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Nov27Written by:Martin
27.11.2008 13:28 
In Germany colds calls are forbidden. Today I experienced a way to circumvent that. I got a letter from Gruner & Jahr, the publisher of a monthly magazine I have a subscription for. The letter heading in bold face is: Important: Your subscription of magazine:…
The remaining letter was quite short. Here’s the original text: 
In English: Dear Mr. […] We would like you to call us about your subscription using the toll-free number 0800-… Our service is available at the following times: […]
I called them. Turns out that there’s nothing wrong with my subscription. They just wanted me to offer another magazine and offered a voucher for some bonus if I subscribe to any magazine they publish. What a devious way to let me call them, because they’re not allowed by the law to call me.  Even if their offer would have been interesting, the way they tricked me to contact them is reason enough to reject any offer. Tags: 3 comment(s) so far...
Re: How to circumvent Cold Calls The fact that you have a subscription is valid reason enough to get any phone calls from them. They only need to refer to your subscription. This is nothing else than "good customer service", even if they only want to sell some new products.
Cold calls are calls from companies you don't have any contract with. Those calls are strictly forbidden.
In my opinion Gruner & Jahr just tried a new method of attracting your interest.
By tom.wellige on
27.11.2008 14:17
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Re: How to circumvent Cold Calls If that would be true they could have called me directly, but they choose to send a letter via mail to trick me into calling them. Phone call costs are not an issue, too. The number was toll-free. They would have to pay for the call in both cases.
Furthermore there's a decision by a German court (OLG Frankfurt from 2005) which ruled that a business relationship to a customer does not automatically imply that the customer allowed such calls (see the German Wikipedia article about cold calls).
And even if this would be "a new method to attract interest" it's a complete failure, because during the first seconds of the call it was immediately clear that they just want to sell something and the intended impression the letter made was completly bogus.
By Martin on
27.11.2008 15:39
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Re: How to circumvent Cold Calls I think this is a EU directive. They are talking about this being implemented in Norway as well. It is not only about calls, it is valid for emails as well. You have to agree that the company is entitled to call or email you.
By morten.rokosz on
30.11.2008 09:22
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