Undertaking date

Undertaking type

s.87B undertaking

Section

Sections 18, 29(1)(l), 79 and 86(1) of the Australian Consumer Law

Company or individual details

  • Name

    BVivid Pty Ltd

    ABN

    54 619 543 547

Undertaking

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has accepted a court enforceable Undertaking from BVivid Pty Ltd (BVivid) in relation to:

  • representations made to consumers about the need and urgency for connecting to the NBN that were likely to contravene sections 18 and 29(1)(l) of the Australian Consumer Law (ACL); and
  • contraventions of the unsolicited consumer agreement provisions of the ACL.

BVivid supplies telecommunications services, including fixed phone, ADSL and NBN services to Australian businesses and consumers. BVivid, through a wholly owned subsidiary in India, employed staff in India to promote its services by unsolicited telephone marketing to prospective Australian consumers.

From October 2017 to May 2018, BVivid through unsolicited telephone calls made representations to some consumers to the effect that the consumer must switch to the NBN immediately to avoid either disconnection of their landline or losing their landline number. In many instances, those representations led consumers to transfer from their current telecommunications services provider to BVivid without fully understanding the nature of the services they were signing up to or the NBN migration process.

From October 2017 to August 2018, in some instances, after negotiating an unsolicited consumer agreement with a consumer, BVivid:

  • provided the consumer with an agreement document that:
    • did not conspicuously and prominently inform consumers of their termination rights in the agreement document;
    • did not set out BVivid’s business address; and
    • was not accompanied by a notice that could be used by the consumer to terminate the agreement;
  • accepted payment in connection with BVivid’s NBN services during the cooling off period (the period of time before which services can be supplied or payment can be accepted in relation to the services); and
  • supplied NBN services to the consumer within the cooling off period (which for agreements negotiated by telephone, is ten business days after the day on which the consumer was given the agreement document).

To address the ACCC’s concerns, BVivid provided the ACCC with a section 87B Undertaking that:

  • acknowledges that BVivid’s conduct may have contravened sections 18, 29(1)(l), 79 and 86(1) of the ACL;
  • it will provide redress for consumers affected by its conduct by allowing them to terminate their contract with BVivid without penalty and obtaining a refund of any termination fees already paid;
  • it will commission an independent review of all BVivid’s policies, practices and procedures relating to its sales and transfer methodology to ensure compliance with the ACL and a commitment to implement any recommendations from that independent review; and
  • it will introduce a compliance program which includes annual training on the ACL, implementing a complaint handling system for ACL complaints and implementing procedures for recording and storing all telemarketing calls that conclude in any agreement with consumers.