Category: speech analytics

ICO and GDPR Call Recording Compliance

Posted on | by Everon Stuart

The old Data Protection Act was replaced on 25th May 2018 with new Europe wide regulation called General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

There are 6 lawful bases to process and retain customer data which includes call recordings, cited by the Information Commissioners Office (ICO). Companies will have to decide and justify which of these bases they use. These include Consent, Legitimate Interest, Contract, Legal Obligation, Vital Interests and Public Task.

Everton Stuart of Vidicode UK and VoiceCrunch says, ‘Along with MiFIDII regulations in the finance industry and PCI DSS for credit card security, GDPR represents a challenge for existing call recording system owners due to the right to be forgotten, refusal of consent, right to portability and the customer’s right to see their data/calls’.

These ‘rights’ make it essential to find all recordings within one month for GDPR compliance. Many current recording systems will only search by time, date, via Incoming CLI (Calling Line Identity) and possibly by some form of call marking.

The Apresa Call Recording system from Vidicode UK offers call marking and screen recording as standard which is ideal for rapid find and retrieval of calls under the GDPR right to be forgotten.

The Apresa System also has a stop recording feature. If a customer decides at the point of contact or during a call that their legitimate interest is being overridden by the call being recorded the call recording can be stopped. An example of this might be where a call is being recorded for training purposes which benefits the company and not the customer. The Apresa will also stop any future recordings of that customer.

There are many clear benefits in choosing the Vidicode UK to assist with GDPR compliance even if an existing call recording system is being used because we offer a phrase and word matching solution through our sister company VoiceCrunch. VoiceCrunch is a voice analytics platform that finds recorded calls identified by using words and phrases as chosen by the user.

The Apresa call recording solution is available for trunk or extension recording of N3, SIP/VoIP, ISDN II, SIPREC E1/T1, TDM, Analogue and Audio (e.g. radio) communication and available on premise, hosted, virtualised or OEM.

 

More Reasons To Record Financial Advisor Calls

Posted on | by Everon Stuart

3 more reasons why Financial Advisors should be recording telephone calls

As someone involved in the call recording industry for many years, I find it difficult to believe that the Insurance Ombudsman stressed the importance of firms recording critical telephone transactions some 15 years ago.

Back in 2002 after numerous complaints, the Ombudsman stated ‘It is important for everyone, including financial services firms, that there is an effective dispute resolution mechanism for businesses. Our evidence suggests some small businesses currently find it hard to achieve a fair outcome in disputes with financial services firms because court action is not a realistic option for them’.

Fast forward to 2018 and the Financial Conduct Authority has launched a consultation on plans to give more small businesses access to the Financial Ombudsman Service. Currently, only individual consumers and approximately 5.5 million of the smallest type of business can access the Ombudsman if they have a dispute with a financial services firm. Approximately 160,000 businesses that cannot access the Ombudsman would need to take a financial firm to court and the FCA believes that many smaller businesses within this group struggle to do this.

Upon launching the 12-week consultation in January 2018 Andrew Bailey, Chief Executive at the FCA, said ‘It is important for everyone, including financial services firms, that there is an effective dispute resolution mechanism for businesses. Our evidence suggests some small businesses currently find it hard to achieve a fair outcome in disputes with financial services firms because court action is not a realistic option for them. We have considered what could be done within our powers and the remit of the Financial Ombudsman Service to improve this situation and are proposing to expand access to the Ombudsman.’

It’s likely that an increasing number of businesses and charities will be taking their disputes to the Ombudsman and whilst we can’t second guess how he will deal with those complaints if they are related to telephone conversations it seems sensible that a recorded telephone conversation will be a highly influential factor in resolving any dispute

The importance of recording telephone conversations is further strengthened by the compliance regulations of the FSA and FCA introduced over the last 10 years with the introduction of MiFID1 and in January 2018 MiFID2 requiring all telephone call related financial transactions to be recorded be in by landline, mobile or SMS.

MiFID1 initially dealt with financial market abuse and a lack of transparency in financial dealings and was aimed specifically at regulating only stock brokers, traders, derivatives dealers and the like. MiFID2 regulates anyone involved with “electronic communications” that relate to the reception, transmission and execution of orders. And anyone means even your local Independent Financial Advisor!

MiFIDII spells out the compliance requirement for regulated firms to take notes of any financial transaction whether it results in a trade or not. As many transactions are conducted over the phone there should be a means of recording these. The options are either writing copious notes which is fraught with difficulty (Link) during the phone call or recording the phone call. The FCA states ‘While having a digital, taped recording of a call is not obligatory for all it is important to consider the benefits of using this method in comparison to simply taking notes’.

You might wonder why then, with all these recommendations, regulations, and fines for non-compliance that thousands of IFAs, Brokers, Financial Planners, Wealth Managers, Financial Planning Consultants and the like still aren’t recording their telephone calls? Could it be down to lack of information, are they simply ignoring sound advice from regulatory and advisory bodies or is it a cost restriction?

If you are a financial advisor, or even if you are a customer of a financial advisor seeking a means to ensure that your important telephone conversations can’t be disputed please call us on 0203 4881498 or e-mail sales@vidicodeuk.co.uk where we can advise on a range of solutions from only £100.

Important links

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/ombudsman-news/18/july-said-that.htm

https://www.fca.org.uk/news/press-releases/financial-conduct-authority-consults-widening-access-financial-ombudsman-service-small-businesses

https://www.fca.org.uk/markets/mifid-ii

The ICO, Data Protection & GDPR

Posted on | by Everon Stuart

6 New Rules to check before recording your customers’ phone calls

The old Data Protection Act will be replaced on 25th May 2018 with new regulation called General Data Protection Regulation or GDPR for short. This will not be affected by the UK leaving the EU.

Whilst many companies will be concentrating (hopefully) on other aspects of GDPR for example, security of personal details and marketing Opt-Ins GDPR also changes the rules on call recording. And if a current call recording system is already in place it would be prudent to check the capability of the system in relation to the new rules.

Current rules on call recording make it acceptable to record a call if a recorded or written message informs the caller (for example on a website, or on correspondence etc.). GDPR changes this in that a company must get the customer’s consent to record a call first. This may be prior to a call for regular customers or for new customers at the beginning of the call. There are also five other exceptions including:

  1. The customer has consented to you recording their calls
  2. Recording is necessary for the performance of a contract with the subject or to take steps to enter into a contract
  1. Recording is necessary for compliance with a legal obligation, for example, to comply with the requirements of the Financial Conduct Authority and MiFID/MiFIDII regulation
  2. Recording is necessary to protect the vital interests of a subject or another person
  3. Recording is necessary for the performance of a task carried out in the public interest or in the exercise of official authority vested in the controller
  1. Where call recording is necessary for the purposes of legitimate interests pursued by the controller or a third party, except where such interests are overridden by the interests, rights or freedoms of the data subject

There is a more defined list of special categories from the ICO. (Information Commissioners Office)

The customer’s right to be forgotten

As well as the customer having the right to not be recorded under GDPR they also have the right to be forgotten. It’s essential that any call recording system makes it very easy to find all the calls belonging to that customer. This could be achieved by the recording system capturing the incoming call identity (CLI), or via notes added to a call or via Voice Analytics.

If you are considering recording your telephone calls or already have a system in place talk to our call recording specialists on 0203 4881498 for further information on GDPR.

We recommend the Vidicode UK Apresa Call recording system which enables callers to stop the recording and has a censure list to avoid that customer being recorded in the future. For existing call recording users, Vidicode’s VoiceCrunch is a voice analytics platform that will quickly find keywords or phrases to identify callers that want to be forgotten.

We recommend that customers familiarise themselves with the requirements of the ICO (Information Commissioners Office) regarding GDPR rules in relation to recording telephone calls. For more comprehensive information about the right to object to calls being recorded click here.