I am Attorney Jeremy Glapion, and I STILL sue companies that just. won't. stop. calling. you. AMA!

Any idea who the company is that's always calling my cell for a cruise or something? I pick up the phone, then there's a foghorn, then a male voice: "Hello, it's your captain speaking!" and then I hang up.

There's class actions pending against two of these companies (although really, the same people are behind it). It may be one of them. Caribbean Cruise Lines and/or Holiday Cruise Line. But maybe there's an unknown player.

What's it take to get on one of those? I get about two a month. I haven't picked up for any of them because they always call when I'm at work, but from looking up the numbers I know it's them.

Class actions of this type are "opt out" rather than "opt in," meaning if a class is certified and you're covered by the class definition, you are in unless you opt out.

If there's a settlement, how do they know you're a member of the class and owe you money? I'm imagining all they have is your cell phone number.

Reverse lookup, primarily. You do have to opt in to CLAIM money, so they also do thinks like publication notice (magazines, newspapers, website banners, etc) targeted at likely class members.

I picked up one of those cruise calls... answered three questions.. and got a "free" cruise (just paid taxes). Then instead of going to the sales presentation when I got there "to get boarding passes", I just boarded the ship, because you don't need boarding passes when you check in there. Cruise was pretty ok!

Did they spend the whole time trying to sell you time shares?

To answer some common questions (I hope this doesn't violate Rule 2...if so, I can edit into my already long original post).

Is this just to generate business?

I would be lying if I said my business didn’t benefit financially from the first AmA. Nonetheless, though I don't expect to convince the most cynical, the reality is I love the Reddit community (I’m a daily poster), and so many people are hounded by these calls that I enjoy educating people on one of the options they have to stand up for themselves (and helping them do so), even if they do it on their own or find a different lawyer. I would shout about this law even if I had nothing to gain from it, because the calls are that damn annoying.

But I do recognize (and appreciate) that Reddit has given me a platform. And it is impossible to separate the education component of this AmA from the marketing, which is why I’m trying to give back with my charity offer.

What about Rachel from Cardholder services, or the Canadian Pharmacy, or the fake IRS people, etc, etc

As much as I'd love to catch all of them, most of these companies are either overseas, scams, and/or are so hard to track down that the time/expense is not worth it.

My shorthand for what makes a viable defendant? Two of the following: 1) They call from a phone number that connects you back to them when you call it back; 2) they freely identify their business name that you can find either in a business database or on Google; 3) they have a website.

What about Rachel from Cardholder services, or the Canadian Pharmacy, or the fake IRS people, etc, etc

I take it the "Your computer is sending viruses to teh Intarwebs!" people fall under "overseas" and/or "scams" and are therefore ineligible?

Yes. I hate them.

What would be the strangest case (that you're allowed to talk about) that you have taken on?

Unfortunately, I can't talk about my strangest one, which I brought on behalf of a Redditor but is subject to confidentiality.

I do have one pending where a company called my client over 300 times after it's documented he asked them to stop. Not strange other than...why would you do that?

I wish I had seen your AMA a few months ago. I was getting almost daily calls from "Your car's warranty department" trying to sell me an extended warranty on my car because the manufacturers warranty was about to expire. Every time they called, caller ID showed the call coming from my local area code. Every time they called I told them that I was not interested and to put me on the do not call list, then I blocked the number on my mobile phone. They finally stopped calling after I finally snapped and screamed at them and told them that I knew that they were spoofing the source numbers on their calls and that I was pretty sure that was a federal crime. I really wanted to go after those guys, but I had no idea how to do it.

Well now you know for the future! This is why I think it's a good idea to do one of these every 6 months or so. People don't know these calls are illegal!

Why -do- they do that? It costs money and manpower. Do you think their business is so wonkily structured that they don't even know they're doing it? It just honestly makes absolutely no sense.

The primary thing I could think of is businesses that only pay telemarketers on commission, since I think they'd be less likely to actually keep functional logs (That telemarketers mentality is "go go go" since they need to keep dialing people to survive and pay their rent).

My theory?

1. Debt collectors hear "you have the wrong number" so much that it doesn't register with them, and/or they don't believe it. They just think a debtor is ducking them.

2. Most people don't know these calls are illegal, so by the time they get sued, they've made enough money to where they just chalk the particular suit up as the cost of doing business. Most legitimate outfits have insurance anyway.

Insurance?

Who is insuring these outfits for anything resembling a sane rate for legal or business coverage without asserting that their do-not-call practices are correct?

Having insurance isn't a cop out for bad behavior. If anything having insurance should encourage better behavior because there is a cost associated with it.

A lot of these companies think they can (and often do) settle for less than their deductible, so the insurance company never finds out.

But these businesses do have general liability insurance. Only recently have insurance companies started excluding TCPA from their coverage.

When I get the calls from Rachael at card holder services I press 1 or 9 and talk to them, then proceed to waste as much of their time as possible. My current best is around 45 minutes. Am I making myself get more of these calls by actually talking to them or is it just randomized number calling on their end anyway?

You probably are flagging your number as a working number in their system, which may increase the number of calls or lead to more calls.

But it's a good fight you're fighting. I like it.

Thanks for the response! It can be really good entertainment on a boring day. It almost seems like they aren't allowed to hang up sometimes. Many of them will stay on the line even after they realize I'm messing with them. I had one start to insult Americans as having relationships with their sisters as if he was trying to get me to hang up instead.

Did you let him know that's only in Alabama?

I have been receiving calls from debt collectors chasing a woman that hasn't owned the cell phone number in 9 or 10 years. I have told them to stop and they never listened. I also get the occasional call from other solicitors, today for instance I apparently won two all expense paid trips. I don't have the dates and times listed on the cold calls. Is there any way to still go after them? I'm also on the do not call list. Any way without the dates and times to pursue legal action, my phone records maybe? Cross referencing them with known dept collection agencies?

Thanks

The wrong number debt collection calls are interesting, because those are clearly illegal under the law, even if you never told them they had the wrong number. Has any single debt collector called a large number of times? If it's 100 debt collectors and each called once, that's difficult to make work economically (at least for bringing in an attorney). If it's 2, and they've each called 50 times, that's a little bit better.

What I would do were I investigating this or bringing this case is I would identify the number(s) that have been calling, determine which collectors they are, and gather your most recent call records. Then, once the case was filed, I would ask for the defendant to turn over their records for all calls made to a particular phone number, as well as subpoena your carrier for historical phone records.

For what it's worth, the statute of limitations for TCPA actions is four years, so only calls within the past four years are "actionable."

The "you've won a trip" are likely scams, and not worth the time and effort to track down.

That's the only problem I see, I haven't been able to get what company they are from before they hang up so I assume they are mostly from the same company but there is no real way of knowing. Also within the last 6 months or so I have been telling them if they don't remove me form their call list I will be perusing legal action. This has slowed the calls down. Would this be the type of case you would consider taking?

Are the debt collection calls usually from the same number?

I would definitely consider taking a case like this should investigation prove out all of this and there's a viable Defendant.

honestly I couldn't tell you, they are always from the same type of number, I don't remember if they are exactly the same. I have gotten a new phone recently so I cant go back and look through.

Check your bills. Some of the calls you answered should be on there. PM me if you want to discuss in more detail.

How long to phone carriers keep historical phone records for?

Depends on the carrier. Detailed call records that show all calls made no matter if answered or not are typically for a shorter period. Verizon, for example, only keeps those for a year.

But normal records that you'd find on your bill probably go back 4-6 years.

I once had a call from an Asian sounding man who told me I had been indicted for tax fraud, and that if I did not provide my credit card number to correct this, all of my college credits would be terminated. Any experience with this?

Edit: spelling

Well known scam.

See here

This one lady I've never met thinks my phone number is her phone number and gives it out to everyone such as her doctors, friends, family, etc. Because she thinks my phone number is her phone number, I have no way of telling her to stop directly. Is this situation covered by the TCPA?

Likely not with her friends and family, but possibly yes with large companies using automatic dialing equipment. It's not the type of case I like to bring though, because, while unfortunate, it risks making the law look bad.

I have a for profit school contacting me a year after I went to check it out. I texted the admission official that I did not want to join thr school anymore. They started texting me prewritten messages with no option to cancel or quit, when I verbally said I do not want to join their school. They sometimes send me spam mail to my house as well. What can I do?

The law does not cover spam mail, but text messages are covered. You could potentially sue over the texts, especially if 1) you never gave them written consent that they could text you or 2) you told them to stop texting you.

How many texts?

They sent like maybe 3-4. But I deleted them. Is that okay?

Your carrier likely has records of the texts, as would the company.

So would I have a case and how can I them to stop texting me?

Next time they text, text "stop" and save that texts. If they don't stop, contact an attorney.

fucking Walgreens keeps sending me "reminder" text messages about a scrip i was never ever prescribed.. despite me sending multiple "STOP" responses (as directed in the text), emails and calls to Corporate.

where do i start?

That's pretty bad. How many texts would you say?

every.. 3 days or so for the last 2 years?

That's a lot (200+ texts) of texts. Happy to discuss more.

I get these sorts of calls fairly regularly. Is there any reason I shouldn't file suit in small claims court for my statutory damages? (assuming it has jurisdiction based on local rules and all that good stuff)

Whether you should or shouldn't go it along is entirely dependent upon the circumstances. If it's easily identifiable company X calling, and they've called you 10 times, and you're comfortable filing a case in small claims, you may want to give it a try.

But a lot of these cases do require subpoenas, discovery, depositions, etc, especially if they don't settle early, and it's easy to find yourself being bullied by a defense attorney on the other side who wants to fight.

Interesting. There's no intent requirement unless I'm shooting for the treble stat damages, right? So I'm surprised that there'd be much room for factual disputes that would warrant extensive discovery.

What are the most common factual issues that are disputed?

(I do plan on giving this a shot, by the way. I'm a non-practicing attorney, so I don't think I'll get too flustered by opposing counsel, even if they do try to pull out a bazooka over a stinking 500 bucks)

The primary factual dispute revolves around the definition of an autodialer. It's pretty broad, and the FCC recently clarified it pretty well, but Defendants still likely to poke at that area and hope that the judge buys it.

Factual disputes can come up over consent as well, but I try to focus on cases where there clearly was no consent, or revocation of consent can be documented.

I (stupidly) put my phone number into a thing on Car and Driver to receive inventory lists for local Jeep dealerships. Needless to say 5 minutes later I had 6 missed calls and 6 voicemails. Several hours later it was a second wind of the exact same thing, but this time I answered and asked them to stop calling and that I wasn't interested. Three weeks later I still get about 2 or 3 calls and voicemails per week from the same dealerships (different sales reps) about that initial inquiry. Is this the type of thing you can pursue?

If it's multiple dealerships, there's a chance that the one you asked to stop did stop, and others continued. If you've ruled that out, it depends on how many calls are coming from each dealership. You couldn't sue them all in the same lawsuit, so it would be about figuring out how many times each called.

There's also a good chance that if they are smaller dealership, they may be just using a regular phone system that may not qualify as the type of equipment the law covers.

So in a general sense it sounds like what I handle, there's some factual wrinkles here that would need to be worked through to see if you had a case.

Is there any legal consequence for the company he originally gave the number to? Assuming there wasn't a clause he consented to that allowed giving it away.

There may be. It's an interesting idea that I've thought about but never had the opportunity to try.

More likely, the legal case would be between the defendant you sue and the company that gave them the number. They would sue and say "you gave us this number that you didn't have consent to call and now we're sued, and it's your fault."

You should hand out business cards to defendants that lose to you. ;)

They won't be forgetting me, that's for sure.

Suing and being awarded judgement is one thing, but actually collecting on the judgement is something else entirely. How successful have you been in actually collecting money from these defendants?

Every case I've won or settled to date I have collected 100% of the award or settlement.

I have no qualms about going after a deadbeat defendant, to the point of getting an arrest warrant issued for contempt.

What are your favourate movies ?

Off the cuff list that I may regret later?

1. Forrest Gump
2. Django Unchained
3. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
4. I Love You, Man

ETA: 5. Nightmare Before Christmas

Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

So glad you chose this one and not the Depp film.

Don't like the Depp one at all, probably because how much I love the original.

That's a good list! Three four and five would probably make my top ten, and I haven't seen two so maybe it would too.

I Love You, Man was a risky pick for this list, but I've seen it a dozen times and I laugh my ass off every time.

Anybody want a peanut?

See you later, Jobin.

Have you seen Hateful 8 yet? How did you like it in comparison to Django?

I have not, but I will be seeing it soon. I'm not usually a Tarantino fan, but I loved Django.

Unrelated, other than on the topic of new movies, I did see The Revenant. Awesome movie, but I don't know if Leo did enough to deserve an Oscar.

I am a manager at a call center. We mostly advertise and answer inbound calls however if we have any abandoned calls or the caller requests a call back or leaves a voicemail we do place outbound calls and leave voicemails. We only attempt to call back at most three times and leave only three voicemails.

What are some thing we can do to protect ourselves from lawsuits as we wish to run an ethical business?

How do we ensure we stay compliant with the TCPA?

What are some big no nos that we should steer clear of?

If you're telemarketing, make sure you have written consent and keep that well documented.

Make sure you scrub for reassigned numbers.

Don't ignore "stop calling me" requests. Most people won't sue you if you honor that.

Make sure everyone is well trained with repercussions for not honoring these requests.

So on and so forth.

There's a lot that can be done, but it mainly boils down to: did the person ask you to call them? If yes, you're good, if not, leave them alone.

The above is not legal advice, of course.

[deleted]

Is it the same company calling or is it different ones? Wrong number debt collection calls fall under the law, so if you've already asked them to stop, you may want to consider a lawsuit.

[deleted]

I have a bunch of lawsuits like this pending, so this is definitely something I do and that falls under this area of law.

As a telemarketer hater, I applaud you... you filthy lawyer. ;-)

Ok seriously, If I wanted to bring a suit - how do I get the info of the company in order to do so? Often the number they are calling from shows up as unidentified.

Also

Political callers and charities are not exempt.

I thought they were. Wow! What if you're a member of their party in your county? We get lots of polling callers, robocalls and "reminders to vote" around early November. Can we go after them too?

Wrong number calls (e.g. wrong number debt collection calls) count.

We get one or two of these per year and in some cases they keep you on the line threatening you for 10-15 minutes, insisting that you owe them money & they are taking you to court. But we KNOW they've got the wrong person. How can we nail these scumbags?

Thanks for doing this. This is truly one of my pet peeves.

1. The harder they make it to find their company info, the less likely it is that they're worth suing. At some point, this will change because legitimate companies might try this approach, but that's a decent short hand for now. So it shouldn't be hard to identify the company by asking or Googling.

2. Not exempt from calls to cell phones! Unless you provided the caller with your telephone number (e.g. on an application form or their website).

3. If it's a real debt collection outfit, you can probably sue them.

How can or do you go after the internet robo callers that spoof their number? Is there a away to find out where those calls are actually coming from ?

I typically don't, because the economics just aren't there. It will cost $400 to sue an unknown number, and then probably multiple subpoenas to unmask the caller, and in all likelihood, you'll find out they don't typically have those money, even if it does trace back to an actual entity.

Spoofing technology has outpaced unspoofing technology.

Unmasking a caller is ridiculously hard because of the design of the telephone network.. Source: Employed at a telecom company.

Is it possible? If so, how?

I receive 2-3 phone calls a day from random spoofed phone numbers. It is mostly pay day loan stuff or an auto dialer and someone on the other line asking me if I want a $5,000 loan. When I tell them they have the wrong person (got this phone number 2 years ago still get calls) they laugh and say, "Fuck you".

What are my options?

What I usually do when contacted by a potential client in a similar situation is call back some of the numbers to see if it connects me to a real company. 99% of the time, for calls like those you mentioned, it does not.

You can also attempt to play dumb and ask if they'll give you their website so you can read some of this stuff while they talk, or ask them to send you an email with the terms. Most won't, but some will.

But the reality is that the technology to spoof numbers has outpaced the technology to unmask them, so the best thing to do is to ignore or black those calls, and report them to the FCC.

My father passed away last January and we still have his cellphone active because it was the main phone for the business that he owned. Somehow an online pharmacy that he used managed to get that number and still call 3+ times a day and when we ask to be removed they are either really nice and apologize and say they will, or they start accusing me of being my dad and insisting i pay for an order he supposedly made long after his death. There was no order made and they never got a cc# for the order and whether the order even exists depends on the caller. Other times its just them asking how that bottle of pills he orders long ago was and if he wants more

How would i go about getting them to stop?

Are you sure he actually used this pharmacy? It might very well be one of the overseas scam pharmacies that call everyone.

I got a new phone number. The previous owner was apparently in a lot of debt. I get several calls a day from a payday loan company. And from AARP for some reason.

How do I make it stop? Should I just change phone numbers?

Tell them they have the wrong number, if you haven't already. Document it if you can. If they keep calling, you might want to consider a lawsuit.

Personally, as a matter of principal, I will never give up my telephone number because a company can't abide by the law.

Document it meaning audibly record the call?

If your state allows it, but even noting date/time/name of rep would be sufficient.

What was the trickiest case you've handled, and did you win or lose it?

In my career (which expands beyond just being solo?) I did work on behalf of some NFL Players in the NFL Concussion litigation. Tricky because of the seriousness of the issues involved, the publicity, the amount at stake, and the personalities.

As for won it or lost it? There's a settlement that's currently being appealed, so tough to say.

Do these same laws apply to a Google voice number that forwards to my actual number? Mine is daily bombarded with the same auto "great news" that I've been approved for a loan...blah blah blah.

If you're forwarding the Google Voice number to your actual number, treat it like a landline. It's about what they call, not where it's ultimately received.

But these loan companies are difficult to track down, to say the least.

So there's a company calling me about installing a home security system. It some where its prerecorded and you hit "1" if you are interested. I hit the button just so I could talk to a real person to get off their list. Does this count as any type of consent?

They seem to have stopped after my second explanation I'm tired of their shit. But a few weeks ago, they called me at work. Does it need to be the same number to count as them calling without consent?

That would likely not count as consent for telemarketing purposes.

And yes, consent is number specific.

Are you going to do something about the military constantly calling you asking you to enlist? Pain in the ass when you first get out of high school...

I'm probably not going to sue the military. That's the surest fire way to get the law changed, other than suing the political campaign of a candidate who becomes President/Congressperson.

I get a lot of calls trying to sell me car warranties, even for cars I no longer own. Have you had any success with stopping or suing these people?

I actually just filed a class action against one such company in New Jersey. The case is still very early, so I don't know the likelihood of success, but they're cases I'm open to, especially if the defendant can be identified (which is the toughest part with some of these auto warranty companies).

I get a couple of calls a month like this, and no matter how often I ask them to stop calling, they dont. Is there anything I can do besides try to get their name and the name of their company? I asked if they had a call back number one time, and they wouldnt give it to me. That said the incoming number is visible, I just never tried it. Thanks for doing this!

You could sue, but that would take knowing who you're going to sue. Get creative in how you identify their company. Perhaps feign interest, or get them to send you an email, or give you their website, so on and so forth. Once you identify them, you can then work to hold them accountable.

But some companies are well trained not to give it out, and for those, not much can be done.

I live in New Jersey and have received multiple calls for a couple years about extending a warranty on my wife's car. After reading about the large settlement, I started to record the dates and times of each call. They have called nine times since July of last year. Is there anything that can be done and how many calls justify a lawsuit?

Which company is it calling? I just filed a class action in New Jersey against National Auto Division, LLC.

I filed a claim with you. Can you do mutiple calls from mutiple different people? I think a company may have shared my number to like these people. I probably get some sort of type of these calls once a week.

To clarify, you can't file a claim with me. I can't give you money. If you contacted me through my site, that's asking me to look into it and get back to you. I'm sure you know that but I want to be perfectly clear!

I can do multiple calls from multiple different people, but they'd typically be in separate lawsuits. I've represented the same person multiple times against multiple defendants before. I typically don't bring an individual case on less than 20 calls, for what it's worth.

Yeah thats what i mean, i filed out like the thing on your website.

I received it. I'll definitely take a look and get back to you. Thanks!

Oh my god. Who are the "Rachel from card holder services" people? They have called me non stop for the past 4-ish years. It is always on a different area code. They always say horrible things then hang up when I ask not to call. Please help me

I wish I knew. I get these calls too and I feel powerless and curl into a fetal position.

Do you think any laws on consumer protection need to be revised to further prevent unsolicited calls?

I think the law is very strong as is, but technology needs to catch up. It is far too easy to spoof a telephone number and make these calls while remaining completely anonymous. I don't know how this can be solved, and I recall from my last AmA that those more in the know than I am said it's not as easy as it sounds to prevent, but that's the biggest problem right now.

As for the law itself, I would like to see the law expanded to cover all calls to landlines, the way it covers calls to cellular telephones. For someone who still has a landline, getting hounded on that landline is still an invasion of privacy, even if the caller is not selling something. As it stands, the law as it pertains to landlines only covers telemarketing.

Can I sue the Red Cross? They won't stop calling and call during horrible times. (8 am or 9pm) I've asked them to stop and they won't.

Join the club. So many people complained about the Red Cross last time. The problem is the negative publicity (on me and the law) for suing the Red Cross would be...astronomical.

Yes, I know the Red Cross faces a lot of criticism, and may not be this Saintly organization in reality, but that's how they are viewed.

I don't have the resources to wage that PR battle.

Yeah I can see how it would go that way. Thanks for being honest and not a slime ball lawyer.

Thanks. That's nice to hear. Yesterday a defendant told me he didn't like me because I go around suing poor companies for phone calls instead of doing real work.

I told him shh bby is ok.

But it still hurt.

I file a DNC complaint every single time I receive one of these calls. I've been called everything under the sun when I try to figure out the name of the company that is calling me. Usually they say something generic like "Credit Services" or something like that. Is there anything I can do to these scumbags?

Continue to file complaints and block the number. Also, when it's an obvious scam like that, simply hang up. Once they know it's a live number (e.g. if you "press 1 to be on the DNC list") they'll likely call back even more.

Unfortunately, in general, those generic companies are scammers, overseas, or have masked themselves so well that the time/effort for a private attorney to go after them wouldn't be worth it.

When I am bored, I do let the scammer talk and I pretend that OMG there is a virus on my computer how did it get there! And I cry and I tell the guy how upsetting this phone call is since my cat just died from eating too many twinkies. Oh how I miss Mr Texas. And what you need my credit card to fix my computer? My eyes are so watery from all this crying I just don't think I can even read those tiny numbers right. Here let me give the phone to my husband and he can handle the rest while I go drink this bottle of wine in the shower.

Hello? This is Sargent Grimes with the FBI my wife just handed me the phone here and her wallet and walked off crying towards the bathroom with a bottle of wine, what the hell did you say to her?

At this point if they are still on the phone, my husband "figures out" they're a scam and demands to speak to the supervisor and then they hang up.

Haha, wow you're creative.

I am fairly certain the phone calls I get are generally scammers calling about a google business listing. So no help there and what not, BUT...

Any advice on keeping your name out of the lists most businesses call from?

I think it's a situation where once you're on a list, it's tough to walk that back. These lists are probably passed around quite a bit.

However, you do have a lot of companies out there using dialers that generate numbers and just call them en masse, and then use technologies to identify which numbers are live (voice detection, pressing a button, etc). When you get a call that's clearly a scam, don't say anything and just hang up.

I have actually taken to messing with them saying we are a new business and then I yell violently at my assistant for giving me the wrong coffee order till they hang up.

Your poor assistant.

I wish we had this in Canada. My business line gets at least one fax spam every pretty much every day. No i don't want your chimney cleaning service ffs.

Do you find the fax spam senders to be technologically in the dark ages still? Do they seem a bit overwhelmed by smartphones and the like? Do you ever find out how successful fax spam is (how many clients acquired sort of thing)?

I rarely ever see fax cases, because like calls, most fax senders are difficult to trace outfits.

Or...

Very small businesses that I just feel horribly guilty suing, as a small business owner myself. Usually I just send them a strongly worded letter.

I didn't become a lawyer to put companies out of business.

I don't think they're in the dark ages, but as far as I understand, it's cheap, proven, and easily done at the press of a button, with no real manpower required.

Have you seen "Chef"?

I have not. Should I?

I worked for shady tele-marketing companies for a number of years. I know for a fact that they recycle DNC list within the the companies and among other companies all which are usually owned by their friends. Being as I worked for the "verification" company we would constantly change scripts because one of our clients would get too many complaints about ripping people off so they would shut that business down and start a new one with a clean slate in regards to complaints. At the verification company if we got too many complaints that the number that we dialed out on with the robo-dialer (which is illegal) they would just find another internet VOIP and get back to banging calls. My question is what recourse does anyone have with these shadier companies that operate like this since it's usually quite hard to pin down the same office much less get a real name for someone there?

And before anyone ask I no longer do this type of work and I would be more than happy to provide information on the people that run these companies the best that I can so they can get what's coming to them.

They'd have more of a recourse if more people like you would come forward! Especially while they're working at these places.

Can I tell the unsolicited caller they have the wrong number/info even if they don't or does that make any future lawsuit invalid? Is postal mail included under TCPA law?

1. If you never gave them consent to call in the first place, tell them whatever you want to get them to stop calling (nothing illegal). They needed consent before they called, not after.

2. Mail is not included.

This is unrelated but maybe you can help! My wife and I have been dealing with a stalker, we have a restraining order against him now. He keeps calling us from spoof numbers so we can't prove its him, anyway we could set a trace or use a program to show the original number that is calling so we can file a report? We are scared for our lives

See if you can get your carrier to set up something like that. I'm honestly not sure how that would work in this context.

I JUST got a call from the number I named "I don't need a fucking business loan" AS I was reading this thread. How do you prove you asked them to stop? Also, would it be a good idea to tell them I'm just using this business as a front and I have plenty of money coming in?

If my client doesn't have it documented, I try and get recordings from Defendant. If that doesn't work, I try and build a circumstantial case (e.g. duration of certain calls, etc).

It would be best to just not respond to them.

So... do you have a Canadian counterpart? ^{Please say yes.}

I get asked enough that I should probably find one, but I don't even know if there are similar laws on the books in Canada.

Occasionally we'll get a call from an unknown number out of our area. If you pick it up, there's silence.

Is this an errant robocaller or do you think they're harvesting "good phone numbers" to call later? I've wondered about that & we've stopped answering those.

That's typically a predictive dialer. These are dialers that call numbers en masse, and when one is answered, attemps to connect to a live operator. But if no live operator is available, it'll be silence and a hang up.

Cake or Pie?

Where does Cheesecake fall? It's got cake in the name, but it has more features of a pie, imo.

Haha, truly the downfall of my research, Cheesecake is claimed by both sides of the argument. I personally believe it to be a pie, but alas as many fervent cake supporters point out, it does contain the word "cake" within its title. Either way, thanks for the response!

I'm with you. I think it's a misnamed pie.

Cheese pie sounds awful...

Awful waffle.

I had a collector call me and my husband racist epithets, call and text countless times in a single day, called our landlord, threaten us with police (over a $60 debt my husband's boss was supposed to pay) stalk our facebook pages, attempt to harass our friends and family and made actual physical threats. I know it's not exactly the same as unsolicited calls (even though they definitely weren't solicited) but my question is: what kind of attorney do I even consult, to put a stop to it?

Wow. This is FDCPA (Fair Debt Collection Practices Act). I do that kind of work. So, I'm happy to discuss, or you can contact an FDCPA attorney in your area.

Was it a legitimate debt collection outfit?

I don't believe so. It was just some guy that buys debt from what I can tell. I have texts, voice mails, screen shots from his messages to family and friends. He suggested my father raped me, made fun of my disabled son, etc. I still get them, nearly every day.

Specifically, it was a snap on debt.

Is he with a company or just a random guy? If you want to PM me the number he calls from, I'll see what I can find.

I got 2 Cs and 3 C+s in my first semester of law school. Can you please give some advices ?

It's tough beyond the obvious: study hard. Law school is about memorization and regurgitating a lot of bull shit onto an exam. Figure out what works best for you to study enough to be able to regurgitate. For my first year, I literally worked in Level D (like 4 stories below ground) in the Harvard undergrad library during my first year because it had no internet, no cell phone, and people rarely visited.

But it's an exhausting process, and you really just have to dedicate yourself to learning enough to be able to at least word vomit in the ballpark and coherently.

Alternatively, there's a possibility that law school just isn't for you. I don't mean that in a bad way. It's not for everyone. Being a lawyer is a tough career. I wasn't thrilled with it until I went solo. And it's better to admit that now, if it's the case, than after 5 more semesters of debt.

I used the TCPA to sue some junk faxers (TravelComm,etc.) back around 2004 but didn't collect. Are you having any success collecting from the travel faxers?

I haven't even bothered suing them, since I suspected I would run into the same collection issues you ran into.

I've gotten calls from the same "home security" company well over 10 times. 3 or 4 or those were in the last 3 weeks.

Every time they call I remind them (usually very loudly) that I am fed up with hearing from them and demand they lose my number. I honestly believe that at this point they're just fucking with me. What can I do about this?

Pray for a way to track down spoofers that doesn't require a ton of money and time. :(

I get these too.

I have the option to keep the recordings of my cell phone calls. From my understanding, Wisconsin is "one party" state, so would these recordings be useful? I think I'll start organizing them.

Recordings are useful, but I make no comment on Wisconsin's recording laws, for obvious reasons!

Sorry for the off-topic question but I need help.

Below is the list of people I have tried to contact for help:

Wa state AG Consumer protection agency

Secretary of state, corporate division

Department of Licensing

Department of Revenue

IRS

Local police department

Local media

private investigator

and finally, my district's Senator

The story, in a nut shell;

I found an illegally operated business within my state and they operate in many other states. From the list above, nobody, including the PI could find any info on these guys. The company goes by the name of GreenLine CarpetClean. They are fraudsters and scam artists.

I went to sue them for their shitty job, I took pictures and I went to my local courthouse to start the lengthy battle to sue them. But guess what? In these United States of America, if you want to sue someone you have to have a physical mailing address plus the name of the registered agents for the particular company. Well wouldn't you know it, the live chat people and the telephone people WILL NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES give up an address to any of their buildings. And this is where my story ends....nobody can help me and these assholes are out there scamming American's everyday.

What would you suggest I do going forward...?

These guys? They can't even decide if their name is GreenLine or GreenLight, and their testimonials come from people in literally "Your Local Area." It almost seems like it may be a foreign company that has independent contractors in the US.

If I were suing them, I would sue them under that name, and then ask the Court to allow me to serve an early subpoena on Domains By Proxy (private registration service for their domain) for the identity of the owner of that domain, and then amend the complaint accordingly.

Can you do the same for companies that will just not stop sending junk mail, even after being asked?

I wish, but this law only applies to calls and faxes.

With online job search websites, often when you submit a resume to an employer, the website will allow you to make your resume searchable to all prospective employers on that site (sometimes they will do this automatically, requiring you to click to opt-out).

Some companies use these resumes to contact prospective employees, repeatedly, through phone calls, texts, and emails, often for low-level positions like sales, "financial consulting", etc. Some of these companies are shady or outright MLM schemes. Would courts consider a person allowing his resume to be searchable as "consent"?

This is a fantastic question, and one I'm sitting here going back and forth on.

My instinct is that...it's very possible consent. If you upload your phone number to a site for purposes of receiving calls about jobs, companies that call you from that site about jobs have your consent. But it's a great question, and would depend a lot on the specifics (for example, if you post in a section for financial sector jobs, and Sea World starts calling you, that may not be consent).

But remember, consent can be revoked, so you can tell these companies to stop calling when they call, and they must listen.

Greetings, my learned friend!

I had a couple of similar cases in Germany, unsolicited e-mails though. They are just as illegal as unsolicited calls here - how is the situation where you reside?

How do you find out what company actually called? Is there a way to find out? Does the telephone company or a government body have to give you the holder of a certain number?

Wow, can you tell me a little bit more about the unsolicited email law in Germany? What kind of damages can you get?

As for finding the company called, often they're not trying to hide it and just either called the wrong number (repeatedly) or don't know/care about the law.

If they try to hide it, I usually try and dig up info on the phone number from other complaints, see if I can tie it to a website, look up domain registration info, look up corporation registrations, etc. Often none of this will work and I'm stuck at a dead end, but sometimes it does.

To get identities from a phone company, I would need to issue a subpoena, which I can only do with a pending lawsuit.

Does that include collection calls? I have two medical bills from a time when I ended up in the hospital one night vomiting blood. I received one bill for less than $500 and then later received a call from a collection company saying that I owed nearly three thousand in total in medical bills. Not only do I have no record of that, but since it was in a different state, the hospital would not even tell me whether or not the payments were accurate in their systems because I had to go there in person, show my ID, and pay a fee (I believe they said 10 dollars per page or something ridiculous). On top of that, the collection company can call me 2-3 times a day even at ridiculous hours like 11pm or even 8am. I have already spoken to them once and told them I want to dispute it because the amount is not correct, but they are unwilling to work with me or simply ask me to "stay on the line". They are only calling my government-issued minute cellphone. The calls are always form the same number and I even have that number saved under the name of "Spam" on my phone so I don't waste my minutes. I also work from home, so being on the phone with absolute silence is a MUST so I have to keep the phone on silent. I have already told them what times they are not to contact me, but they still contact me during those times. What can I do?

PS: What are your favorite games? Do you play League of Legends? If so, I'd love to test my skills against such an awesome attorney.

First, if they're calling at those hours (after 9 PM), that's a violation of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. I do that kind of work as well. They can't call after 9 PM local time.

Second, to dispute a debt, you have to do it in writing.

Third, you can still tell them to stop calling, and while they would have to stop calling, they can still collect on the debt if it is a legitimate debt.

Are you being crystal clear to members of your class action law suit that you, as the attorney, stand to gain the most out of all the people involved in the Action?

Or in perhaps a less inflammatory way, what does your fee structure look like for class action suits?

I imagine it's something along the lines of 30% of the damages paid.

In a class action, I only get what the court approves. That could be 15%, it could be 40%. The contract I have with the class rep does not control what I get from the entire class payment.

I don't think the criticism of class action attorneys is fair. Those who levy the criticism compare our total fees to individual recovery. If there are 1 million people in a class that gets $10m, and I get $2m and the class members each get $8, when you compare $2m to $8 it looks bad.

But the flip side is that those 1m people got a lawyer for $2 each. That is probably 3000x less than what a lawyer would cost the individual in an individual case.

More broadly, however, class actions are expensive and risky. It is not unheard of for law firms to spend hundreds of thousands, or millions of dollars, trying a class action, only to lose, and be left eating that loss. That risk needs to be compensated, or attorneys simply won't bring the cases.

Finally, the beauty of the class action mechanic is not that it's going to make every member of the class whole, but that it holds companies accountable for little frauds on a large scale. If BT&B cell carrier adds a $1 "shh bby is ok" charge to the bills of all its 5 million accountholders, the class action mechanic is the only way they can be held responsible short of government intervention. No one person will sue over $1, nor would BT&B care. But a class action asking for $5m? That hurts.

How do you feel about SoS stealing the Blizzcon finals from both Jaedong and Life?

I've always been so bad at Starcraft that I don't pay much attention to it. How do you feel about it?

I have cable service with company A and actually wrote on my application form "no soliciting/advertising" they then gave my info to a few companies to call on their behalf who then refused to stop calling when asked. Its all recorded. Who do I take to small claims court? Cable company A or the telemarketers they hired? Both (double pay out)? Thanks, fight the good fight.

If they're calling on company A's behalf, I would sue company A.

You can't get double payout, unfortunately!

Do you know of anyone like you operating outside of the US, or are you able to yourself? Here in the UK, nuisance calls are pretty much constantly tolerated by a lot of people, with the Telephone Preference Service seemingly limited in what it can handle.

I cannot, and unfortunately, I'm not familiar with laws beyond the US. I wish though -- it would give me an excuse to get over there.

LSU, huh? A lot of partying you got there, i guess.

question: How difficult was to get in harvard law school? Did your LSAT score was the deal breaker or you had an awesome resume? And last but no least: what did you major in?

1. Less than you might expect. I'm not a big partier, and I made a great group of friends who weren't big on it either. There were some, definitely, but probably on the lower end of what you'd expect at LSU.

2. It's tough to say how difficult it was because I wasn't behind the scenes evaluating myself, and it was never really a goal of mine. It wasn't until I did really well on my LSAT that I thought I'd have a chance and fortunately, they took a chance on me. The process was pretty simple: application, interview. But I do know from just looking at statistics (and its reputation) that getting in is not easy.

3. I majored in Psychology.

Hi Jeremy. Thank you for what you do! We have been on the "no-call" list for several years now, but there has been a real increase in the number of telemarketer and robo-calls in the last year or so. Has something changed in the law to allow more loopholes? Also, survey calls cannot be blocked, can they?

The Do Not Call list only applies to telemarketing calls, so survey calls don't fall under that.

However, for calls to your cell phone, survey calls very well may be illegal under the law. No exemption for them.

As far I'm aware, there are no new loopholes, companies are just getting good at hiding their identity, knowing that on the off chance they're tracked down, they can either disappear or they've made enough money to chalk it up as a cost of doing business.

I live in Spain. Do you know if that's applicable here? I recieve a lot of phone calls from internet companies although i've said them a lot of times that I'm not interested in his company and I don't want them to call me more. Any advice? (I didn't want to sound like asking for legal advice, I just want to make them stop)

I do not know the law in Spain. I'm sorry. This is the law in the United States, but beyond that...I'm clueless.

What is your top 5 favorite vidya games?

Bonus question: wow. Faction, race and class (i assume you play or played wow since you mentioned blizzcon)

I stopped playing WoW after Burning Crusade, I think. I'm a big Diablo (and now Overwatch) fan, and dabble in Heroes of the Storm.

Top 5 favorite video games...wow, that's tough.

1. Last of Us
2. Diablo 2
3. SMB3
4. Dark Souls
5. Dark Age of Camelot

I've resorted to adding numbers to the "Reject call" list on my phone but still keep getting calls for home security systems. Is it generally one company with multiple lines or are there that many companies that want to give me a free home security system?

Edit: They tend to have different area codes, but that doesn't seem like it would be a difficult hurdle to overcome.

I suspect these companies are actually lead generator companies that then sell the leads to various companies who are oblivious to how they acquired those leads.

Collections keeps calling me during work hours after I've told them not to . Does this fall into your category ?

Actually yes, but it's not necessarily the TCPA (could be, but I'd need more).

It sounds like it could fall under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, which prohibits a ton of debt collection practices. Damages aren't as big -- $1,000 max plus your attorney's fees -- but I do this work as well.

In particular, this part may be relevant:

15 USC 1692c(a)(1)

(a) Communication with the consumer generally

Without the prior consent of the consumer given directly to the debt collector or the express permission of a court of competent jurisdiction, a debt collector may not communicate with a consumer in connection with the collection of any debt—

(1) at any unusual time or place or a time or place known or which should be known to be inconvenient to the consumer. In the absence of knowledge of circumstances to the contrary, a debt collector shall assume that the convenient time for communicating with a consumer is after 8 o’clock antemeridian and before 9 o’clock postmeridian, local time at the consumer’s location;

This has happened multiple times , should I sign up for a consultation ?

With me? Just shoot me an email if you'd like. Or contact a local FDCPA attorney in your area.

At least three times a week, generally more, I get a call from a phone number with the same area code, same first three numbers, but a different last four numbers. When I have answered to tell them to stop calling it seems like the same company. I block the number, but the last four digits just keep changing. I have no idea who they are, or what they're even calling for. What do you do in situations like this?

What I do when I investigate these calls where they refuse is try and play dumb.

One of my common gotos if I get a call is "Oh I'm so glad you guys called back. Last time you told me to check out some website for more information but I completely forgot it and I was really hoping to sign up/buy/etc." It works a surprising amount of times. Lots of "goshes" and "gollys" thrown in for effect.

If you are on the "do not call" list and receive 2 or more calls, what happens from here? Is there anything to stop the receiver of the calls from taking no action until the number of calls reach 1000 so that they can collect much more money? I assume that once legal action is initiated, the unsolicited phone calls stop.

In theory, nothing says you have to sue right away. There's no duty to mitigate. That said, if you're plainly waiting until you accumulate a large number of calls, it doesn't play well in front of a judge or jury, and they may do what they can to make your case difficult.

I get that you need to make a living and your focus is on companies legitimate enough that they can at least be sued, but I am interested in fighting back against all scam artists who use email, telephone, etc, to cheat the vulnerable, and it is a hard thing to figure out how to do; do you have any advice?

The best bet for them is to report them to your State Attorney General and/or the FCC and/or the FTC. It's a shame that the system is set up so it's not economically viable to sue the worst actors, but I don't know that could be fixed.

I've had my same phone number for about 8 years now, but yet I continue to receive phone calls, almost daily or multiple times a day from various numbers asking for the same person, who is not me. Is there anything I can do about this to make it stop?

Tell them to stop, but if that hasn't worked, figure out who the most frequent violators are, and assuming those companies have made a lot of calls, go to a TCPA attorney and let them know the company name, number(s), estimated number of calls, and the situation.

I've been receiving calls from a company in Texas area codes which mentions I have an outstanding payday loan or something and that they're going to get a warrant issued for my arrest if I don't settle. I never took out the loan but they had an old (now closed, thank god) bank account number they referenced. Would this be a good case?

Are you able to determine what company it is? It sounds like a scam, but I've seen "legit" companies behave similarly.

Is it possible to do anything about the calls from a "Windows Tech"?

They love to say my computer is being hacked right now, even when I tell them the computer is off. At first, it was funny... Now, it just pisses me off. I repeatedly asked them to not call me again, but they just ignore anything you say. To call these people bastards would be an understatement.

From my research, these are scam outfits in India. I just don't know of any feasible way to go after them legally.

A few month back I got a new phone number, now every few days I get calls from different 800 numbers that are all automated sex line messages, I do not know how to speak with a human on the line and do not want to pay to speak to one do I have a case?

That could very well be a case, if you can identify the company(ies) calling.

Ok, next time they call ill listen. Now i do need to ask, if the previous owner of this number gave out the number will that hurt the (potential) case?

Consent can only be given by the current subscriber or customary user, not a previous subscriber.

If you Google the numbers you should be able to identify companies.

HOW CAN I MAKE THEM STOP!?

I am getting constant robo calls that pretend to be people asking to install GE security software. Eventually I decided to stay on and answer through the questions and was connected to a person. I asked for the name of the company they work for and it doesnt exist. WHAT ON EARTH CAN I DO TO MAKE THEM STOP?

Edit: All on cell phone, have a list of blocked numbers, and would be HAPPY to sue.

I get these too. They're nearly impossible to economically trace to the source, in my experience.

I work in a small business, and we get a call by a credit card processing company twice a day. i put our number on the do not call list, and it didn't stop them.

Are business land lines free game?

The DNC list only applies to business lines, as far as I know.

Good stuff. I get these calls from time to time (Your Health Insurance is APPROVED!) but never keep a log of them or jot anything down. The next time I get one, what information do I need to get from them that would be helpful to you?

Company name (and some corroboration of that name, such as a website, email address, or call back number).

Would this apply to spam emails perhaps?

Oh God, I wish. Not federally. I believe some states have email spam laws, but I am not well versed in those. California does I believe.

What are your thoughts on companies using devices to mask their true phone number?

If I get a call from a number like this, how do I report the scam or abuse?

I keep getting a call from "Microsoft Support" telling me my IP address is bad and I need to give them information. I know it's a scam because I don't have a home computer.

My thoughts? I wish technology/Congress/carriers would somehow come up with a way to unmask/prevent spoofing. But I don't know of any easy way.

The best bet for these calls is to block and/or ignore completely (don't press "1", don't yell at them). You can report to the FCC as well, but they're well aware of these guys.

In all likelihood, they're scammers based overseas.