FTC Moves up "Do Not Call" List Registration

tbase writes "AdAge.com has an article about the new FTC "Do-Not-Call" List which will be opening for registrations earlier than previously announced. The FTC Press Release says online registration will be available "on or around July 1." and that "Companies will face an $11,000 fine for each telemarketing call that violates the FTC's new consumer-protection provisions.""

Woo Hoo

[the_Bionic_lemming]

Looking forward to saving 15 bucks a month getting rid of Privacy Manager and caller ID.

Re:Do-Not-Mail

[SkArcher]

Heh, we all wish - unfortuanately, because e-mail is exactly the same accross borders, most e-mail spam could be sent from outside your country and would not have to comply

What I would like to know is if it is possible to have your snail-mail address put on a no bulk mail list. I have enough coasters already thank you AOL.

Why $11,000?

[dmomo]

I am not complaining about a penalty. But why so much for EACH offense? Is $11,000 arbitrary, or is there some reasoning behind it? Where does the money go, and what is it used for? It just seems like a big contrast with the couple hundred dollar fine at the State level.

A sigh of relief

[andyring]

Finally, this idea is taking hold. I'll admit it does run a bit contrary to my conservative, smaller government, pro-business beliefs, but on this issue, I agree, this is the right thing to do. Of course, we'll hear a bunch of whining and moaning from the telemarketers about how it will hurt them. And, quite frankly, I don't care. Their calls harass me enough that I think it is worth it.

I worked at RadioShack for six months a few years ago, and we were supposed to try and push additional things on our customers (cell phones, batteries, cables, more cell phones, and cell phones again). I hate suggestive selling. I hate doing it and I hate it being done to me. If I want it, I will buy it.

If I want info on refinancing my home, new windows, fixing my credit, buying a coupon book, getting another credit card, etc., LET ME SEEK IT OUT. I despise the thought that others (aka telemarketers) believe they know what I want or need better than I do. I am perfectly capable of deciding what products or services I wish to purchase, so let me decide on my own without invasive selling.

Doesn't matter, most calls from India now

[shodson]

This new law probably won't matter because it seems like most of the telemarketing calls I've been getting lately have been coming from India. If MCI hires an Indian telemarketing company to call me did MCI break this law? How does this apply to overseas telemarketers?

Shucks..

[Anonymous Coward]

Damn, they're going to stop calling me? I'll miss them, cause now I cant listen to half their spewl, tell them I'm interested but i'll be right back and then put them on hold. Sometimes they're still hanging on after 15 minutes or so .. when I feel sorry for them and yell "FUCK YOU" and hang up on them.

(FYI, I know they're just doing their job etc. that's why I only do this to telemarketers who keep calling me back after I have told them specifically not to call me)

An interesting incident last night

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking of telemarketers, I got a pre-recorded call last night on my answering maching while I was out. It said to call an 877 number to get more info on this alarm system they were pitching. So I decided to call to inform the person that my state has a do-not-call list that they are obviously ignoring. Funny thing is, I could never get through. For over an hour, all I got was a fast busy signal. You'd think that the morons would at least want to make sure that the marks can actually call in so they can get suckered. Idiots!

But perhaps some other folks would like to check and see if they can get through. Their number is 1-877-723-3872. If you call, feel free to tell them about the legality (or lack thereof) of leaving messages on answering machines and ignoring do-not-call lists.

How....

[Anonymous Coward]

....accessable is this system?

Let's say I'm a business that calls people for a living....SLOMINS SHIELD SECURITY SYSTEMS come to mind, I get bothered by them EVERY MONTH.

I'f I'm SLOMIN, how do I get access to the DO NOT CALL LIST? Is it an internet resource that I have to check on before I call someone on my cold-calling list?

Or are the lists that I buy going to be censored with the DNC people taken off of it?

This makes it difficult to see just who the responsibility falls on. Is it the job of SLOMIN to check who they're calling against the DNC list? Or is it the responsibility of the LIST PROVIDOR to take all of the DNC names off of the list?

Now I know my company has bought a mailing list to do snail-mail mailings, and we keep that same list around for about a year, and mail to sections of it at different times of the year. Is there now going to be a mandatory refresh time for these lists? Can I only assume a list is good to use without liability for x amount of time?

For these myriad reasons, I think that prosecution for calling people that are on the DNC list will be next to impossible.

"well, I got the list from XYZ list co. and they shouldn't have put people on this list that are on the DNC list." - Lawyer A, ANYTOWN USA representing Acme Cold Calling Co.

"I just gather information, I can't be responsible for filtering out people that are on the DNC list. This is the responsibility of the people using the list" - Owner of XYZ List Co.

"Let's sue both of them, AND the DNC list providor, one of them is bound to pay up or settle. And this won't cost you anything unless we actually get paid a settlement" -Scummy Lawyer B, of firm Ambulance Chasers Inc.

Ultimately, I think that this will spell the end of telemarketing (because of COURSE the phone company is going to realize that this is a great opportunity to charge $10 when you activate new service to automatically get put on the list) and more SPAM SPAM SPAM SPAM SPAM SPAM SPAM SPAM.....(trails off into Monty Python jingle)

Re:Why $11,000?

[mactov]

How about spending the revenue from the fines on a series of public-service announcements and ads reminding people that the best prevention for these things is for them to produce no results? The big problem with spam, telemarketers, et al is that every now and then someone actually does buy something and encourages them.

Aside from a few very lonesome shut-ins (who are victims of this sort of stuff, not genuine consumers) I don't know of anyone who likes getting spam or telemarketing calls.

Re:Nice!

[Hellkitty]

Caller ID has been working 100% for me for the past few years, and it only costs $1 a month. It is quite simple - if you show up as "Out of Area" or "Unknown Caller", there is not possibly anything that we have to talk about. You know who I am when I pick up the phone - I need to have the same information on you before I determine if I choose to communicate with you or not.

I'll sign up, but I doubt that it will work too well. I did a little bit of telemarketing work while in college for some beer money, and let's just say that the place I worked for would not give two shits about this fine. I think they really stretched the boundaries of the law, and they'll probably find a way to do so with this. Enforcement will be difficult. If they call me even though I'm on the list, they are banking on the fact that I don't care enough to follow up on it. And if one call gets through to you once every six months, are you really going to be enraged enough to file a complaint? And once you do file the complaint, you know it will be caught up in beauracratic BS for quite some time before any action comes out of it.

Re:Do-Not-Mail

[mark_lybarger]

yeah, if it were'nt a profitable business then it wouldn't exist.

capitalism does work in practice if left to work. this freaking governement interference in the market just wacks everything up and gives the public the impression that the gov't does really do something for them while raping all other rights and freedoms outlined in the constiution.

guess what, if you don't give people a channel to contact you, they won't. go home and stay inside. stay off the internet and don't get the mail. disconnect your phone and get rid of the cable tv. hell dig a hole in the ground and crawl inside. it's your land you s/b free to do that. people won't come knocking on the entrance of your underground hole to "bother" you or steal your precious resources.

no, i don't like spam either, but people are going to contact you however you expose your self for contact. email, annoying phone calls, door visits, time share sharks while on vacations. they're all after you and your precious dollar and everything you do to thwart them away will make them find another way to come after your precious dollar.

when it's a p2p network it's ok to allow unregulated use, some of which might be ok, some might not. when it's a phone network, or an email communication channel, we want to the gov't to protect our rights all to hell? if you don't want spam; don't use email.

Hmm...

[GreyOrange]

I'm just glad to know that the telemarkers are not powerfull enough to overide such legistation(plus they probably ticked off quite a few politictions) and that they will be under more control. The one thing that realy ticks me off though is "Some businesses are exempt from the TSR and can still call you even if you place your number on the registry. These include common carriers (such as long-distance phone companies and airlines), banks and credit unions, and the business of insurance, to the extent that it is regulated by state law..."(from ftc webpage)
and those are the people I am getting spammed by all the time, lousy phone company, I give them money and they harrass me with advertisements of services. I'm not paying to be bothered, just to use the phone. Oh well.

$11,000 Question

[Jedi Holocron]

Does the victim get a portion of this fine?

Salesmen, speak up! What about cold calling?

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

How does this affect someone like myself who owns a small business and makes cold calls as a part of the marketing? I cold call other business people, usually at there place of work, and don't sell anything over the phone, I simply try to get an appointment to meet with the person to talk about their productivity and see how my consulting service might help them. Is there any risk to what I do now? Should I even bother with the DNC list, or is it cool since I'm only calling them at work (doubtful number is on the list) and I'm not selling anything during the call?

Sneaky Telemarketers

[psychopenguin]

None of this really matters since telemarketers are already using semantics to find their way around the current rules. I got a call a while back, and started to run through the junkbusters script.

tele-loser> "Wouldn't you like it if ?"
me> "Is this a telemarketing call?"
...long pause...
tele-loser> "No sir, this is a survey!"

See how the new scam works? It's just a survey, but if you really sound interested they transfer you to a sales person for your convenience.

Re:Do-Not-Mail

[Lord Dimwit Flathead]

Most of the big junk mailers are members, as this is their advocacy group. Though I don't see an unrestricted member list, this page [the-dma.org] tells us:

The DMA membership roster includes companies like AT&T, IBM, AOL Time Warner, Mellon Bank, Microsoft, Home Shopping Network, The New York Times, Rapp Collins, Prudential Insurance, Phillip Morris, Proctor & Gamble, as well as R.R. Donnelley, Acxiom, Experian and DoubleClick.

I would be very surprised if the volume of junk mail from large national direct mailers did not decrease noticably a few months after you added your address to the list. You probably will not see a noticable decrease in mail from local merchants and organizations, as these guys are a lot less likely to be able to justify the $1075 annual membership dues [the-dma.org].

I don't understand organizations fighting this.

[djh101010]

In our state, we recently had a no-call list instituted state wide. The telemarketing groups, of course, fought it tooth and nail.

What I don't understand, is how they think that they are losing business. If I sign up for the list (which I did), I am stating an unwillingness to deal with a telemarketer already - they haven't lost a potential sale, because there is no way I'd buy from one anyway, and if anything they've saved their call center a bit of time and abuse.

Even more puzzling are those who choose to ignore the state law and call anyway - like they think I maybe forgot I signed up, or that I'll be so happy to hear about the new windows or whatever they're selling that I'll change my mind.

Why do telemarketing groups fight something which keeps them from wasting time calling folks who identify themselves as "not interested"?

Just Imagin

[hrieke]

Someone doing the US a favor by writing a program that would use the web to solve this issue by signing up everyone!
By using the phone company's tools against them- maybe using a PHP program, we could lookup a number in an area code on the online Whitepages, screen scrape the data to fill out the form for the FTC & States.

Re:Salesmen, speak up! What about cold calling?

[BCGlorfindel]

To my knowledge the do DNC list applies to automated dialing services, so as long as your dialing the businesses by hand there should be no problem.

Ask them if they mind if you record the call..

[Torqued]

I've started doing this lately when I've gotten a telemarketing call.. A few of them were really caught off guard by it. Most have just hung up the phone.. no one has said "yes" yet! :)

Who isn't covered?

[Skjellifetti]

What effect will this have on academic research in the social sciences that uses telephone surveys? Will these still be legal? How about market research calls such as the call I got yesterday about my radio listening habits? Are these still legal? I do know that the list does not cover political calls or calls from non-profit groups, but what else is not covered?

Re:Nice!

[smartin]

True, caller ID can give you a reasonable indication that the call is not worth answering. The problem is that you've already got up from what you are doing to go and answer the bloody phone only to find that it is not worth answering. Personally at that point i'm pissed enough to either answer and chew them out or answer and jerk their chain by wasting their time in some manner. My current fav is to just say hang on while i get the person whose name they ask for and leave the phone off the hook for a while.

As for enforcement and getting people to report abusers, that's easy. The govt should just pay the victim a portion the fine. Give me $500 of the $11k and i will persue it every time.

This is the greatest news ever!!!

[lawaetf1]

Seriously, I can't think of a single thing that the government has done in the last year to improve quality of life as much as this new reg. The only sad part is that there are going to be those who won't hear about this for years to come. Any millionaires want to sponsor The Last Call to inform Americans about this new option? It'd be an ironic gesture, sure, but it'd also be the noose around the neck for these irritating parasites, may their stomachs roast in Hell forever!!

Re:Nice!

[Eraser_]

A contracting partner of mine has a thing which says "I do not accept calls from telemarketers. Push 1 to connect, or enter your phone number so the call can be screened, and have the number added to the accept list".

I can call him on my cell phone and home phone because Call ID works, but from a friends house with no call ID I have to hit 1, and then it rings.

Telephone Terrorism

[vudujava]

I wish I had seen this story earlier.

I honestly don't believe that this will work simply because telemarketers are getting more and more agressive already and will break other rules in order to conceal their identity.

For the past two months, my wife and I have literally been terrorized by someone soliciting something. They call our home phone hourly from the hours of 5:00pm to 10:00pm, 7 days a week AND hammer her cell phone as many as 20 times a day. They are always in search of my wife (no, she doesn't have any outstanding bills). She bailed and changed her cell number despite the fact I begged her to work with me to get these bastards. Now they only call my home number and hang up whenever I answer. The always refuse to identify themselves until I verify (or my wife verifies) that I'm the person they're looking for (they want my wife's last four), of course, we've continually refused. These ass-clowns only give first names, claiming under the law that's all they're required to do. They refuse to identify their organization. Refuse to verify or decline whether they have prior business with my wife, and finally, they refuse to say where they got our number. I have repeatedly told them to put my number on their do not call list, and they laugh and often get abusive. It's gotten to the point where I sexually harrass them when they call, until they hang up. Of course, as I've said, they won't talk to me now.

I'm filing a complaint with my local police department this week (as instructed by SBC who refuses to help me without police intervention - bastards). I'm sure that this won't be the end of this, or telemarketers. I'm dumping my land line once this is over and blocking all unknown numbers coming in on my cellphone (I think there's a service from my provider). Fuck it, I'm white listing everyone and everything. The only phone number I'll put down on any ap going forward will be my local police department.

Re:11,000 dollar fine?

[Anonymous Coward]

That give incentive to harrass, not deter future calling.

How does a $10,000 fine + $1/call give incentive to harrass?