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Loading ...The Federal Trade Commission today announced it is accelerating the timetable for phone registration for its national marketing “do-not-call” list.
The list program is designed to enable consumers to block telemarketers from making calls to their home phone numbers. Marketers covered by the FTC rules are required to remove registered consumers from their telephone sales lists.
Companies will face an $11,000 fine for each telemarketing call that violates the FTC’s new consumer-protection provisions. Originally, two forms of registration — Internet and phone — were to start in late July after the FTC’s do-not-call registration Web site goes live. Now, however, phone registration will begin for the western half of the country on July 1 and for the rest of the country a week later. That earlier start means that the size of the FTC list will be larger in September when telemarketers will be required to begin scrubbing their call lists against it. The new scrubbed lists have to be used starting in October.
So in case you’ve been living under a rock; Beginning in July, consumers will be able to put their telephone numbers on the national registry, which telemarketers subsequently will be required to access. When registration opens in July, consumers can register for free in two ways: online or by telephone. The FTC will announce the Web site URL for online registration and the toll-free number in June. To better manage the anticipated volume of registrations, initial sign-up by phone for the registry will be phased in, region-by-region, over an eight-week period. Online registration will be available throughout the United States in July. As of October it will be illegal for most telemarketers to call a number listed on the registry.
Of course the scammers will be out in force trying to get you to pay them to add you number to the list. Don’t be fooled. The FTC website will have details on where to sign up for free.
In addition to establishing the national “do not call” registry, the amended TSR calls for other changes, including limiting abandoned calls, restricting unauthorized billing and requiring telemarketers to transmit Caller ID information. [Comment on this Post]
