Pell & Bales said yesterday it may seek “legal recourse” against The Sun newspaper, after an article was run over the weekend which the agency said sought to “tarnish” its reputation.
The article, entitled Will gotten gains, first appeared in the 6 June edition of The Sun.
It was written by a reporter who had “gone undercover” to work for Pell & Bales in its telephone fundraising department, making calls on behalf of charities including Crisis.
The article accuses call centres of “targeting” older women who already donate to charity and “bombarding them with appeals for more money”.
In the statement on its website, Pell & Bales defends its “track record of raising money for some of the UK’s most worthy causes – over £1bn in the last 20 years”. The statement also “refutes in the strongest possible terms any allegations or insinuations of wrongdoing”, made in The Sun’s article.
“We are a sector leader,” said the statement. “We take any attempt to tarnish this record very seriously and will be conducting a thorough review of options and potential legal recourse.”
Pell & Bales said that "despite the accusatory tone" the article contains no evidence of wrongdoing.
The Sun’s undercover reporter wrote about the difficulty of taking people off cold-call lists.
“The first woman I called shouted at me," she wrote. "I only just remembered to scroll down and tick the tiny box that stopped the company from calling her again”.
The article also said that people who don’t explicitly ask to be taken off lists will instead be ticked as “Not Now”, which means they will be contacted by telephone fundraisers again in the future.
The article concludes that: “there is no suggestion that Pell & Bales did anything illegal. Indeed, the company is scrupulous in instructing its employees to stick to acceptable practices.
“However, many of my calls reminded me of poor Olive [Cooke]”.
In a response to the article, Jon Sparkes, chief executive of Crisis, said that telephone fundraising was an important part of the charitable work done by the organisation. He also said that Crisis follow the rules and regulations set by the Institute of Fundraising “all the time”.
“Like many charities, telephone fundraising is an important source of funding for the work we do. Every pound we raise helps us do more to help homeless people.
“We are members of the Fundraising Standards Board and follow the Institute of Fundraising codes of conduct at all times. At the start of each call it is confirmed the person is happy to take it. If at any point the person wants to end the call - it is ended. Our fundraisers are specifically asked not to continue if the person is confused, upset or angry.”
The Sun’s article on Saturday appeared the day before a piece in the Mail on Sunday which criticised “callous” telephone fundraising company Listen.
