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Mohammed Liaqat and Rubani Ghulam were directors of a company which harassed people with nuisance cold-calls in 2020 and 2021
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Posh Windows UK Ltd, based in Stoke-on-Trent, made more than 400,000 unsolicited marketing calls trying to sell home improvements within a nine-month period
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Both have now been disqualified as company directors following investigations by the Insolvency Service
Two businessmen from Stoke-on-Trent who allowed their home improvements company to make hundreds of thousands of nuisance cold-calls have been banned as directors.
Mohammed Liaqat, 37, and Rubani Ghulam, 55, were directors of Posh Windows UK Ltd, which specialised in a range of products including windows, doors and conservatories.
However, the company made 461,062 unsolicited marketing calls in a nine-month period between August 2020 and April 2021.
The calls were to people who had registered with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS), a statutory register of people who have said they do not want to receive marketing calls.
Posh Windows UK Ltd was fined £150,000 by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) in 2022 but went into liquidation in the same year without having paid any of the fine.
Liaqat, of Clarke Street, and Ghulam, of Thorndyke Street, have now been disqualified as company directors for four years.
Simon Gillett, Chief Investigator at the Insolvency Service, said:
Mohammed Liaqat and Rubani Ghulam allowed their company to make nearly half a million nuisance calls to people who had explicitly said they did not want to receive marketing calls, causing significant inconvenience to members of the public.
Many of the victims were also subjected to aggressive pressure tactics and repeated calls.
Directors who ignore privacy regulations and allow their companies to harass the public through relentless cold-calling will face the consequences. In this case, both Liaqat and Ghulam have been banned from running companies for four years, protecting consumers from further misconduct.
Posh Windows UK Ltd was based on Cheapside in Stoke-on-Trent, with Liaqat and Ghulam appointed as directors in 2018.
The company first came to the attention of the ICO in January 2021 when one of its employees received an unsolicited direct marketing call in the evening.
During the call, the caller referred to government grants for home improvements and wanted to book an appointment for the following day.
They only hung up when the recipient told them that the telephone number was registered with the TPS.
Further complaints to the TPS and ICO indicated that pressure tactics were being used and constant calls were made, often outside standard business hours. Some callers were called more than 10 times, even after they had told them to stop.
In total, Posh Windows UK Ltd made 630,971 calls between 1 August 2020 and 30 April 2021. Of those, 461,062 were made to subscribers whose telephone numbers had been registered with the TPS for more than 28 days
All but 84 of the 461,062 calls were made from a withheld number, breaching privacy regulations.
ICO investigations began in March 2021 but Liaqat still allowed the company to trade for more than a year without the ability to adequately screen numbers against the TPS register.
Andy Curry, Head of Investigations at the ICO, said:
We welcome the decision to disqualify Mohammed Liaqat and Rubani Ghulam as directors of Posh Windows UK Ltd.
Nobody should be made to feel uncomfortable or distressed after simply answering the phone, and our investigation found that this company showed complete disregard for both the law and the thousands of people they were aggressively pestering.
Our Financial Investigation Unit works closely with the Insolvency Service to bring companies and directors to account. By disrupting the non-compliant activities of directors such as Mohammed Liaqat and Rubani Ghulam, we can help ensure they can’t easily resurface under a different name and continue to cause further harm to people.
The Secretary of State for Business and Trade accepted disqualification undertakings from Liaqat and Ghulam, and their bans started on Thursday 31 July.
The undertakings prevent them from being involved in the promotion, formation or management of a company, without the permission of the court.
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