This seems like something people here might know about...

At a recent trade show, we had a prize draw. On the ballots, there was a
little checkbox for "Please contact me about future (company name) events".
We would then contact those that checked the box by email.

I managed to convince my higher-ups to let me put "Please contact me..."
instead of "By entering this draw, you agree to be contacted periodically by
(company name)." Now they say they want to contact everyone anyway, either
by phone or email, whether they checked the box or not, in case "they forgot
to check the box or something."

Besides throwing courtesy out the window, does anyone here have any
experience with Canadian law in this situation?

Thanks

Experienced but Undocumented wrote:
Certainly under British and European law, that would be illegal.

--


x theSpaceGirl (miranda)

# lead designer @ http://www.dhnewmedia.com #
# remove NO SPAM to email, or use form on website #

"SpaceGirl" <NOtheSpaceGirlSPAM@subhuman.net> wrote in message
news:2oeog9F9pehtU1@uni-berlin.de...
Certainly illegal? I could not even fathom any rationalization for that
statement. If companies couldn't contact other companies without being
invited to in the first place... how would business get done?

"Experienced but Undocumented" <e01@removethis.toao.net> wrote in message
news:tLpUc.34716$fz2.34373@edtnps89...
By entering a draw at a convention it should be presumed that you will be
contacted in the future... its pretty much the sole reason companies have
draws for prizes - to build up a contact list.

I just did a convention last month in Las Vegas... we had a prize draw in
the booth and had almost 850 entries in our draw box. 2 weeks after the
convention we called everybody who entered the draw with:
"Thank you for stopping by our booth... we did the draw for the prizes and
posted the results on our website. We wanted to check as well - did you
receive our information package at the convention? Did you have any
questions or would you like some more information on our service? Would you
like somebody to contact you in the future about our service?"

We phoned everybody up and didn't have a single complaint... why? Because
its expected... and they don't expect it they are extremely naive and need
the call to wake them up and welcome them to the real world.

As far as the law goes... I'm in Canada as well and we don't even have
anti-junk fax laws here, so it would be hard to fathom there being anything
against building up a contact list one way or other (a prize draw, buying
it, harvesting through the internet, etc) and calling people up to sell them
your products/services.

On Tue, 17 Aug 2004 17:02:17 +0100 SpaceGirl
<NOtheSpaceGirlSPAM@subhuman.net> broke off from drinking a cup of tea
at to write:

And unenforcable.

"I didn't tick the box"

"So sorry, we thought you had."

Matt

"SpaceGirl" <NOtheSpaceGirlSPAM@subhuman.net> wrote in message
news:2oeog9F9pehtU1@uni-berlin.de...
would not even be spam! After all, the 'customer' made the first approach
by entering into the draw. 'They' provided their contact details and in
business speak, that is an invitation to communicate :-)

Bill Logan wrote:
I would still LART it because I did NOT opt-in to get the emails. And if
they called.. I would report them for that too.

Bill Logan wrote:
The OP said also that "Now they say they want to contact everyone
anyway, either by phone or email, whether they checked the box or not."

It's not about dictatorship, it's about the individuals choise to decide
if s(he) accept to be contacted or not. If I don't check the box, then
that's a signal that I'm not interested to be contacted (spammed) with
unwanted mails or phone calls.

If they don't have a check box and planning to contact everyone who
participate in the draw, then they have to make it clear that with
participating I am aproving tha they contact me. If I don't like it, I
can decide not to participate.

--
Arne

mentalguy2004 wrote:

Doesn't the Data Protection Act only apply to electronic media?

If their info is on a card then it isn't covered by this. Long time
since I looked at it.

--
Charles Sweeney
http://CharlesSweeney.com

"Viper" <venomx@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:Z-6dnbwZuNDI_r_cRVn-rw@comcast.com...
even spam is not 'illegal' it is merely objectionable. Even where countries
have laws against it they only require opt out clauses etc. I.E. the first
unsolicited email is not illegal AFAIK. (If you know where it is illegal
perhaps you could post a link?)

Just because (most?) ISPs are against it in their TOS only makes it against
their rules - not the same thing as illegal!