The first 72 hours
A TCPA demand letter arrived this morning. Here is the next three days, hour by hour.
Most of what goes wrong after a demand letter under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act goes wrong in the first week, and most of it is avoidable. This page is the order of operations. Each entry links to the article that explains it.
Read it once, slowly, and find three things.
The dollar figure, the deadline, and the name of the sender. Everything else can wait ten minutes. Do not call the number on the letter yet and do not throw it away.
What each section meansDecide whether it is real, on evidence, not on how it made you feel.
A genuine demand lists specific calls or texts with dates and numbers, cites 47 U.S.C. § 227, and comes from a sender you can find in a state registry. A scam has none of that and wants payment by a method you cannot reverse.
Is it realLook the sender up before you speak to them.
State corporate registry, the domain typed by hand, PACER for any filed cases, a bar directory if a lawyer signed it. Twenty minutes, all free, and it changes the tone of every conversation that follows.
Who sent itBefore you call anyone, do four things that cost nothing.
Write the deadline down. Suppress every number in the letter in every system you and your vendors use. Tell staff not to delete anything. Pull the call and text logs for the dates listed. Then, and only then, think about who to call.
Before you call anyoneWork out which deadline is real.
The date on the letter is the sender’s deadline for a reply. The federal limitation period is four years. Both matter, for different reasons. If you need more time, ask for it in writing before the date passes.
The deadlineMatch every listed call against your own logs and find out who made it.
Your staff, a call centre, a lead generator, an SMS platform. The answer does not remove liability, since a business is liable for calls made on its behalf, but it tells you what records exist and what a vendor contract covers.
The mistakes that make it worseHave the first conversation with a lawyer with your records in hand.
Bring the letter, the logs, the consent records, the vendor contracts and your insurance policies. Ask about demand-stage experience, cost per stage, and which listed items the evidence can remove. Decide on a path before the deadline and reply in writing.
The first conversation with a lawyerIn this edition
- Is this TCPA demand letter real?
- The anatomy of a TCPA demand letter: what each section means
- Is the deadline in a TCPA demand letter real? And what happens when it passes
- Who sent this letter? How to check the sender in twenty minutes
- Before you call anyone about the letter, do these four things
- The first conversation with a lawyer: what to bring and what to ask
- Six mistakes businesses make in the first week after a TCPA demand letter
The numbers the letter relies on
- $500 per call or text, 47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(3) and § 227(c)(5)
- Up to $1,500 per violation if willful or knowing
- The same again under Fla. Stat. § 501.059 for Florida recipients
- Four years to file, 28 U.S.C. § 1658(a)
- Calls allowed 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. in the called party's local time