Telemarketers adapt to new law
By Joe Ruff
Associated Press
OMAHA, Neb. — In the months before the national do-not-call list went into effect, Stuart Discount laid off more than 150 workers at his telemarketing company. Now, however, the company is back to full strength.
"We've done a good job of rehiring," said Discount, president of Tele-Response Center Inc., which employs more than 500 people at its Philadelphia headquarters and two call centers in West Virginia.
The telemarketing industry appears to have similarly weathered the creation of the list, which more than 63 million Americans have signed up for. A year after it went into effect, fears of massive layoffs and failures among telemarketing companies haven't been borne out.
The list seems to be here to stay. The U.S. Supreme Court last week declined to consider the American Teleservices Association's challenge of the law. The association argued the list violated the right to free speech.
Many consumers do appreciate the list. Once their phone numbers are on it, telemarketers in most instances are barred from calling them.
"I'm on the list and I love it," said Ann Perl, of Omaha. "I signed up in March or April and my calls went down in three weeks."
People can register numbers on the list or file complaints at www.donotcall.gov or by calling (888) 382-1222.
Businesses that break the law face fines of up to $11,000 for each violation. So far, the Federal Trade Commission, which oversees the registry, has received more than 500,000 complaints against companies and is seeking legal action against four.
People still can receive calls from nonprofit groups, politicians and companies they recently have done business with.
Discount said his company has adjusted to the do-not-call list by shifting toward fund raising for nonprofit groups and business-to-business sales pitches.
But some industry executives say telemarketers still face hard times. Tim Searcy, the American Teleservices Association's chief executive, said he's standing by his prediction that some 2 million of the industry's 6.5 million jobs would be lost because of do-not-call legislation, including managers and other support personnel.
However, a recent study by London-based market analysis firm Datamonitor estimates the do-not-call list will play a relatively small role in telemarketing layoffs when compared with technology advances and the outsourcing of jobs to countries with lower labor costs.
"I don't think that's a very accurate figure," said Datamonitor's Mark Best of the teleservices association's estimate. "We think that's inflated."
Estimating that there are about 4.3 million telemarketing jobs in 50,600 call centers of 10 workers or more, Datamonitor concluded that some 7,500 to 15,000 jobs could be lost by 2008 because of the do-not-call list. About 200,000 telemarketing jobs could be lost by 2008, Best said.
Firms like Discount's are working harder at emphasizing different kinds of telemarketing, for example, taking on more customer service work, in which the call centers receive calls instead of making them. Telemarketers also are carefully targeting outbound calls to recent customers of companies, Best said.
"'Do not call' has definitely had an effect," Best said, but "less of an effect than the industry had forecasted."
Some companies have fared better than others, said Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., one of eight members of the House of Representatives who voted against the legislation in 2003.
Terry said that he initially had worried about the big players and massive job cuts. Omaha is home to about 40 telemarketing businesses that employ some 39,000 people. Terry said he has heard more recently from people who worked in smaller businesses who have been laid off because of do-not-call.
Influent Inc., a telemarketer that employs 1,500 people, said it hasn't had to lay off any employees because of the list said it has given the company another layer of regulations to deal with.
