The business day passed yesterday with many key issues regarding the Federal Trade Commission’s do-not-call list undecided.
Among them was whether the Direct Marketing Association would provide the Federal Communications Commission with a copy of the list so it could start enforcing usage.
The DMA has started asking members if they have a copy of the list, but at deadline had not yet decided whether to comply with a request from to the FCC to supply it.
“We’re checking our options,” said DMA president H. Robert Wientzen. “We’re trying our best to cooperate with the FTC, the FCC and the legislative branch, but there are some hurdles and legal questions, and we’re researching those now.” He added that the DMA was worried about the hygiene of the list.
Also unresolved was the legal status of the do-not-call registry.
At deadline, the U.S. Appeals Court in Denver was still considering whether to let the list take effect. It was weighing a challenge from the Federal Trade Commission, and also considering the views of telemarketers who say the list would violate their free-speech rights.
The three-judge panel asked the FTC and telemarketing groups to comment on a request to merge three appeals into one by the end of the week, according to wire service reports.
On Wednesday, FCC chairman Michael K. Powell asked the DMA for help in enforcing the list after a federal judge barred the Federal Trade Commission, which initiated the program, from implementing it because he said it violates the free-speech rights of telemarketers.
In a letter to DMA president Robert Wientzen and senior vice president Jerry Cerasale, Powell asserted that the FCC had a right to request the list provided it’s to be used to assure compliance.
Earlier this week, U.S. District Judge Edward Nottingham issued an order stopping the FCC from taking over the list from the FTC which he had previously ordered to stop administering the list because it violated the First Amendment free speech rights.
Nottingham said that a person who has been stopped from doing something by a court order cannot do the same thing indirectly (Direct Newsline, Sept. 30).
The judge also blocked the FTC from giving the list to its sister agency. Wientzen explained the FCC is “legally capable of enforcing (the do-not-call rule), but practically incapable of enforcing it.”
The list contains more than 50 million phone numbers to the registry in hopes of blocking calls from telemarketers under a program that officially took effect on Wednesday.
In a related development, the DMA announced that it had set up a consumer complaint line. It would allow consumers who have listed their phone numbers on the do-not-call registry to complain about violations.
Consumers can send an e-mail to [email protected], call a toll-free number (1-800-969-6566) or log on to the DMA’s Web site (www.the-dma.org/review/complaint.shtml).
“We’re saying to consumers, ‘Tell us if you’re on the list and tell us if you’re getting calls,” Wientzen said. “We will do our best to correct it.”
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