Can you sue telemarketers for unwanted calls initiated to your child's phone?

These days most minor children have a cell phone, and where there is a cell phone, there is a telemarketer looking to call it. Can parents sue telemarketers for unwanted calls initiated to their child's cell phone?

Telemarketers want to say no, and telemarketers have tried a variety of arguments to kill these TCPA lawsuits.

Ninth circuit case Hall v. Smosh Dot Com, 72 F.4th 983, 985 (9th Cir. 2023) settled several of them.

In Hall, a parent purchased a phone/phone number for her thirteen year old son to use "at times" and she placed the phone number on the FTC's NDNC registry. The defendants started texting it and the Hall sued under the TCPA 47 U.S.C. § 227(c).

The defendants moved to dismiss, claiming the boy's mother did not have standing to sue.

Defendants argue Plaintiff does not have standing because she did not plead she was the actual user of the phone number to which Defendants sent the text messages nor the actual recipient of those messages.

The district court judge liked the argument that as mom was not the customary user of the phone, she didn't have standing. Mom appealed, and the ninth circuit held:

We now hold that the owner and subscriber of a phone with a number listed on the Do-Not-Call Registry has suffered an injury in fact when unsolicited telemarketing calls or texts are sent to the number in putative violation of the TCPA.

This ruling implies two further conclusions that both head off further defense arguments. Argument #1 is that a plaintiff can only be the subscriber of one residential number. Hall says that result is illogical - the Hall plaintiff certainly had a cell phone number of her own. It would be silly for a court to tell Elon Musk (father of twelve and counting by three different mothers) that his entire clan can only have one residential phone line.

A second illogical conclusion is that the minor child must have exclusive access to the phone. The Hall court acknowledged that the 13 year old only had access to the phone "at times" and still found the mother had standing.

Would you like a free case review? Do you have a question or a telemarketing, debt collection, or bankruptcy case that would make a great blog article? We might even review your pro-se complaint or motion in a blog post. Email peter@nwdebtresolution.com and/or nathen@nwdebtresolution.com and we may answer it for everyone!

Are telemarketers harassing you in Washington, Oregon, or Montana? My Washington State TCPA plaintiff law practice can help, just give us a call at 206-800-6000 or email peter@nwdebtresolution.com.

The thoughts, opinions and musings of this blog are those of Peter Schneider, a consumer advocate and Washington State plaintiff's TCPA attorney at Northwest Debt Resolution, LLC. They are just that, his thoughts, opinions and musings and should be treated as such. They are not legal advice. If you are looking to file a lawsuit for TCPA violations and unwanted calls please contact me for a consultation.

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