Comments for 3 Steps To Sue Telemarketers And Win

3 Steps To Sue Telemarketers And Win

2007-02-14T20:42:57Z

Andr -Tascha Lamm has successfully sued telemarketers in small claims court and wants to share his secrets with you. For only $195 in filing costs so far, he's received $6160.00.

The 3 basic steps are:

1. Log the calls
2. Know and follow the local Small Claims Court rules
3. Prepare Your Case and Be Ready for Court

He goes into much more detail on his site about what each of these entail. Check it out.

Here's a list of local small claims court info.

Inside, we uploaded a sample form you can keep a couple of copies of by your phone for taking notes. — BEN POPKEN

Kill The Calls [via Consumerism Commentary]

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Click to enlarge

Comment from MikeWas on 2007-02-17

2007-02-17T09:53:49Z

"you are legally required to have a local agent"

Most states have a fail-safe to deal with this exact problem. Two of the states I have lived in allow for a plaintiff to accomplish service on an out-of-state defendant by sending a copy to the Secretary of State, and that's it.

YMMV.

Comment from poornotignorant on 2007-02-16

2007-02-17T01:48:03Z

I don't get telemarketers. Do they know I'm poor or is it because I screen all calls with my $10 answering machine(bought for $1.50 at a thriftshop)?

Comment from TechnoDestructo on 2007-02-15

2007-02-15T12:59:52Z

Yes, thousands of dollars. That is what the law allows. The law was enacted because millions of people were sick to death of this shit, and wanted some STRONG incentive for telemarketers to behave themselves.

Comment from Nygdan on 2007-02-15

2007-02-15T08:24:52Z

I don't understand, he's suing them for thousands of dollars because they called him after he asked them not too?

Thousands of dollars?

Comment from Starfury on 2007-02-14

2007-02-15T02:57:30Z

I do helldesk support which means I'm on the phone a lot at work. At home I'll either ignore the phone or let one of the kids get it. If it is a telemarketer I'll usually just hang up. A few times I've given the phone to the kids, told them the person was dead, that I was robbing the place, or put the phone down by the PC speakers and continue playing a game. I'm sure the sound of machine gun fire was fun to listen to.

Comment from Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!) on 2007-02-14

2007-02-15T00:54:17Z

aaaaaaand I just e-mailed with the site creator and he's fixing the attorney stuff.

Comment from Eyebrows McGee (now with more baby!) on 2007-02-14

2007-02-15T00:53:16Z

There's a serious and repeated error on his site -- in many states (I would GUESS most states), attorneys ARE allowed in small claims court. I just quickly checked the five largest states by population, and Texas, Florida, Illinois, and New York all allow attorneys in small claims; only California doesn't.

And even if you're in a "no attorneys in small claims" state, when you sue a corporation, you may end up facing a corporate attorney in small claims, which could be a nasty surprise.

@Spanky: It's possible they were just "hiding" their local agent. I've had this problem with a few corporations that figure the best way to stave off lawsuits is to illegally refuse to give you their information so you can't serve them. My favorite was a company that finally gave me the "correct legal name" and address of the corporation, and then moved for dismissal on the basis that I had sued the corporation under the wrong name -- the one they gave me, of course! (The judge was unimpressed.) So sleazy.

I would report them to the state Attorney General, though, if they have no local agent and you can't serve them. That'll theoretically bring down a world of hurt on them.

Comment from spanky on 2007-02-14

2007-02-15T00:20:35Z

I tried this several years ago with a really flagrant violator, but after carefully logging and recording all the calls, researching and locating the company involved (some shady operation out of Florida, natch), and getting everything else in order, I ran into a big brick wall. Apparently, in order to sue in small claims court, you have to serve someone here. In order to do business here locally, you are legally required to have a local agent. (An agent of record? Something like that.)

These guys didn't, though, so I wasn't able to sue them in small claims. I would have either had to go to civil court, or to Florida. Scary places, both.

This was a long time ago, so I hope I'm not misstating or misremembering anything. If I am, though, some mean lawyer will come and lay some smackdowns on me for it.

Comment from homerjay on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T22:36:23Z

Medalian1- everything I've found online (FCC and FTC websites) specify "telemarketers." How do we know market researchers fall under that catagory?

Comment from trixare4kids on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T22:33:23Z

That's all well and good -- but as for me - I get telemarketing calls that are obviously coming from overseas AND with spoofed caller ID numbers.

I can ask 10000 times to be taken off the list, they just either hang up on me or say yes and then call again anyway.

Comment from medalian1 on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T22:06:43Z

You can sue market research.

Comment from homerjay on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T21:38:58Z

Okay, I've been trying to figure this out for a while now. Hawkins says you can't sue charities (or more importantly in my opinion, pollsters and market researchers).

Are they required to keep their own DNC list? If they are, what recourse do you have if they don't stick to it?

Comment from permissionmag on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T21:28:15Z

Unfortunately, many telemarketers are exempt from Do No Call lists.

Not surprisingly, politicians are on the top of the exemption list. Also exempt are non-profits, especially the Police Athletic Leagues and Fraternal Unions that seem to love calling at dinner.

Comment from Hawkins on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T21:26:36Z

Keep in mind that this doesn't work on charities, or charitable-ish fund-raisers. You can ask them to put you on their Never Never Ever Call Me list, and that usually works... but I don't think you can sue 'em.

Comment from dohtem on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T21:23:33Z

Bookmarked. I gotta try this.

Comment from William Mize on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T21:14:08Z

And you can also sue junk fax senders.

An oldie but a goodie about a Librarian who did just that.

Comment from medalian1 on 2007-02-14

2007-02-14T21:09:31Z

Who still gets telemarketing calls? Since I've been on VOIP I've had 0 ... which has been a couple of years now.