Commission approval of Federal Register notice:

The Commission has approved the publication of Federal Register notice amending the Telemarketing Sales Rule to revise the fees charged for industry access to the National Do Not Call Registry. As detailed in the notice, the FTC has completed its solicitation of public comments on the proposed fee changes, which were announced in April 2006. Twelve comments were received and considered during this time. Under the new structure, the annual fee for each area code of data accessed will be $62, and the maximum amount charged to entities accessing 280 area codes or more will be $17,050. The rulemaking still allows telemarketers to obtain the first five area codes of data for free and allows those entities exempt from the Registry’s requirements to obtain access at no charge. The new fees will take effect on September 1, 2006.

Telemarketers are required to renew their subscriptions to the National Do Not Call Registry once a year, and must “scrub” their call lists once every 31 days. The Do Not Call Web site for telemarketers (telemarketing.donotcall.gov) will inform them when their subscription account numbers (SANs) expire and give them renewal instructions. To date, consumers have registered approximately 128.6 million telephone numbers on the Registry, which accepts home land line and personal cell phone numbers at www.donotcall.gov or 1-888-382-1222.

The Commission vote to approve the issuance of the Federal Register notice was 5-0. Copies of the notice are available now on the FTC’s Web site as a link to this press release. (FTC File No. P034305; the staff contact is John A. Krebs, Bureau of Consumer Protection, 202-326-3747.)

Copies of the documents mentioned in this release are available from the FTC’s Web site at http://www.ftc.gov and from the FTC’s Consumer Response Center, Room 130, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Washington, DC 20580. Call toll-free: 1-877-FTC-HELP.