licensee of the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) and has demonstrated its commitment to raising and maintaining the standards and effectiveness of the direct marketing industry


    Hmmmm. Kind of makes one think it has satisfied the OFCOM-supervised Telephone Preference Service of its suitability to enjoy the status of "Associate Licensee", such status being in some way or other an official endorsement of the business's 'commitment to raising and maintaining the standards and effectiveness of the direct marketing industry'.

    Or that's what anyone might infer from the above text.

    But they'd be wrong, because anyone can buy any licence they feel like from the variety offered by the Telephone Preference Service, licences which to varying degrees allow access to the TPS's list of registered telephone numbers.

    I could fork out £4,400 right now for a Full Annual Licence -- I could be a Full Licensee, yay! -- but that has nothing whatsoever to do with me demonstrating a commitment to, er, anything other than self interest and self protection: I really don't want to run foul of the TPS by cold-calling loads of people who happen to be on TPS' opt-out list. Better that I pay that £4,400 and keep myself on good terms with the TPS.

    Or I could, like The Advertising Protection Agency's Philip Medhurst, just pay £160 a year instead for a sort of slimmed down access; all the details are here:

    http://corporate.tpsonline.org.uk/tpsC/html/Cost.asp

    Anyway. Hopefully The Advertising Protection Agency has now learnt something from The Advertising Standards Authority about, er, advertising.

    But this small business still seems to have some way to go towards understanding just how easy it is to fall into the trap of inadvertently using words and phrases in certain ways that, surprisingly enough, have a capacity to mislead. The Advertising Protection Agency most surely will never want that to happen.
  • Coopdivi
    Coopdivi Posts: 3,412 Forumite
    The Advertising Standards Authority has upheld a number of complaints made against TAPA on the 25th January 2011.

    http://www.asa.org.uk/ASA-action/Adjudications/2012/1/The-Advertising-Protection-Agency/SHP_ADJ_172523.aspx
  • katejo
    katejo Posts: 4,023 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper
    Glad to see that this discussion is now available again.
This discussion has been closed.
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