#phonepayplus

When I was last involved with premium SMS services back in 2004-6ish the Crazy Frog debacle and the sudden surge in rather questionable premium SMS subscription services gave rise to a new regulator ICSTIS - now PhonepayPlus - who amongst other things created what is now a pretty universally accepted code of practice for managing SMS services.

On particular feature of that code was a standardised "STOP" command for unsubscribing from a service which is specified in section 2. This mechanism is now implemented in pretty much every SMS subscription service out there whether premium or not.

This sort of easy mechanism to exit a service is key on SMS which is hugely intrusive if abused - much more so than email - and where there are far fewer options for filtering etc.

With all that in mind I was hugely surprised and disappointed by my interactions with T-Mobile over the last few days:

I started to receive unsolicited marketing SMS from T-Mobile's new You Choose marketing service from shortcodes like 400004, 400044 and 400444 - several of which ended with " ...opt out by texting Stop to 400000".

I texted "Stop" (note that is the default capitalisation in the iPhone message editor - and matches what was asked for in the messages I had received) to 400044 and got a reply telling me to "...confirm your opt-out, please send STOP to 400000".

I texted "Stop" to 400000 and received no reply at all.

I continued to receive SMS and so asked T-Mobile support on twitter why that was happening. Their response was that I should try sending "STOP" in capitals to 400000!

I texted "STOP" to 40000 and got a response saying that I had asked to opt-out but to "...confirm your opt-out, please send STOP to 400000". I texted "STOP" to the same code again and got a confirmation that I was unsubscribed.

On querying the necessity for all upper case (which is relatively awkward to produce on iPhone anyway) T-Mobile stated that it is "usually typed in capitals"!

I think most folks would agree that this was an unnecessarily awkward and unhelpful process - which the conspiracy theorist might think was aimed to make it as hard as possible to unsubscribe.

Beyond the question of why they subscribed me in the first place the key questions are:

the need to send STOP to a shortcode other than that the message originated on. The code says that this should only be done if there is a good reason e.g. the original code has premium charges associated with it.

the need to send STOP in capitals in order for it to be recognised. Section 2.1 of the code clearly states that it should work with *any* combination of case - and in more practical terms String.equalsIgnoreCase() has been around for quite a long time!

the need to send it a second time as confirmation. It is hardly likely to be sent accidentally and there is a real danger the user doesn't bother reading the first reply and assumes the job is done.

PhonepayPlus is doing a good job, but there is always room for improvement. A few fines handed down to some premium rate phone and text companies indicates that the regulatory body is serious about making sure that companies operate strictly under the code of practice.

There are many mobile phone users that have been cheated out of millions of pounds and have not complained or protested against such charges on their bill. In February PhonepayPlus fined two Dutch companies R&D Media Europe and Unavalley BV £100,000 each for taking advantage of well-known websites such as Wikipedia, Twitter and YouTube to operate a quiz based premium rate text service and breaching the code of practice.

When many of these premium rate service companies can make £100 or more easily on a single phone, it is basically a money making machine considering the methods employed by these companies to get a high user participation. Whatever the methods employed to participate in premium rate activities, it is my estimate that 4 out of every 5 people do not complain. 2 out of those 4 people when they see premium rate charges on their bills will call their mobile phone company, after which they will simply accept the charge because they consider it too much effort to pursue a refund on the premium rate charge or because their phone company has told them the charge will stand.