Answers to the questions that arise most often, with the article cited alongside wherever the answer follows from a rule.
Questions and answers
How many regimes apply to a contact centre?
Six, and they do not cross-refer. The national customer service regime, where one exists; the rules on the cost of consumer contact lines; consumer law as it applies to service and to distance contracting; data protection, as regards recording, logging and unsolicited communications; accessibility of support services; and transparency of automated interaction systems. Each layer has its own instrument, its own timetable and its own authority, and none of them refers to the others.
We serve Spanish customers from Portugal. Does Spanish law apply to us?
Very likely. Ley 10/2025 of 26 December applies to undertakings established in Spain or in another State, provided they operate in Spanish territory. It covers providers of services of general interest and all large undertakings — 250 or more employees, turnover above €50 million or a balance sheet above €43 million. It has been fully enforceable since 28 December 2026 and its waiting-time and human-attention requirements are markedly more demanding than the Portuguese ones.
Ley 10/2025 (Spain)
Does the law distinguish between calling and emailing?
No. Article 13 of Directive 2002/58/EC sets a single regime for unsolicited communications for direct marketing purposes, and the national transpositions follow it. What varies between Member States is not the channel but the choice the Directive expressly left to national law in article 13(3): whether communications not covered by paragraphs 1 and 2 require consent or merely the absence of objection. In Portugal, the criterion is the recipient: prior express consent for natural persons, opt-out for legal persons, whatever the channel.
Article 13 of Directive 2002/58/EC
What does it take to demonstrate that we comply?
Evidence organised by obligation. Complying and being able to show that you comply are different things, and before an authority or a contracting party only the second one counts. The practice that solves it is easy to state and laborious to execute: for each applicable obligation, identify the document, record or measurement that demonstrates it, check whether it exists, produce what is missing, and name who keeps it current. That matrix, not good intentions, is what gets produced in an inspection.
We hold a quality certification. Are we covered?
No. Certification against a voluntary standard demonstrates conformity with that standard, not with the law. Certification schemes address service quality; the legal regimes address obligations, deadlines and evidence. An operation can be certified and non-compliant at the same time, and frequently is.
Your question is not here
Put it directly. Recurring questions are added to this page.