The House of Representatives have been discussing a bill that would allow prerecorded voice messages to call mobile phones. This bill is called The Mobile Informational Call Act of 2011. This bill would change the Telephone Consumer Protection Act which was enacted in 1991. Currently, the TCPA does not allow companies to use automated dialing and prerecorded voice messages to call cell phones.
This new act is a bipartisan act, one supporter is Lee Terry. One argument for the act is that technology has changed in many different ways since the TCPA was enacted in 1991. This statement is true since many more people use wireless phones instead of land lines since 1991. Also cell phone customers are not typically charged by the minute like they were in 1991.
The argument against this bill would be that most mobile phone cutomers do not want telemarketers calling their wireless phones. What does the bill do to counteract this argument? The bill states that the person receiving the automated call must have given prior express consent. What does prior express consent mean? According to the bill it means the oral or written approval of a person. The bill also states that express consent is given if the call is regarding an already established business relationship or if the customer provided a telephone number as a means of contact when purchasing a product or service.
When reading this bill, I understood this as, if a customer orders a product and provided a phone number, regardless what type of phone it it, that customer could receive an automated call in the future. So the only way a consumer could make sure that they would not recieve an automated cal would be to not provide a phone number for means of contact.
Could this bill provide companies with more profits therefore stimulationg the economy? If businesses were able to place automated calls to wireless phones, they would be able to reach more potential customers. This could increase sales therefore causing the need for more products or services to be produced or provided. This would mean more jobs and increase in profits that could be taxed.
More people have been switching from landlines to mobile phones in the past few years. The question then becomes, has the TCPA been causing companies to lose profits, since companies cannot contact as many customers as they were able to in 1991? Could this bill help our economy?
This new act is a bipartisan act, one supporter is Lee Terry. One argument for the act is that technology has changed in many different ways since the TCPA was enacted in 1991. This statement is true since many more people use wireless phones instead of land lines since 1991. Also cell phone customers are not typically charged by the minute like they were in 1991.
The argument against this bill would be that most mobile phone cutomers do not want telemarketers calling their wireless phones. What does the bill do to counteract this argument? The bill states that the person receiving the automated call must have given prior express consent. What does prior express consent mean? According to the bill it means the oral or written approval of a person. The bill also states that express consent is given if the call is regarding an already established business relationship or if the customer provided a telephone number as a means of contact when purchasing a product or service.
When reading this bill, I understood this as, if a customer orders a product and provided a phone number, regardless what type of phone it it, that customer could receive an automated call in the future. So the only way a consumer could make sure that they would not recieve an automated cal would be to not provide a phone number for means of contact.
Could this bill provide companies with more profits therefore stimulationg the economy? If businesses were able to place automated calls to wireless phones, they would be able to reach more potential customers. This could increase sales therefore causing the need for more products or services to be produced or provided. This would mean more jobs and increase in profits that could be taxed.
More people have been switching from landlines to mobile phones in the past few years. The question then becomes, has the TCPA been causing companies to lose profits, since companies cannot contact as many customers as they were able to in 1991? Could this bill help our economy?
