Sales calls and POPIA consent
Whether a South African business needs consent before cold-calling new prospects, how consent can be taken by phone, and how to handle a request to stop.
By Achekam · · 4 min read · For Running a business businesses in South Africa
Many South African sales teams still run on the phone. A new rep is handed a list of numbers, a script and a target, and told to start dialling. A common working assumption is that POPIA's marketing rules are about e-mail and SMS, and that a call is a conversation rather than a message.
The Information Regulator does not share that assumption. Its guidance treats a marketing call the same way as a marketing e-mail, which means the consent rules apply before the phone is picked up. This article explains why, how consent can be obtained over the phone, what to do when someone says "stop calling me", why the absence of a block is not permission, and how to keep follow-ups and lost leads in order.
Calls count as electronic communication
POPIA restricts direct marketing by electronic communication. The Information Regulator's guidance note on direct marketing says it regards telephone calls as electronic communication for those rules.
That single sentence brings sales calls inside the same framework as e-mail and SMS marketing. For a prospect who is not yet a customer, the starting point is the same: the Regulator's guidance note says a business must obtain a non-customer's consent before sending direct marketing by electronic communication, so the first contact may only be a request for consent, and it may approach that person only once.
For a sales team, the practical meaning is stark. A cold call to a new prospect cannot be the pitch. At most, it can be one call to ask whether the person consents to receiving marketing, and if they decline, there is no second call. The fuller treatment of consent across channels is in consent before e-mail marketing under POPIA.
Consent by phone: read out the form and record the call
Consent can be taken during a call, but the Regulator sets conditions. Its guidance note says consent for electronic direct marketing must be obtained in writing on the prescribed Form 4, or a substantially similar form, and where consent is sought by telephone, the form must be read out and the call recorded.
So a phone consent process needs three things:
- A script based on Form 4. The wording read to the person must be the form, or substantially similar to it, not a salesperson's paraphrase.
- A recording. The call in which consent is given must be recorded, so the consent can be proved later.
- A way to find the recording. A recording nobody can locate does not help when a complaint arrives.
The Regulator's guidance note on direct marketing under POPIA, dated 3 December 2024, sets out these requirements and treats telephone marketing alongside e-mail and SMS. Give it to whoever writes your call scripts.
The right to demand that marketing stop
The Consumer Protection Act adds a separate right that applies to calls just as much as to messages. The CPA text published on the government's page, as originally published, gives anyone approached for direct marketing the right to demand that it stop, and requires the marketer to have procedures to receive such demands.
On a phone call, the demand usually comes as a sentence: "Please don't call me again." The procedure has to catch that sentence. The rep must record it at once, the number must go onto the business's do-not-contact list, and the list must be checked before anyone dials again. Running that list across every channel is covered in keeping a do-not-contact list for marketing.
No block is not the same as consent
A common argument in call centres is that a number not registered on a do-not-contact register under the Consumer Protection Act is fair game. The Regulator's guidance note rejects that. It says a business may not contact a person for electronic direct marketing simply because that person has not registered a pre-emptive block under the Consumer Protection Act; POPIA consent is still required.
The register can tell you who has objected in advance. It cannot tell you who has consented. For non-customers, only the second question decides whether you may call to market.
Questions for every call list
- Is each number an existing customer, or someone whose recorded consent we hold?
- For anyone else, has the single consent request already been made?
- Has every number on our do-not-contact list been removed?
- Is the script for consent calls based on Form 4, and are those calls being recorded?
Logging follow-ups, and closing leads as lost
Once a prospect has consented, or is an existing customer, follow-up calls become part of normal selling, and they need managing. In Achekam, staff can put dated follow-up tasks on a lead for themselves or a colleague, mark them done or cancelled, and see overdue follow-ups and those due over the next seven days. The Follow-ups tab sits under CRM & SALES, in Leads, and on each lead's page. Follow-ups are never deleted, so the history of who was due to call whom, and what happened, stays on the record.
When a prospect says no, the lead should not vanish. In Achekam, a lead that someone has worked cannot be deleted; leads are closed as lost instead. That keeps the evidence that the person declined, and helps stop the same number being called again from an old list. Cancel any open follow-ups on the lead at the same time, so nobody is prompted to ring.
Change the script before the next shift
Review your call lists and scripts now. Split the list into existing customers, people with recorded consent, and everyone else; rewrite the first call to new prospects as a single, recorded consent request based on Form 4; and make "please don't call again" a phrase every rep knows how to log. Those three changes bring a phone-based sales team into line with the Regulator's guidance.
General guidance only, not advice on your own circumstances. Tax and payroll rules change: check the current position with the authority or your adviser.
