CommSec, a prominent financial services provider, must pay $55,000 to the Australian Media and Communications Authority (ACMA) and review its emailing systems after its customers complained of receiving spam from it.

The ACMA launched its investigation after receiving complaints that CommSec was continuing to send commercial emails to people after they had ‘opted out.’ Under the Spam Act, a business must honour a person’s request to ‘opt out’ within five working days. To this end, the ACMA chairman, Mr Chapman, stated "the failure to act on a request can result in significant penalties if a business is found to have breached the Act."

ACMA also found that the email campaigns carried out by CommSec in January, February and March of 2009 did not provide customers with an unsubscribe facility. An unsubscribe facility is mandatory under the Spam Act.

The ACMA has taken this opportunity to warn businesses against spamming practices and as a reminder of the penalties, which may be imposed. Mr Chapman stated that he “expects that Australian businesses take note of this outcome."

Since the ACMA investigation, CommSec has commenced a review of its email systems and processes. An independent consultant will assess the review and CommSec’s email campaigns for a one-year period.

This demonstrates that penalties for breaches of the Spam Act are both real and in some cases, significant. To learn about your compliance with the Spam Act, please read our article titled “Spam: What You Need to Know.”