What says STW…

I’m dealing with a supplier who it turns out records all phone calls. I’ve checked and they have a message on their main number saying as much, but no message when you call someone on their direct line.

I’m idlely interested in the legality of that as I was under the impression it’s illegal to record calls without the other party’s knowledge/consent. One of my team is a bit upset to find out that her calls to them have been recorded without their knowledge (they’ve always used the direct lines rather than reception so never heard the message).

Either way it’s a big alarm bell for me, what kind of business expects to be involved in so many disputes that recording all calls is worthwhile? This isn’t a bank or big corporate we’re talking about either.

I sourced a recording solution for work. My understanding is you need to state somewhere that calls are recorded, but don’t need to state before every call.

IMU it’s not illegal to record a call between two parties if one of them is the recorder, but if it was ever used in court, the recorder would have a pretty difficult time explaining why it was felt necessary to record without informing the other party to the call. I think it is illegal to intercept third party’s calls without their consent.

Either way it’s a big alarm bell for me, what kind of business expects to be involved in so many disputes that recording all calls is worthwhile? This isn’t a bank or big corporate we’re talking about either.

I think a supplier choosing to do this reflects badly more on the clients rather than the supplier, unless the supplier’s boss is just paranoid I suspect it’s more they’ve been shafted more than once in the past. Is it an industry/sector with many suppliers fighting over a few large clients?

what kind of business expects to be involved in so many disputes that recording all calls is worthwhile?

“Calls may be recorded for training purposes” is what they usually say.

The supplier is in a very competitive marketplace but in my opinion it’s really counterproductive. We want relationships built on trust but this makes us feel like we’d always have to be on our guard. It’s by no means common practice in the industry and we’ve got plenty of other people we deal with who don’t do it (or at least I don’t think they do!).

I get that cougar, but in this example the training value would probably be in teaching their staff to negotiate better against ours. I’d not really be comfortable with using our own calls to train them in that way.

On your guard against what?

On your guard against what?

What they did in this case. Argued a higher fee for a piece of work based in saying something like “that’ll be at our usual rate of x% then, yeah?” in a conversation, as opposed to what we have in our written terms with them.

Not the biggest deal in the world but they were trying it on and there are plenty of their competitors who we’d rather deal with as a result.

If they state they are recording calls thats one thing. Can you legally ask for a transcript as a sort of call their bluff?

I ask as a manager I once had, told me tell clients calls were recorded. This was a blatant lie and she was caught out when asked for a transcript. She couldn’t provide it…

I think it is illegal to intercept third party’s calls without their consent

Absolutely correct …section 71 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, but recording a conversation isn’t the same as intercept.

Minor legal technicality I know!

Sounds an odd thing to do if deliberately trying to catch the purchaser out to earn a few more quid (unless we’re talking thousands difference), they’d have to be dumb to realise even if the verbal terms were legally binding you’d ditch them afterwards (and possibly let the wider industry know to be aware of the shady practice). I guess it could have been a sales guy desperate to meet his monthly target or something. Regardless, I don’t think it’s the recording of phone calls that’s the real issue here

Absolutely correct …section 71 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, but recording a conversation isn’t the same as intercept.

Minor legal technicality I know!

It’s section 1 not 71 of RIPA that creates the offence, minor legal technicality 😉 Recording would only be illegal if it fell under the ambit of unauthorised directed surveillance which would not apply to a business or private individual. There may be data protection issues though.

they’d have to be dumb to realise even if the verbal terms were legally binding you’d ditch them afterwards (and possibly let the wider industry know to be aware of the shady practice). I guess it could have been a sales guy desperate to meet his monthly target or something

Exactly what I thought however the MD of the business is backing him up so you’re also right in that

I don’t think it’s the recording of phone calls that’s the real issue here

And yes, it’s over a very small amount compared to what we could have spent with them in a year.

Routine in banking as it’s a FCA requirement for relevant people (brokers, etc). The clients I’ve worked for don’t ever seem to use any pre-announcement for calls to say that they’re being recorded.

So someone verbally agreed to something and now you’re trying to wriggle out of it? Nothing can be agreed unless it’s in writing?

There was a case recently in small claims where one side recorded a conversation. The judge refused to allow it, or a transcript, as he had no way of verifying veracity. IE just turning up in court with a “recording” doesn’t mean anything legally as it is hard to prove it is a true representation of the conversation without some expensive analysis. I can’t find the link now..

Secondly my mate is a big time criminal barrister and they regularly ask if they can have the police recordings examined to see if there has been any “editing”, and many times the prosecution will withdraw the phone tap evidence rather than have it examined. Make of that what you will.

unknown – Member
Either way it’s a big alarm bell for me, what kind of business expects to be involved in so many disputes that recording all calls is worthwhile? This isn’t a bank or big corporate we’re talking about either.

I didn’t realise it was unusual TBH.

We record all calls (though with a message at the start of each call, even to direct lines). It’s saved us tens if not hundreds of thousands over the years. Usually things like people agreeing a price verbally then billing us something different or ordering something non-refundable and later pretending we hadn’t informed them of the fact.

There’s not really any ‘worthwhile’ about it either, it costs virtually nothing in storage or setup time for a company using something like Asterisk to manage their calls.

I know my place says that they *may* record all communications, however in reality there is a judgement to be made even if you can prove someone said something – i.e. do you want to keep them as a customer? If you take them to court, that isn’t happening. This applies to written Ts & Cs being broken by clients, also.

Of course, there are times when you might want to get rid of an unprofitable client…

Secondly my mate is a big time criminal barrister and they regularly ask if they can have the police recordings examined to see if there has been any “editing”, and many times the prosecution will withdraw the phone tap evidence rather than have it examined. Make of that what you will.

“Phone tap” product is not capable of being evidence in criminal proceedingsexcept in exceptionally tribunals. You cannot request access to the material nor are you allowed to ask if such material exists, S17 of RIPA applies. So either your mate is talking about one sided recording, such as the OP is asking about as opposed to interception / taps or talking rubbish. I’ve never known a case be withdrawn because there was any problem with the veracity due to dodgy editing, most officers can barely work the kit let a alone seamelessly edit the product. Also it’s not a technique that is regularly used being burdensome on resources and expensive among for a few reasons .

One of our customers will ring up a few times asking the same question, the answer to which is not to their liking, but in different, ever increasingly bizarre ways, until they get someone who either misheard them, was confused by the question or whatever and gives them the response they want. They then quickly hang up and place the order based on that, then when we kick back, they refer to the phone record, and if we want any future business, we will honour the terms. Sadly they place a lot of business with us, so our hands are tied and our trousers down.

(They don’t tell people they record calls)

I now refuse to answer any of their questions over the phone, they either email or nothing, and assume everyone records calls

From experience a few years ago, a web site disclaimer was sufficient for general call recording. It didn’t need to be announced every call.

The system I looked after did all the company recordings, incoming and outgoing. It was a Telecoms company and the software was the stuff we sold so it was used for demonstration and training purposes – pretty much as the website disclaimer.

Setup was a USB device plugged into a SQL Server, incoming ISDN line fed into the box and then came out into the phone system.

Audio both ways was fired from the USB box, into the database and sat there for as long as you wanted depending on the size of disk you had.

There were some rules about calls including card transactions as there had to be some way of blanking out card details given over the phone, usually a key code the call handler put into their handset that flagged a portion of the recording as card info. You weren’t allowed to record that.

You couldn’t edit the calls within the database, you could export as files and edit but these were legally inadmissible. There was a secure export that did an encrypted self playing file for legal purposes.

Customers that used it were pretty much call centres, usually bought the call recording along with a reporting add on for call stats.

Had a loans company ring me up , usual speil calls rreecorded for trianing purposes, said no to the loan offer and just chatted to the nice lady, we apparently liuved near each other etc, and had similar likes, phone call got interupted by an angry manager who was listeniong in, he also forgot i could hear him giving the poor lady greif for wasting time and not selling a loan.

So even if calls are not recorded they may be monitored to save staff wasting time, or giving wrong information etc.

Kilo -So either your mate is talking about one sided recording, such as the OP is asking about as opposed to interception / taps or talking rubbish

Thanks very much for your correction, obvs I am only paraphrasing a conversation with my mate over a beer, so it is fortunate you are here to keep things factually accurate.
However, over another beer last night, I asked about this, he said you are right, except he was talking to me about intercepts of calls made from prisons which can be used in evidence and are often challenged, calls recorded indirectly from bugs in a room, and recordings of bugged conversations rather than calls, all of which are admissible. I confess the bugged conversations bit was the main thrust of my memory of the conversation.
But he maintains he has challenged bug evidence and telephone recording from prison evidence many times and often the prosecution will withdraw it rather than have it examined further.

You should have recorded it.

aracer – You should have recorded it.

Genius.

I bet this guy wishes he had..

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jul/05/mike-ashley-talk-deal-court-sports-direct