Telephone canvassing banned in France: what the law will change

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A feeling of helplessness. Despite the many measures adopted in recent years, the French continue to be bothered daily by abusive telephone canvassing. Senator Pierre-Jean Verzelen, member of the Les Indépendants – République et Territoires group, and several of his colleagues have therefore tabled a bill to strengthen consumer protection.

The text was adopted this Thursday, November 14, at first reading in the Senate by 340 votes for and 0 against. In other words, a very broad consensus of elected officials from the left, center and right. Here are the main points to remember.

Correcting the deficiencies of previous texts

The law introduces certain essential measures. This includes the ban on telephone canvassing of a consumer who has not previously expressed their consent to be the subject of commercial prospecting by this means. If this measure is approved, this will completely change the situation for the sector, and you will theoretically no longer be bothered, unless you have given your consent.

Quoted by Ouest-France, Pierre-Jean Verzelen emphasizes in this regard: “Every French person will be able to continue to be canvassed, but they will have to take the step of registering with the companies that can call them. This makes the consumer an actor since he decides who has the right to call him or not and it puts an end to multiple calls” .

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In addition to this measure, which would represent enormous progress, the text establishes the impossibility of selling a good or providing a service via consent by telephone canvassing. This is also positive, as some unscrupulous sellers tend to take advantage of it.

We also note restrictions on canvassing times, which are now limited to 7 hours per day and two calls or attempted calls per 60-day period. Finally, if the customer objects to the conversation continuing, the merchant must end the call immediately and must not contact the customer again.

Bloctel, a disappointing tool ?

The text will now follow its course and it will first have to be adopted by the National Assembly before coming into force. Through their action, the parliamentarians also want to address the shortcomings of the Bloctel system, which has shown its limits. The latter currently only has 12 million registered numbers, or 10% of French telephone lines. As for those who have taken the step, they still report receiving unwanted calls, which illustrates the flaws in the system.

Another question: what about the canvassing sector, which is said to represent between 29,000 and 40,000 jobs in France ? According to the defenders of this proposal, this sector is in crisis and canvassing has been relocated to countries where labor is cheaper.

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