The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) rules implementing the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) explicitly state that “[n]o person or entity shall initiate any telephone solicitation to:… [a]ny residential telephone subscriber before the hour of 8 a.m. or after 9 p.m. (local time at the called party’s location)….” A telephone solicitation is of course a pitch to sell products or services.
Deluge of class action litigation – In recent years, a few plaintiff’s attorneys have seized on this “Quiet Hours” proscription to bring TCPA class actions, alleging violations even where consent might have been given to receive telemarketing calls. Faced with this deluge of litigation, in March of 2025 the ECommerce Innovation Alliance and others petitioned the FCC to clarify that individuals who provide the requisite consent “cannot claim damages under the TCPA for messages received outside the hours of 8 a.m. to 9 p.m.” The FCC has yet to act on this petition. Many of the cases have
