Domestic and General - How rude are they?

[NewsreadeR]

I have just had a phone call from Domestic and General trying to sell me an extended warranty for my HD box for £99.

Having spoken to Jake from Domestic and General for approx 4 minutes, the penny suddenly dropped that he was not in fact ringing from Sky, but on behalf of.

What I draw the line at, is the fact that:

1) He did not make it clear that he was not Sky

2) He had no interest in HD but was trying to sweet talk me into spending £99

3) The fact that D and G had my Name, Address, and Home Phone Number on their computer systems.

4) The fact that he called me rude and that he was going to terminate the call

I then spoke to his supervisor, a Mr Richard A----- who told me he would listen to the call, he would retrain Jake, if needed. I also asked him for a written apology for the way I was spoken to and a direct number to his call centre so I could make a complaint. Having looked up his head offices phone number on the internet he then gave it to me.

Apparently D and G do not have incoming call lines, and that it was my fault that they contacted me, because I told Sky that I consented to being contacted by 3rd parties at the point of ordering. I did nothing of the sort, as when I bought my HD Box, I did it over the telephone and was never asked if I consented or not.

Representing Sky, Domestic and General should be ashamed of agents like Jake and tbh I am very annoyed at D and G as well as Sky for passing my details on.

//rant over

Update: Having just checked My Sky, it quite clearly says:

Third Party Marketing: no

Therefore D and G do not have my authorisation to hold my details or cold call me. And obviously Sky do not take into account my desire for privacy.

[G01]

The details could have been passed over before you opted out of 3rd party contact. D&G are the only sky authorised warranty providers. Just be thankful it wan't one of the hundreds of scam warranty providers who take your direct debit details and run

[NewsreadeR]

Well I opted out in January 2007, I only bought my HD box in September.

I would not have been too bothered, if the guy at D and G had not proceeded the way he did, in idle chit chat and not take NO I do not want a warranty as an excuse to continue trying to sell it to me.

Seriously, I am a salesman and I know when people are interested or trying to do a hard sell. As I mentioned, he initially gave me the impression he was Sky themselves. Then to call me rude and threaten to terminate the call, just took the biscuit.... He rang me.

As for the unscrupulous callers, I agree. However that does not excuse the fact that I opted out and then Sky passed on the details. In my eyes that is a breach of Data Protection, and I fully intend to take it all the way, unless D and G apologise, in writing and remove my personal details off their computer systems.

[DSCW]

Sounds like you got the rough end of a person who was in a job they don't want to be doing and had been knocked back a lot of times that day. I have worked in Call centres but always on inbound calls on Service or Helpdesks. I will never ever work on outbound, I have seen normally perfectly sane people break down because of the knock backs and not getting any commision. The basic wage is generally minimum wage + commision

I never buy extended waranties from the equiptment supplier, they are always a rip off. I have had a few incidents like this, but I have to say not on behalf of Sky, but with other companies. I had Comet try 3 times after I bought my HD TV

If I feel I need extended cover I always contact the manufactorer Direct, I always get a better and cheaper deal on extended waranties.

[NewsreadeR]

Just got a reply from Sky:

Thank you for providing the information I requested.

On checking our records, there was an indicator set at "Yes" for sharing information with third party companies. This was taken from the original creation of the account.

I have amended your account in order that no calls are received from Sky or any of our business partners and can confirm that you are showing as registered for the TPS service.

May I confirm the circumstance in which Sky authorises disclosure of customer data in the course of providing its services. We disclose data to Sky business partners who carry out necessary installation and repair work for us, to be used for this purpose alone. These partners are bound by strict contractual terms to ensure the safe keeping and storage of that data. They are also permitted to share that data with sub-contractors, again only to enable the necessary work to be carried out, and provided adequate security measures are in place.

Please be aware that data brokerage companies may source customer data from many sources, including warranty cards, consumer spending data and questionnaires completed by consumers.

We would also like to take this opportunity to remind you that you have a right under Section 11 of the Data Protection Act 1998 to object to marketing communications and you can instruct companies who send you such communications to cease that activity and remove your data from their databases. If this fails to draw their activity to a close we would recommend that you contact the Information Commissioner’s Office with respect to that activity.

Please rest assured that Sky has not unlawfully disclosed your data to a third party and we do not share data with third parties without consent.

We want all our customers to get the best service possible and I hope my reply has resolved your enquiry.

Should you require further assistance with regard to this matter please contact me and I will be happy to help.

Which is about as much use as a chocolate fire guard. So reading that Sky have not divulged my information to Domestic and General. I have obviously filled in a warranty card, also filled in a questionnaire and then sent them both to Domestic and General. Then to top it all, my Credit Card Company have grassed me up to them as well.

Or have I completely misread what Sky have put?

[Kbramman]

Personally I read it as saying that they did give your details as out, as for some reason when you first signed up, the account had a yes for the giving out info - surprising if true knowing you!!!

The rest is them denying that they have broken the DPA and that it could have been you filling in a survey etc - I doubt...

So, in short, yes they handed out your details - BUT the account on their system shows that they can, which means the option in My Sky is a load of Bull obviously and should be removed until sorted...

K

[NewsreadeR]

aaah

I have read it that Sky gave my details to an installer only.

We disclose data to Sky business partners who carry out necessary installation and repair work for us, to be used for this purpose alone.

As Domestic and General wanted to sell me a warranty and not do repair work, that effectively rules that paragraph out. As this in my eyes has absolutely nothing to do with D and G.

It's a shame Sky didn't send my details by TNT to Domestic and General then.

/still very annoyed

[Kbramman]

If I was in a mind to argue back, I'd take this quote:

"As part of your registration, we may send you periodic updates about products, services and events and special offers via email. Please refer to our Private policy further information. Please tick if you WOULD prefer the information you have given to us to be shared with companies outside the BSkyB Group for sales, marketing and market research"

From the My Sky section of the website when you change the option for Third Party Marketing.

Also, I'd be surprised if ANYONE who had that information, and had a flag that said they could use it, only used it with the partners for installation...
That means they would only be using once or twice (if you had multi-room or upgraded), bit of a waste of the information from my marketing point of view...

But I don't want an argument...

[nheather]

After my first SkyHD box packed up 2 months before the end of the year warranty and having read the stories of unreliable SkyHD boxes I relented and took out the D&G warranty.

Another factor is that the warranty does cover the dish and wiring (including alignment problems) and since my dish is rather exposed and gets knocked about in storms it seemed like a good idea.

Glad I did as last Thursday my second SkyHD box packed up. Rang D&G on Friday morning who passed me onto Sky who had an engineer out first thing today (Sunday) to replace the box.

Yes D&G are a seperate company but they are very closely allied to Sky. The paperwork I received is all Sky branded (barely a mention of D&G) and once you have spoken to them and they have established a problem you are passed straight over to Sky. This seemed to be a transfer to a different phone extension rather than an external call so wouldn't surprise me if D&G have a presence in Sky's offices. It is then a Sky engineer who comes out to resolve the problem.

So as far as I am concerned Sky and D&G can almost be regarded as the same company for the purposes of this warranty.

So no probs with D&G here (although I do agree that their salesman can be a little pushy).

What does annoy me is having to take out a warranty at my expense to protect myself against an inherently flakey product - yes I know I could fight it through SOGA etc. but life is too short and my family wouldn't put up with the downtime whilst the compalints and arguments are passed backwards and forwards.

Cheers,

Nigel