Thank you, and my answers… - Posted by Hal Roark
Posted by Hal Roark on July 01, 2003 at 17:42:48:
Tom,
You and rl have been kind enuf to provide your own answers; I should do the same.
Before I do, though, I want to thank you for the state’s link. Turns out my state does have a registry. Interesting. I’ll have to check that out some day.
Here are the answers to my own questions…
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Read the law. Thanks.
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Theoretically, any unsolicted calls from a business is telemarketing. Theoretically, it doesn’t matter if it’s Bob’s Pizza dialing for 1000 new customers a day or Joe Newbie making his first and only preforeclosure phone call. Theoretically, it doesn’t matter if one is selling (worse) or buying. Theoretically, one could characterize either buying or selling, in low or high volume, as “telemarketing.”
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There absolutely are degrees of telemarketing, in the real (and not theoretical) world. Joe foreclosure investing looking to buy a house that might be for sale is not the same thing as MCI pestering me at dinner to buy their long distance plan.
In fact, a few interesting questions are the following:
a) Would the foreclosing seller even recognize the call as a “telemarketing” attempt?
b) would he/she even know what to do about it if they construed it that way?
c) Even if A and B above were the case, are the chances of punishment all that great?
Interestingly, look at the consistent way the FTC even defines telemarketing again and again and again in it’s literature:
"What about telephone surveys?
A: If the call is really for the sole purpose of conducting a survey, it is not covered. Only telemarketing calls are covered ? that is, calls that solicit sales of goods or services. Callers purporting to take a survey, but also offering to sell goods or services, must comply with the National Do Not Call Registry."
Again later:
"The FTC’s Telemarketing Sales Rule requires certain disclosures and prohibits misrepresentations. It gives you the power to stop unwanted telemarketing calls and gives state law enforcement officers the authority to prosecute fraudulent telemarketers who operate across state lines.
The Rule covers most types of telemarketing calls to consumers, including calls to pitch goods, services, “sweepstakes,” and prize promotion and investment opportunities. It also applies to calls consumers make in response to postcards or other materials received in the mail.
Keep this information near your telephone. It can help you determine if youre talking with a legitimate telemarketer or a scam artist.
Its illegal for a telemarketer to call you if you’ve asked not to be called. If they call back, hang up and report them to your state Attorney General.
Calling times are restricted to the hours between 8 a.m. and 9 p.m.
Telemarketers must tell you it’s a sales call and who’s doing the selling before they make their pitch. If it’s a prize promotion, they must tell you that no purchase or payment is necessary to enter or win. If you’re asked to pay for a prize, hang up. Free is free.
It’s illegal for telemarketers to misrepresent any information, including facts about their goods or services, earnings potential, profitability, risk or liquidity of an investment, or the nature of a prize in a prize-promotion scheme.
Telemarketers must tell you the total cost of the products or services offered and any restrictions on getting or using them, or that a sale is final or non-refundable, before you pay. In a prize promotion, they must tell you the odds of winning, that no purchase or payment is necessary to win, and any restrictions or conditions of receiving the prize.
Its illegal for a telemarketer to withdraw money from your checking account without your express, verifiable authorization.
Telemarketers cannot lie to get you to pay, no matter what method of payment you use.
You do not have to pay for credit repair, recovery room, or advance-fee loan/credit services until these services have been delivered. (Credit repair companies claim that, for a fee, they can change or erase accurate negative information from your credit report. Only time can erase such information. Recovery room operators contact people who have lost money to a previous telemarketing scam and promise that, for a fee or donation to a specified charity, they will recover your lost money, or the product or prize never received from a telemarketer. Advance-fee loans are offered by companies who claim they can guarantee you a loan for a fee paid in advance. The fee may range from $100 to several hundred dollars.)
If you have the slightest doubt about a telephone offer, wait until you can get information in writing and check it out!"
When I read this, it’s very clear to me what kind of definition the FTC is using of “telemarketers”: businesses that use the phone as a means of soliciting customers to BUY their Product or service. This isn’t a ban against someone, even a business, calling me to buy something I have for sale.
Granted, one could still argue that me buying the house in foreclosure is telemarketing. I accept that theoretical possibility.
In my real world, though, I just don’t see that as a possibility at all. I mean, one in a billion.
And, let’s say the seller does report me, they make a complaint. HERE’S the best part: there is still no guarantee that anything is going to be done about it!
Let’s say something is. Let’s say my states attorney general decides to investigate.
He calls me and I fully disclose that I called as representative of my corp because I thouht he might want to sell his house (I wasn’t selling any product or service; I was looking to buy). I tell him that when the homeowner said don’t call again, I didn’t call again. Period.
Theoretically, the atty general could prosecute. Theoretically.
Are you kidding? In the real world, where, as Dan Kennedy likes to say, “parents eat their young”.
My atty general doesn’t have enuf money to prosecute the drug lords; I have NO FEAR he will chase me, even if it gets to this stage – and that’s awefully doubtful in the first place.
What that leads us to is…
- Where I place this on the risk continuum. I recognize that it is a real risk for phone users. In my opinion for my business, though, this risk is so theoretical and hypothetical as to be almost non-existent. I mean, one in a billion. And frankly, if I make a billion preforeclosure calls, I’m gonna make a lot of money. Paying a $10,000 fine will be chicken feed in comparison.
Thus, I place this risk way, way, way out to the right. In the land of over the fence and deep into the theoretical woods.
And I think that’s the real value of this thread, Tom. While this thread has given me new info and helped me realize a new, potential risk that could exist, I suspect the greater value for others is that this thread has shown how competent, thoughful investors can disagree on an issue.
It’s all about making an informed judgement, and proceding therefrom.
Not all opinions are equal. Informed opinions are better. Experienced, informed opinions are best.
Someone could argue that in my state, they don’t have to return security deposits. Ok; that’s their opinion. They are wrong; state law clearly says they do, and, when they don’t, they have to send a letter within 30 days of the end of the tenancy describing why some/all of deposit money was withheld and for what reasons… hey, that person can have any opinion they want, but mine is informed by state law and tempered by personal experience… informed, and experienced opinions, the best kind.
Hopefully, someone will read this in Kalamazoo and say, Hey, that’s interesting. 4 presumadly experienced investors had differing opinions on the same topic. Each is doing different things with their business as a result. Isn’t that interesting?
Interesting? Yes. Necessary? Even more so. For the whole thing about business is to cut a path to the fastest and most efficient way to earn profits. That means navigating big and little land mines. One man’s mole hill is another man’s mountain.
May we all, nonetheless, reach the promised land! Part of my path will still include dialing for dollars!
Cheers,
Hal
