The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (“TCPA”) is a federal statute that was enacted in 1991 to safeguard consumer privacy through the regulation of certain telemarketing practices. As our readers are aware, businesses operating without regard for TCPA compliance can incur massive civil penalties. As such, it is important to keep the following TCPA compliance tips in mind:

• To help ensure TCPA compliance, obtain prior express written consent to call/text. Consumers should be required to take an affirmative action to submit an online consent form and indicate their consent with an action, such as clicking a submit button or activating a checkbox. If a checkbox is used to indicate consent, the checkbox should not be pre-populated.
• Maintain comprehensive consumer consent records, including the specific language used to obtain consent (at the time that consent was obtained), the method of consent capture, and any changes made to the consent language over time. Businesses should consider utilizing third-party site recordation providers, such as Jornaya and/or TrustedForm, to document consent obtained on their websites.
• Compliance with the TCPA includes offering consumers an easy way to opt out. Businesses should provide a clear and simple method for subscribers to opt out of the receipt of future telemarketing communications. Businesses must employ ‘STOP’ response capabilities, where customers can text the word ‘STOP’ (or similar language) to cease SMS communications. During a prerecorded voice call, consumers should be able to opt out by communicating the request to an automated, interactive voice or via key press-activated, opt out mechanism. If businesses utilize live agents to call consumers, these live agents should be trained to honor consumers’ requests to not be contacted again by placing them on internal DNC lists.
• Scrubbing against the National Do Not Call Registry (“NDNC”) is one of the most important TCPA compliance measures. Unless they have consent to call/text, businesses should scrub against the NDNC to ensure that they do not contact numbers listed on the registry. Businesses should also scrub against state DNC registries.
• Train and regularly verify that company staff members are well-versed in TCPA compliance protocols.

The Importance of TCPA Compliance to your Business

The aforementioned TCPA Compliance tips are 5 (of maybe a hundred) TCPA compliance measures that companies should implement as part of their telemarketing practices and procedures. The Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission continue to enact and update regulations aimed at improving industry telemarketing practices. Businesses should retain telemarketing law attorneys that are experienced in counseling clients on ever-changing state and federal telemarketing laws, rules, and regulations.

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