The companies contacted consumers with offers to activate energy and phone service contracts and provided misleading information regarding the caller’s identity, the reason for the call and the financial benefits of the proposed offers.

The Italian Competition Authority has imposed over 500,000 euro in fines on call centre companies promoting energy contracts (Titanium S.r.l. and Fire S.r.l.; J.Wolf Consulting S.r.l.) and contracts in the telecommunications sector (Nova Group S.r.l. and Communicate S.r.l.; Entiende S.r.l.). Specifically, the Authority imposed a fine of 160,000 euro jointly on Titanium S.r.l. and Fire S.r.l., 120,000 euro on J.Wolf Consulting S.r.l., 80,000 euro on Nova Group S.r.l. and 40,000 euro on Communicate S.r.l., 120,000 euro on Entiende S.r.l.

The Authority established that these companies contacted consumers with offers to activate energy and phone service contracts, based on misleading information regarding the caller’s identity, the reason for the call and the financial benefits of the proposed offers. In practice, the companies employed a variety of telemarketing methods, all involving the transmission of unclear, incomplete and misleading information.

In the energy sector, call-centre operators were found to pose as staff of regulatory and supervisory Authorities or of a “utilities billing support centre”, and to inform consumers of supposed regulatory price increases or alleged irregularities (duplicate activation of supplies on a single account or switching-related problems), with the aim to persuade consumers to sign a new supply agreement. In the telecommunications sector, call-centre operators claimed to be working for the technical or administrative department of the consumer’s current provider and falsely reported imminent service disruptions, or the expiry of the tariff plan under the existing contract and price increases from the user’s current provider. They also claimed that these events could be avoided by activating a new offer with a different operator at particularly favourable contract terms, which later proved to be false.

This conduct was therefore found to affect consumers’ freedom to make an informed decision when selecting a provider, as it impaired their ability to assess the benefits of available offers through the provision of false information, in breach of Articles 20, 21 and 22 of the Consumer Code.

The Authority reminds consumers that the website www.difenditicosi.it provides useful information regarding their rights and the tools to protect themselves from persistent and aggressive call-centre practices.

Rome, 9 December 2025

• Text of the decision Fire
• Text of the decision J.Wolf Consulting
• Text of the decision Nova Group
• Text of the decision Entiende