National Do Not Call Registry

The National Do Not Call Registry is the federal list of telephone numbers whose owners have asked not to receive telemarketing calls. A number appearing on it does not settle whether a call is allowed. The same rules that create the Registry create exceptions to it, and the working question for a lending team dialling purchased leads is which exception the call rests on and what evidences it.

What the Registry prohibits

The National Do Not Call Registry is maintained by the Federal Trade Commission. Under 16 CFR 310.4(b)(1)(iii)(B), a seller or telemarketer may not initiate an outbound telephone call to induce the purchase of goods or services to a number on that list. The rule is drafted as a ban with named exceptions, so a call is unlawful unless an exception applies.

Two related duties sit beside it. A separate prohibition at 16 CFR 310.4(b)(1)(iii)(A) covers a person who told this particular seller directly not to call, which is a different list and no national scrub reveals it. And 16 CFR 310.4(b)(3)(iv) requires the version of the registry relied on to have been obtained from the Commission no more than 31 days before the call was made.

The written agreement exception

Consent is the first route out of the prohibition. 16 CFR 310.4(b)(1)(iii)(B)(1) requires the seller to demonstrate express agreement in writing from the person called, and the regulation says what that writing must show: authorization for calls made by or on behalf of a specific party, the telephone number calls may be placed to, and the person's signature.

Each of those three elements does work. A writing that authorizes calls generally, without naming the party doing the calling, is not the agreement the rule describes. The seller carries the burden of demonstrating the agreement, so an exception nobody can produce later is not an exception.

How the business relationship clock is measured

A prior dealing is the second route. 16 CFR 310.2 defines an established business relationship as a purchase, rental, lease or financial transaction within the 540 days before the call, or an inquiry or application about the seller's goods or services within the 90 days before it. The clock runs from the consumer's own act, not from when a record changed hands.

Those are the FTC's figures. The FCC counts the same two events over different periods, and the exemption is narrower than its name suggests: it lifts the Registry prohibition and nothing else. Both points, and the ways the relationship ends before the clock does, are in established business relationship.

The relationship exception also carries a condition inside it. Under 16 CFR 310.4(b)(1)(iii)(B)(2) it holds only where the person has not stated that they do not wish to receive outbound telephone calls, so a stop request from the consumer ends the exception regardless of how recent the transaction was.

Source: FTC Telemarketing Sales Rule, 16 CFR 310.4(b)(1)(iii)(A), 16 CFR 310.4(b)(1)(iii)(B) with its clauses (1) and (2), and 16 CFR 310.4(b)(3)(iv) · definition of established business relationship at 16 CFR 310.2 · regulation text read 20 September 2026.

Why two sets of federal rules apply

The Federal Trade Commission enforces the Telemarketing Sales Rule at 16 CFR 310. The Federal Communications Commission enforces separate rules at 47 CFR 64.1200, written under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. Both reach the same call. The FCC keeps consent and the business relationship inside the definition of telephone solicitation at 47 CFR 64.1200(f), so an exempt call is not a solicitation at all.

The windows differ slightly between the two. The FCC counts 18 months from a purchase or transaction and three months from an inquiry or application, where the FTC counts 540 days and 90 days. They are close, they are not the same sentence, and when both rules reach a call the shorter window is the one that binds. 47 CFR 64.1200(e) extends the FCC restrictions to wireless numbers.

Which exemption a purchased lead is resting on

A purchased lead can be on the Registry, and that alone decides nothing. What decides it is which exemption the call rests on and whether the caller can produce the evidence for it. Consent travels with the record only if the writing itself authorizes calls by or on behalf of the party now dialling. An inquiry made to one company is not an established business relationship with another.

Liability for a telemarketing call sits with the party that places it and with the seller it is placed on behalf of. Buying a record does not transfer that to the vendor. Which of the two exceptions a given campaign is relying on, and what document proves it, is a question worth answering before the dialler runs rather than after a complaint. Nothing here is legal advice on any particular call.

One figure a buyer would want is absent on purpose. No federal dataset reports what share of purchased mortgage leads carry a number on the Registry, because the overlap between the national list and a private lead file is not something either agency publishes. The commonly repeated percentages for it trace to vendor marketing rather than to a study, so none is printed here.

Source: FCC rules implementing the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, 47 CFR 64.1200(c)(2) and 47 CFR 64.1200(e), and the definitions of established business relationship and telephone solicitation at 47 CFR 64.1200(f) · FTC Telemarketing Sales Rule, 16 CFR 310.2 and 16 CFR 310.4(b)(1)(iii)(B) · regulation text read 20 September 2026.