By Staff
WASHINGTON -- Cass County's congressman, U.S. Rep. Fred Upton, Monday joined President George W. Bush in the White House Roosevelt Room for the signing into law of his bipartisan legislation providing the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) full authority to implement its do-not-call registry.
The House overwhelmingly passed the legislation, H.R. 3161, on Thursday by a vote of 412-8.
The bill came on the heels of last Wednesday's federal district court decision invalidating the do-not-call list for which 50 million people have already signed up.
Upton co-authored H.R. 3161 with Reps. Billy Tauzin, R-La., John Dingell, D-Mich., and Ed Markey, D-Mass.
Shortly following Wednesday's ruling the four members of Congress came together to draft the bill and to provide unequivocal authority to the FTC to implement the no-call list.
The Senate passed similar legislation Thursday evening as well.
Nearly half of America (50.6 million numbers have been registered with 104 million households having phones) has signed onto the list since the FTC began signing people up to the registry in June.
Michigan recently enacted a law that will adopt the National Do Not Call REgistry as the state do-not-call list.
As a result, Michigan consumers will be able to register once, with the national registry, to have the protections of both federal and state law.
Under the FTC's registry, consumers will be able to enroll in the free service using the Internet or toll-free number.
Telemarketers would be required to check the list every three months to find out who does not want to be called, and those marketers who call consumers on the registry could be fined up to $11,000 for each violation.
Federal enforcement of the National Do Not Call Registry is scheduled to begin Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2003.
All consumers whose numbers were on the registry by Aug. 31, 2003, will notice a downturn in telemarketing calls starting Oct. 1. Consumers who registered after Sept. 1 will notice a drop in telemarketing calls within three months of the date they registered.
H.R. 395, the "Do-Not-Call Implementation Act," the measure that created the no-call registry passed the House by a vote of 418-7 on Feb. 12.