A Florida-based telemarketer will pay $1 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it allegedly called people on the national do-not-call list through an automated dialing service and left pre-recorded messages, according to the FTC.
The U.S. Department of Justice on behalf of the FTC alleged that the Florida-based telemarketer’s automated phone dialing service called and then illegally hung up on more than 64 million people — and called more than 1 million numbers that were listed on the National Do Not Call (DNC) Registry, according to the FTC.
The case is on file in U.S. District Court in Orlando, FL.
The Broadcast Team (TBT) and its two principals, Robert J. Tuttle and Mark S. Edwards, of Ormond Beach, FL, violated the FTC’s Telemarketing Sales Rule in the course of using “voice broadcasting” to call millions of U.S. consumers using automated dialers and prerecorded messages, the FTC charged.
Many of the numbers TBT allegedly called were on the federal DNC Registry. The FTC also charged that TBT failed to pay for access to the DNC Registry’s numbers in several instances.
The FTC further alleged that when the calls TBT made were answered by people, instead of voice mail or answering machines, TBT ended the call or hung up after playing a recording. This allegedly violated the TSR.
The complaint further alleged that TBT unlawfully called DNC-listed numbers and made calls without paying the required annual fee for access to DNC-registered phone numbers, according to the FTC.
The proposed settlement requires TBT and its owners to pay $1 million in civil penalties and bars them from violating the TSR by hanging up when a person answers or by playing a recorded message instead of connecting the call to a sales person.
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