Feds to create an Anti Telemarker List

[The Evil Genius]

All I can say is - thank god. Screw those whose job it is to ruthlessly harass us while we are at home.

FTC Creates New Rules for Telemarketers

Wed Dec 18,11:10 AM ET Add U.S. Government - AP to My Yahoo!

By DAVID HO, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Federal regulators are creating new protections for people plagued by unwanted telemarketing calls, establishing a national "do-not-call" list that consumers can use to keep their phones from ringing with sales pitches.

Federal Trade Commission officials said that under the strengthened rules telemarketers also must transmit identifying information that can be viewed by services like Caller ID and limit the number of "abandoned" calls that hang up or leave people listening to silence on the line.

The regulations were being made public Wednesday.

The national do-not call registry, first proposed in January, would allow people to stop sales calls made from outside their state. Consumers who register on the Internet or with one call to a toll-free government number would remain on the list for five years before having to renew, FTC officials said.

Officials said the agency is taking bids from companies interesting in creating the registry.

Once the list is operating, telemarketers will have to check the registry every three months to find out who doesn't want to be called, the officials said. Telemarketers who call listed people could be fined up to $11,000 for each violation.

The registry will likely cost about $16 million in its first year and would be paid for with fees collected from telemarketers, officials said. The agency has not decided how those fees will be imposed and still needs congressional approval to collect them.

Louis Mastria, a spokesman for the Direct Marketing Association, which represents telemarketers, said the new rules are unlawful and the group is considering challenging the FTC in court. He said the do-not-call list endangers the jobs of some of the industry's 4 million workers, many of them single parents and students.

"In this soft economy you have to step back and think twice about doing this," he said.

Rep. Edward Markey (news, bio, voting record), D-Mass., praised the do-not-call list, saying it "will provide consumers with a powerful new tool."

"Hopefully by this time next year the only thing consumers will hear ringing during supper will be sleigh bells or jingle bells and not the jangling phone," said Markey, the top Democrat on the House Commerce Committee's telecommunications and Internet panel.

There are exceptions to the FTC's do-not-call protections.

A company can call someone on the list if that person has bought, leased or rented something from the seller within 18 months. Telemarketers also can call consumers if they have inquired or applied for something during the last three months.

The FTC also has limited authority to police certain industries — such as telephone companies — that fall under the jurisdiction of the Federal Communications Commission (news - web sites). The FCC (news - web sites) is considering its own do-not-call registry.

The two agencies would have to work together to cover all telemarketers unless Congress gives more authority to one.

Charities are exempt from the FTC's do-not-call list, but third-party telemarketers who call on their behalf are bound by rules that require them to obey when consumers ask to be put on a do-not-call list, officials said.

Another new restriction on telemarketers involves machines called predictive dialers. The machines dial numbers stored in a database and predict when a telemarketer will be ready to finish one sales call and start another. When the machine reaches a person, the call is supposed to be transferred to a telemarketer who is just finishing another call.

The system doesn't always work and calls are made before a telemarketer is available. With these "abandoned" calls, a consumer on the other end picks up their phone only to be disconnected or greeted with a long silence before the sales pitch begins.

The new rules limit abandoning — calls that hang up or have pauses longer than two seconds — to less than 3 percent of a telemarketer's business, agency officials said. The FTC also is requiring sellers to play an identifying recording after two seconds if no operator is available.

The new rules also prohibit telemarketers from charging someone without permission, especially when the seller already knows the person's billing information.

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[redman]

Lovely.

I live in CA, the most populace state in the country, so most calls to me probably already originate here anyway.

And this is like banning guns anyway. Only the law-abiding will comply. What recourse do you and I have at home at 8:47 p.m. on a weekday if an unlisted number calls us?

[Sag]

New York State has had this for a year. I registered to it when it first came out for the obvious reasons. I can tell you it has helped one hell of alot. I still get the occasional one that is exempt from the legislation, just like the Feds are proposing. I can honestly tell you I'm down to about 2 a month, instead of 2 a day.