WASHINGTON—Ahead of this week’s House Energy and Commerce Committee markup that includes the Stopping Bad Robocalls Act (H.R.3375), both CUNA and NAFCU sent letters to the committee stating support for legislation that would target illegal robocalls.
NAFCU's Brad Thaler urged the committee to "tailor the bill appropriately to target illegal robocalls, while ensuring consumers still receive wanted, time-sensitive information from their credit unions."
NAFCU has met with several members of the committee's staff on this issue.
Autodialer Regulations
Thaler, NAFCU's vice president of legislative affairs, also reiterated NAFCU’s support for the bill’s provision requiring the FCC to issue regulations on the definition of “autodialer” within six months of enactment.
NAFCU said it continues to share its concerns related to the definition of an autodialer and the need for clarity under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) to ensure credit unions can contact their members without fear of frivolous litigation. The association also noted it has also actively worked with the FCC on efforts to modernize the TCPA for more than three years
Thaler shared the association's support of the committee's efforts to protect consumers from unlawful robocalls and provide the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) with "reasonable benchmarks to continue its work to prevent and eliminate illegal robocalls and target the bad actors responsible for defrauding consumers."
"With respect to the issue of the FCC's reassigned numbers database, NAFCU supports a comprehensive safe harbor from liability for callers using the database that accidently place a call to a reassigned number," Thaler also noted. "As such, NAFCU is concerned that the bill's more narrow safe harbor provision could present a risk to credit unions' ability to make legitimate communications to their members."
CUNA’s Feedback
In its letter CUNA said it supports the addition of language to address erroneous call-blocking by the Federal Communications Commission.
“We appreciate the bipartisan effort that produced H.R. 3375 and support the inclusion of language regarding notice and a complaint mechanism for opt-in, white-list call blocking, redress for erroneous call-blocking by the Federal Communications Commission, and cost protection for callers using the notice and complaint process for call-blocking services,” wrote CUNA President/CEO Jim Nussle.
The FCC in June voted to approve a default call-blocking order that would allow default call-blocking of robocalls for consumers, leading to CUNA concerns that credit unions could be unable to contact members with timely information, the trade association said.