You can stop most telemarketing calls by adding your number to the National Do Not Call Registry, a free federal list maintained by the Federal Trade Commission. Registration takes a couple of minutes, covers landlines and cell phones, and never expires. Sales calls from legitimate companies should stop within 31 days, and if they don’t, you can file a complaint or sue.
How to Sign Up
There are two ways to register, both free.1Federal Trade Commission. National Do Not Call Registry
- Online at DoNotCall.gov. Enter your ten-digit phone number with no dashes or spaces and a working email address. The system emails a verification link that you must click within 72 hours, or the registration is thrown out. If you’re registering more than one number, each gets its own email and each link has to be clicked separately.2Federal Trade Commission. National Do Not Call Registry FAQs
- By phone at 1-888-382-1222 (TTY: 1-866-290-4236). Call from the phone you want to register. There’s no email step this way.2Federal Trade Commission. National Do Not Call Registry FAQs
When Calls Should Stop
Your number appears on the registry the day after you sign up, but sales calls can take up to 31 days to actually stop. Companies need that window to download the updated list and clean it against their own calling databases.2Federal Trade Commission. National Do Not Call Registry FAQs
Once your number is on the list, it stays there. You don’t need to re-register, ever. The only way a number comes off is if the line gets disconnected and reassigned to a new person, or if you ask to remove it yourself.3Federal Trade Commission. Do Not Call Registrations Don’t Expire
What the Registry Won’t Stop
The registry is a list, not a filter. It tells law-abiding telemarketers whom to skip. It doesn’t physically block anything. Scammers running illegal robocall operations aren’t consulting a federal list before dialing, and internet calling has made it cheap to spray calls from anywhere in the world. Expect some illegal calls to keep coming even after your number is registered.2Federal Trade Commission. National Do Not Call Registry FAQs
When a call looks suspicious, let it go to voicemail. Real callers leave messages. Most scammers don’t.
Calls That Are Still Legal
Several types of calls fall outside the definition of telemarketing, so they can reach a registered number without breaking any rules:
- Political calls, including campaign outreach and polling.
- Charities calling on their own behalf. A for-profit fundraiser hired by a charity does have to follow registry rules.
- Pure surveys and research calls with no sales pitch attached.
- Informational calls like appointment reminders, flight changes, and fraud alerts.4Federal Trade Commission. Q&A for Telemarketers and Sellers About DNC Provisions in TSR
Companies You’ve Done Business With
A company you’ve bought from, paid, or received a delivery from can keep calling you for 18 months after that last transaction. If you only inquired or applied without buying, they get 3 months from your inquiry.4Federal Trade Commission. Q&A for Telemarketers and Sellers About DNC Provisions in TSR After that, your registry status applies to them like anyone else. And you can always tell a specific company to stop calling you directly, regardless of any prior relationship. That request has to be honored immediately, and the company must keep your number on its internal do-not-call list for five years.5eCFR. 47 CFR 64.1200 – Delivery Restrictions They can’t charge you, run you through a pitch first, or forward you to another number to make the request.6eCFR. 16 CFR Part 310 – Telemarketing Sales Rule
Written Consent You’ve Given
If you gave a company written permission to call or text you with marketing, that consent overrides the registry. Under the FCC’s one-to-one consent rule, effective January 27, 2025, your permission only covers the specific company you named. A single form on a comparison-shopping site can no longer be used to hand your number off to dozens of sellers at once. Each company needs its own separate consent, and the calls that follow have to relate to what you were looking at when you agreed.7Federal Communications Commission. One-to-One Consent Rule for TCPA Prior Express Written Consent Frequently Asked Questions
If Sales Calls Keep Coming
Once your number has been registered for at least 31 days, you can report unwanted sales calls at DoNotCall.gov/report. The form asks what the call was about, the number that called you if you have it, and the company or product involved.8Federal Trade Commission. Report Unwanted Sales Calls – National Do Not Call Registry These reports feed the FTC’s enforcement database, and repeat offenders can face civil penalties.
Suing Under the TCPA
You can also sue on your own. Under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, if the same company calls you illegally more than once in a 12-month period, you can bring a case in state court for up to $500 per call. If a judge finds the violation was willful or knowing, that award can be tripled to $1,500 per call.9Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 47 US Code 227 – Restrictions on Use of Telephone Equipment Two calls a week for two months from one company can add up to more than $20,000 for a single consumer.
Companies have one meaningful defense. If they can show they set up and followed reasonable procedures to avoid calling registered numbers, including regularly scrubbing their lists, a court may accept that as an affirmative defense.9Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 47 US Code 227 – Restrictions on Use of Telephone Equipment A business that scrubs the registry and misses a newly added number sits in a different spot from one that never bothered.
Taking Your Number Off the List
If you change your mind, call 1-888-382-1222 from the phone you want removed. The number comes off the next day. Telemarketers have up to 31 days to update their own copies of the list, so calls may not pick up immediately.2Federal Trade Commission. National Do Not Call Registry FAQs