Most folks know a robocall when they hear it. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act regulates calls utilizing artificial or pre-recorded voice, so many TCPA defendants try to argue that they didn't place calls using it. So what happens when the listener knows what they heard, but the telemarketer denies it? Such is the case of Suarez v. Portfolio Recovery Associates, 2025 WL 1191119 (April 8, 2025). Ms. Suarez believes the callers used artificial or pre-recorded voice hundred

If you fall behind on paying your debts, the people you owe have a certain amount of time to pursue it in court, or the debt becomes what is called time-barred, or past the statute of limitations. But if your debts include national banks and credit cards, this can become more complicated than just looking up the statute of limitations in just your state. The true statue of limitations that governs your situation can be one of the more complicated areas of the law as case Pazy

Telephone consumer protection act defendants typically don't have a lot of great defensive options. They made the calls or they didn't. They were selling selling something or they weren't. So many of their defense tactics are to harass the TCPA plaintiff, and one of those tactics is to demand unfettered access to the cell phone that received the calls for reasons. Can they just demand you hand over your smart phone so they can thumb through its emails and apps and call record

I don't always agree with judges' rulings, but many judges do strive to follow the law and will reverse themselves when they see they got the law wrong. Such is the case with the recent opinion issued in Dobronski v. SelectQuote 2025 WL 900439 (E.D. Mich February 28, 2025). At issue is 47 CFR § 64.1601(e) Any person or entity that engages in telemarketing, as defined in section 64.1200(f)(10) must transmit caller identification information. (1) For purposes of this paragraph,

I've written previously about Washington State's commercial electronic mail act (CEMA) prohibition on unwanted text messages, and recently a plaintiff used that law to bring claims against Capital One. Capital One had one of these obnoxious "refer a friend" programs where by a couple clicks and they would send a text to all the contacts in your phone promoting Capital one. If a contact signs up, you get a reward. But your contacts didn't ask for the text messages, Tamie Jense

Final expense insurance telemarketing calls are going crazy right now because they are very profitable for the sellers. Many people involved in the final expense insurance racket hire telemarketers to call Americans en masse, and if they get someone to answer the phone and not hang up, transfer the person through to some phone agent to sell a policy for a big company. The final expense insurance telemarketing industry loves the calls and the sales from the calls, but layers d

According to FRCP 33(a)(1): Unless otherwise stipulated or ordered by the court, a party may serve on any other party no more than 25 written interrogatories, including all discrete subparts. Suppose in a telemarketing lawsuit you sue the Seller, Telemarketer, and a corporate officer of both. Is that four parties and up to 25 interrogatories each? Maybe. Maybe not under the concept of the-words-don't-mean-what-they-say common interest doctrine. Like many things, it started in

What if there was a tool to get rid of an opponents arguments, claims, or defenses that you don't like? Did you know it can be done in specific circumstances, and it probably should be done in specific circumstances? Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(f) provides that the court “may strike from a pleading an insufficient defense or any redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous matter.” Ewing v. Freedom Forever, LLC, 23-CV-1240 JLS (AHG), 20 (S.D. Cal. Jan. 19, 2024).

There comes a time in every serial TCPA plaintiff's life that a desperate TCPA defendant's defense attorney has a novel thought - he read somewhere that 47 U.S. Code § 227(c) claims only apply to "residential phone lines", not businesses. And a lightbulb goes off - he'll argue that the plaintiff's sequential telephone consumer protection act claims mean the plaintiff is now in the business of filing TCPA lawsuits, ergo, the TCPA no longer applies to the TCPA plaintiffs reside

After a lawsuit is filed with the court, typically defendants can respond with an answer, or a motion to dismiss. Many defendants' knee jerk reaction will always be a motion to dismiss. It delays the case, which defendants typically like, maybe there is a pleading defect in the complaint, and if nothing else, many of them seem to believe and many defendants daydream that the TCPA plaintiff is a terrible person, the defendant did nothing wrong, and maybe a motion to dismiss th

How do you hold telemarketers accountable for do not call violations and calling with artificial or prerecorded voice? How do you pursue trebled damages or injunctive relief? You literally plead your case in your in your complaint. But it has to be done in a convincing way. Federal court operates on notice pleading. "Notice pleading" is a legal standard in civil litigation where a party only needs to provide the opposing party with a general explanation of their claim or defe

I don't recommend sending demand letters in lieu of a summons and complaint in TCPA litigation and I am here to do a deep dive on why. Although it seems much easier and cheaper to draft a demand letter versus file a lawsuit, filing a lawsuit can head off a big headache like played out in Mey v Pintas et al 5:2024-cv-00055 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia. While blowback from a demand letter is rare, this is the second instance I have obser

There is a long running $100 shopping rewards voucher / gift card / retail rebate scam out there. The people behind it claim they will send you some sort of card or voucher or certificate worth $100 and all they ask from you is $3.49 or similar small amount just for "shipping and handling". Lots of folks have experienced different parts of the elephant. https://archive.jsonline.com/newswatch/231052511.html https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXzVR376BTc https://www.consumerreport

In 2017 the ninth circuit said “the scope of a consumer's consent depends on the transactional context in which it is given. The call or text message must be based on the circumstance in which the consumer gave his or her number.” Van Patten v. Vertical Fitness Grp., LLC, 847 F.3d 1037, 1040 (9th Cir. 2017). Telemarketers want to treat consent like it is the measles, just being in the same room with it can infect you. Let's look at two recent cases of how tight consent really

You got unwanted telephone calls, you figured out who is behind it and sent a demand letter or even a telephone consumer protection act summons and complaint. They respond with some sort of "Certificate of Authenticity for Web Leads" / Trusted Form / Jornaya with a bunch of details about some request for calls, and even a "video", and they claim YOU did it. I've seen this a few times and here is what I do to analyze the situation. Usually these lead authenticity certificates

Our good friend Eric Troutman once professed that every time a Telephone Consumer Protection Act case gets dismissed, an angel gets its wings. Today he wrote an article about a TCPA pro-se plaintiff's lawsuit getting dismissed. "BACK TO BASICS: Court Dismisses Plaintiff’s TCPA Case Against Liberty Bankers On the Simplest Possible Grounds–But Its Lawyers Missed it" First, a bit about the lawsuit Gutman v. Liberty Bankers Insurance, 2025 WL 615128 (D. N.J. Feb. 26, 2025). In br

This is unsolicited review of a telephone consumer act pro-se plaintiff's complaint. I chose this complaint because it fits the theme of another recent blog post - are confirmation text messages actionable under the TCPA. First, the standard disclaimers. I practice in the ninth circuit and I will look at it through the lens of my practice area. The lawsuit itself is from New Jersey and perhaps a lawsuit might work there that won't work here, and vice versa. The lawsuit has a

One of the themes of this blog is playing defensive ball, and not letting the other side rack up easy points from unforced errors. So lets look at a fair debt collection practices act case that teaches pro-se plaintiffs in particular to stop self snitching, Scroggin v. Credit Bureau of Jonesboro, Inc., 973 F. Supp. 2d 961, 966 (E.D. Ark. 2013). If you are suing a telemarketer or debt collector, you probably don't like them. I would hazard to guess that many plaintiffs of all

I just wrote a different post on who bears the expense of responding to subpoenas, and someone pointed me to the story of a pro-se TCPA plaintiff hit with an eleven thousand and change sanction over some subpoenas he issued. This happened to an experienced telephone consumer protection act plaintiff Craig Cunningham in Cunningham v. Jordon, et al. Case No. 22-cv-01419, Doc. No. 80 (N.D. Ga. Feb. 21, 2025). This post isn't judging him, but to look at what happened to avoid a s

If you deal with enough scammers and telemarketers, you will run into witnesses who refuse to testify. The correct thing to do is use the power of the court to compel them to answer. Lets start with ninth circuit case Barnett v. Norman, 782 F.3d 417, 420 (9th Cir. 2015). Prisoner Barnett and two prison guards fought violently in his cell. Barnett says that the guards attacked him with a flashlight and a baton without provocation and followed up with pepper spray and more bato