DoublePositive.com

If you want additional information about this or any other telemarketing compliance topic, please contact Ken Sponsler at possiblenow.com.

---------------------

Translating Regulatory Requirements
Into Operational Compliance

Commentary By Ken Sponsler, CIPP
General Manager of PossibleNOW’s Consulting Services Group

Over the years our privacy preference compliance consultants have performed assessments of a wide array of companies from Fortune 500 sellers to 25 seat service providers. Regardless of the company's size, many are challenged to implement the operational aspects of compliance. While attorneys and telemarketing compliance professionals can provide information about regulatory requirements, many companies struggle with determining how to translate those requirements into compliant operations.

The "Compliance Overlay"

I use the term “compliance overlay” to describe the process of integrating or overlaying compliance processes into the existing corporate infrastructure. This can be a very complex and sometimes costly undertaking.

Some of the factors that impact complexity and costs are:

Nature of the organizational structure
Number and capabilities of independent systems (CRM, marketing, etc)
Number and types of customer data sources
Quality of customer data
Number and type of decentralized operations
Availability and capability of IT resources
Number and function of third parties
Lead or campaign list generation processes
Existing consumer privacy preference management processes

Overlaying compliance onto existing infrastructure requires carefully planned integration of compliance requirements, systems capabilities and end user needs. A simple illustration of this complexity is management of the Established Business Relationship (EBR) exemption.

Federal and many state laws may exempt solicitation telemarketing based upon a consumer’s previous inquiry or transaction even though the person’s phone number is registered on a state or national DNC list. However, these exemptions vary by state. Inquiry exemptions range from 0 to 3 months and transactions from 0 to 18 months. The type of transaction is important as well. For instance, many state rules limit exemptions for so called “win-back” telemarketing or allow broader exemptions for “subscription or on-going” based customer relationships commonly found in the insurance and banking industries.

These varying rules demand that the most recent customer interaction event be recorded and available to the people that need it all times. This means that customer data might require regular updating from a variety of sources.

An important first step is the company’s legal review and approval of consumer interaction events that will constitute valid inquiries and transactions. After this is completed, companies must be able to disposition various customer interactions and the date they occurred. Inquiries, purchases, renewals, payments, “call me now” requests, contract signings, orders, web inquiries, re-orders, shipments, enrollments, cancellations, and countless others can be consumer interaction events that companies must be able to systematically record.

The next step in the process is to determine how EBR telemarketing campaigns will be developed. This leads to the issue of compliance data management. While many companies integrate compliance within their customer database, others choose to handle compliance as a separate external process.

The integrated customer data approach envisions that campaign building occurs primarily from supposed “callable” records within the CRM or other data source. This can be a very complex process that can be fraught with risk.

A few of the pitfalls we have observed are:

Outdated or missing company-specific DNC requests
Inaccurate or inadequate disposition codes
Insufficient data access
Haphazard updating mechanism from third party providers
Improper application of federal and state EBR rules
Inability to account for wireless DNC rules
Inability to account for pre-recorded message prohibitions
Lack of or inadequate compliance recordkeeping
Other companies have decided to address compliance outside of their customer data sources. In this methodology, the specific parameters of the campaign form the basis for the initial data pull from customer records. The compliance processes are then applied to this raw file.

PossibleNOW’s DNCSolution is able to scrub this raw file against a federal and state specific EBR rules dataset which accurately reflects the campaign type (i.e. inquiry, transaction, win-back, subscription, and so forth). The campaign is also scrubbed against the company-specific internal DNC and wireless lists. The system provides a “good through” date based upon the applicable federal or state rule associated with the area code in the customer’s telephone number. However, this methodology still requires that companies maintain accurate consumer inquiry or transactional data as well as the type and date of event.

Conclusion The EBR campaign illustrated above represents a small sampling of the many challenges companies face to ensure regulatory requirements are integrated into their operations. There are obviously a multitude of other technical, process and administrative challenges as well. The foundation of operational compliance is a comprehensive guidelines document that describes what your company must comply with and how it complies. Employees and third parties must be trained on the guidelines and compliance must be continually monitored and enforced.

A thorough risk and cost-benefit analysis can help companies decide the best course of action for their particular business and telemarketing activity. Our compliance consulting and audit team, along with our staff of experts in IT and managed services, can help ensure your telemarketing operations support all of the regulatory requirements. For more information please contact me at ksponsler@possiblenow.com.

If you want additional information about this or any other telemarketing compliance topic, please contact Ken Sponsler at possiblenow.com.

DoublePositive

Do you have live call transfers of double-verified and interested borrowers in your leads mix? You should, and we can help. You can call me at [~repphone~], Click to Chat or just Get Started!

Post your classified ad below, there's no charge!

Our newsletter reaches over 14,000 mortage companies and professionals each week. Would you like them all to see your classified message for free? Let us know!

Post Your Classified Advertisement Here! >>

GoToMyPC is the fast, easy and secure way to access your PC from any Web browser or wireless device in real time. Access Your PC from Anywhere

The Internet is the new yellow pages. More and more, consumers turn to the web first to research and find nearby retailers and local service providers—at the rate of 213 million searches every single day. Simply put, if you’re not online, those people can’t find your store or purchase from you. And LeadConnect™ is the simple, affordable, and effective solution that targets and showcases your business to local shoppers on the web, driving more buyers directly to you. Help your customers find you!

What is RingCentral? Hailed by Inc. Magazine as "Best for...Toll-Free Numbers", RingCentral enables mobile professionals and small businesses to effectively manage communications, project a professional image, and win customers. RingCentral combines a toll-free or local number with a Virtual PBX, Auto-Attendant, Voicemail, Internet Fax, Call Forwarding, Click-to-Call, and many other time and money-saving features. Get a unique Toll-Free and/or Local number with voicemail for as low as $9.99 a month!

DNCSolution is a family of Internet-based products that handle the full range of Do Not Contact (Do Not Call, Do Not Fax, Do Not E-mail, Do Not Mail) compliance. DNCSolution also addresses the privacy directives and opt-in/opt-out preferences of your prospects and customers. DNCSolution.com

Leads360’s lead tracking software can give you visibility over your sales force and get valuable insight into your contact ratio. Contact Leads360 today and learn how we can help you increase your contact ratio by more than 20% in the first month. Call 1-888-508-4462 or visit Leads360.com


This Week's Transfers:
Get the complete list of Transfers available this week