The Telemarketing Sales Rule - Part 2

by: AFI

The original Rule contained a provision prohibiting calls from any consumer who previously asked not to get calls from or on behalf of a particular seller. The ammended rule retains that provision, and adds a new one prohibiting calls to any numbers consumers have placed on the Do Not Call Registry maintained by the FTC.


Calling a consumer who has asked not to be called potentially exposes a seller and telemarketer to a civil penalty of $11,000 per violation.


The FTC's National Do Not Call Registry has been accepting registrations from consumers who choose not to receive telemarketing calls since June 27, 2003. Consumer registrations are valid for five years or the number is disconnected. If you registered your phone number(s) on this exact date like I did, you need to re-enter them before June 27, 2008 or everyone will start calling you again.

Access to the National Registry is limited to sellers, telemarketers and other service providers. Sellers are companies that provide, offer to provide, or arrange for others to provide goods or services to a customer in return for some type of payment as part of a telemarketing transaction. Telemarketers are companies that make telephone calls to consumers on behalf of sellers. Service providers are companies that offer services to sellers engaged in telemarketing transactions, such as providing lists of telephone numbers to call, or removing telephone numbers from sellers lists.

The FTC is preparing a fully automated and secure web site at www.telemarketing.donotcall.gov to provide members of the telemarketing industry with access to the National Registry's database of phone numbers, sorted by area code. The only consumer information available are telephone numbers.

Over half the states currently administer their own Do Not Call Lists. Most of these states will add the numbers to the National Do Not Call Registry. However, TSR does not preempt state law, so state law will also need to be checked .


full copy of the FCC's regulations can be found at: http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attatchmatch/FCC-03-153A1.pdf.



The purpose of the telemarketing sales rule is to combat telemarketing fraud, give consumers added privacy protections and defenses against unscrupulous telemarketers, and help consumers tell the difference between fraudulent and legitimate telemarketing.