Just wanted to throw light on the changing tele-marketing rules.......... and the new laws of the FTC.

I definetly think that it is going to effect the tele-marketing business in U.S.A, though it is for the benifit of the customers.

What do you all think...food for thought..

The rules and concerns about telemarketing.


The Telemarketing Sales Rule
The Telemarketing Sales Rule enforces a law passed to fight fraudulent activities carried out by telephone. Companies that violate the Rule may be subject to fines of $10,000 per violation. The FTC defines telemarketing as any plan, program or campaign to sell goods or services over the telephone.

The Rule requires specific disclosures.

For outbound calls, the following prompt (before any sales pitch is given) clear and conspicuous oral disclosures:

The seller’s identity;
That the purpose of the call is to sell;
The nature of the goods or services offered;
That no payment or purchase is necessary to win if a prize promotion is offered.
Prize promotion disclosures: the odds of winning, or if the odds can’t be calculated, the factors that determine the odds; that no purchase/no payment is necessary to win; a statement of no purchase/no payment method of entry; and any material restrictions or limitations on any offered prize.

A telemarketer cannot:

Call again once you’ve asked them not to;
Call you before 8:00 A.M. or after 9:00 P.M.;
Withdraw money from your checking account without your express, verifiable authorization;
Misrepresent the offer or the goods or services offered or make any false statement to get you to pay, no matter what method of payment you use;


List Management Processes
Contact State, DMA and private list providers to subscribe to lists ($500 for each state, it seems like)

Receive and document lists from sources

Reformat data into proper format for campaign

Manage incoming lists at different intervals throughout the year

Create and manage individual campaign DNC lists

Create and manage master DNC list

Agent Training Process

Develop Training program

Manage agent training process

Document agent process

Policy Development Process

Develop internal DNC policy

Have attorney review DNC policy

Periodically update DNC policy

Have attorney review updated DNC policy

Customer Policy Request Fulfillment Process

Create fulfillment process

Collect and administer policies for mailing

Document policy fulfillment based on campaign

Campaign Documentation and Archiving Process

Create file management process

Create campaign document management process

Manage files specific to each customer

Manage overall database

Allocate storage space to process

Reporting Process

Create company wide reporting process

Create customer reporting process

Manage company wide reporting process

Manage customer reporting process

Produce monthly company reports

Produce customer reports as needed



A telemarketing Call Center should have all these things in place.

This will come into law from September 2003.

Thanks,

Vasu
www.datasoftnet.com

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Thanks

Kam Patel

The U.S. DMA is currently bringing suit in Federal Court (in Oklahoma if I remember correctly) alleging that this legislation is unconstitutional on various grounds. Anyone marketing into the the U.S. should track the results of this lawsuit.

Mr. Sreekumar is not *completely* accurate on the costs involved in subscribing to the various state DNC lists-- the costs vary greatly from state to state, and many are a function of the number of people you will have calling into a state (this is prohibitive for outbound ops that compete on low cost bases, with large numbers of reps).

On an even more frustrating note, the DNC laws themselves are discriminatory on their face-- you have blanket bans on some kinds of calls to DNC listed numbers, while other kinds of calls (calls that DNC listed households are going to be just as hostile to) are 'fair game'. Why should banks be able to sell financial products over the phone, and newspapers sell subscriptions, while a cookware company cannot hire some 100 seat outbound center to peddle the same products being sold on TV via infomercials?

There is no good reason for this. Basically, some industries have influential state lobbyists, and some don't.

The registration requirements are definitely designed with U.S. operations in mind, and will predictably only get worse for offshore and nearshore operations to comply with.

That said, a National DNC list would be preferable to what currently exists: a state-by-state patchwork quilt of DNC lists, "black dot" statutes etc. on various models, with varying penalties, incorporating licensing schemes or not, etc. In other words, an expensive compliance mess. But in the end, our industry won't get that: what we'll wind up with is the worst of both worlds.

What is gradually evolving in the U.S. regulatory situation is something not entirely unlike the U.S. securities laws. A state-by-state patchwork of un-harmonized laws, AND a draconian Federal-level statute, all of which have to be complied with-- at risk of suit from aggressive U.S. regulators that bring prosecutions on a "looks like it might violate" basis.

The *really* frustrating element of all this is that it's likely to drive a segment of our industry "underground". If there was reasonable, well-designed legislation that was easy and inexpensive to comply with, and protected consumers while assisting industry, only a tiny minority would not comply. With expensive, cumbersome, arcane legislation, offshore operations in particular are going to ask themselves, why bother complying? The ability of the U.S. or state governments to chase down all the offshore operations is very limited. So 'above board' operations will have their reputations damaged by the "underground" operations, and have to compete with businesses that do not have to pay the cost of compliance. U.S. taxpayers will foot the bill for an expensive and futile campaign to chase down the offshore "underground" operations.

Who wins?

And Mr. Patel-- if your product can "weed out" DNC numbers on a same-day-as-registered basis, we'd be interested.