In BC, licensed telemarketers are required to follow certain rules about when and how they can call you. Here are a few of those rules.
5 rules about telemarketing calls
- A telemarketer can’t call you on a weekday before 9:00 am or after 9:30 pm (your local time).
- A telemarketer can’t call you more than once in a 30-day period about the same offer.
- A telemarketer can’t call you from a blocked number.
- A political party or a savings institution that is calling you doesn’t need a licence.
- If a third party is calling you on behalf of a charity, they need a licence.
The law in BC
If a company contacts you to sell goods or services and they are taking payment over the phone, they most likely need to be licensed with us. Our telemarketing consumer help page sets out who needs to be licensed and when they are allowed to call you.
Where to go for more help
We can only help in situations when a telemarketer is calling you outside of the legal calling times. Our authority applies to licensed telemarketers in BC. Check if a telemarketer is licensed through our website.
To stop calls from legitimate telemarketers, you can register your number with the National Do Not Call List. Please keep in mind this won’t stop scam calls. If you get a scam call, report it to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.
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Watch out for charity scams
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The Do Not Call List
Tips about telemarketing in BC
About Consumer Protection BC
We are responsible for regulating specific sectors and certain consumer transactions in British Columbia. If your concern is captured under the laws we enforce, we will use the tools at our disposal to assist you. If we can’t help you directly, we will be happy to provide you with as much information as possible. Depending on your concern, another organization may be the one to speak to; at other times, court or legal assistance may be the best option. Explore our website at www.consumerprotectionbc.ca.
As well meaning as I’m sure you are, there doesn’t appear to be any real teeth in you rules or authority. Far more needs to be done more seriously. Telemarketers seem to be laughing at you.
Hi Doug, sorry to hear you feel this way. The telemarketing laws we oversee only apply to licensed telemarketers. If telemarketers are operating illegally without a licence, they are likely scammers or have no intention of following the rules to begin with. Issues like that are handled by the police/Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre. Legitimate telemarketers have to follow the rules we oversee and we have the authority to enforce those laws. You can learn more about what we do by exploring our About Us page on our website.
I was constantly getting calls at 5:30 am 6 am from the same telemarketer. I cancelled my landline that morning. Maybe tell the telemarketers these rules
Hi Marge, thanks for your comment. The rules we oversee apply to telemarketers in BC. If you’re being contacted by Telemarketers from outside BC, the CRTC has some good tips for other ways you can deal with them: https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/phone/telemarketing/ . I hope this helps.
Thank you very much for the information, it helped me a lot.
Scam calls, are far more invasive and annoying,
If they come on my cell, I immediately block the number. That doesn’t help, they call again from a different number, repeatedly.
And the same scammer calls several times a day.
I can’t block numbers on my land line.
Hi Carol, it is annoying to receive unwanted calls for sure. The Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has a page that outlines steps to take to reduce unwanted calls. You can visit their website here. I hope you find their information useful!
some of the cordless phones sold at the bigger electronics stores (Walmart, Best Buy, London Drugs, Amazon, etc.) have an internal call block function that builds a list to which you can easily add numbers you want to block (Panasonic is usually quite decent and up to date with Bluetooth functionality)