The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) has issued a £70,000 fine to a firm responsible for hundreds of nuisance calls, taking the value of penalties served by the ICO on companies making live nuisance calls to over £500,000.

Devon-based EMC Advisory Services Limited (EMC) used two third-party companies to make calls on its behalf to identify Payment Protection Insurance claims; however, the company failed to ensure that people registered with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS), the national registry that enables people to opt out of receiving marketing calls, or people who'd previously asked not to be contacted weren't being called.

The company was responsible for 630 complaints to the ICO and the TPS between 1 March 2013 and 28 February 2014. The ICO warned the company last year that under the UK electronic marketing regulations, they were responsible for ensuring third-party marketing calls on their behalf were not made to people who had previously opted out of receiving marketing calls.

Despite the warning, the ICO and the TPS continued to receive complaints from people receiving nuisance calls from either EMC or the other third-party companies acting on its behalf.

A copy of the monetary penalty notice is available here.