Case Study - Failure To Comply With The DMA Privacy Promise

The Committee on Ethical Business Practice heard a case where a DMA member refused to give assurances that it continues to comply with The DMA's Privacy Promise, first adopted as a condition of membership in 1999. As numerous phone calls and letters from DMA's monitoring compliance staff and the Committee were ignored, the Committee forwarded the case to the Board of Directors with a recommendation for censure, suspension or expulsion and publicity to that effect.

The DMA Privacy Promise is a condition of DMA membership. All consumer marketer members must follow four traditional privacy protection practices:

1. Provide customers with notice of their ability to opt out of information exchanges;
2. Honor customer opt-out requests not to have their contact information transferred to others for marketing purposes.
3. Accept and maintain consumer requests to be on an in-house suppress file to stop receiving solicitations for your company and,
4. Use the DMA Preference Service suppression files on all mail, phone and e-mail prospect lists before prospecting.

What is the monitoring process?

Every month, The DMA staff randomly monitors ten members for compliance with the DMA’s Privacy Promise. DMA members complete a worksheet, and provide evidence documenting their compliance with the Privacy Promise. A compliance expert reviews the company's submission and, if all is well, the member is issued a certificate of compliance. DMA staff has received cooperation from the vast majority of members contacted.

Complaints alleging that a company does not comply with the Privacy Promise can also come from individual consumers and industry representatives. Staff sends a letter to the company, and the company usually responds, resolving the complaint quickly.

What happens if a company refuses to cooperate?

If the company refuses to respond or to resolve the complaint, the matter is referred to The DMA Committee on Ethical Business Practice for review. The Committee will ask for response and/or correction.

The Board has made it clear that any unanswered Committee questions or unmet Committee requests will be referred to The DMA Board for appropriate action, which may include censure, suspension, or expulsion from The DMA and publicity to that effect.

For the complete Privacy Promise Compliance Manual go to http://www.the-dma.org/privacy/privacypromise.

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