The cost of investigating and enforcing federal rules against telemarketing abuse will soon be transferred from taxpayers to the telemarketing industry itself.
The federal government announced Sunday that it will move to transfercosts associated with the Do Not Call List (DNCL) to theindustryitself, CBC reported Monday.
Although the operation of the DNCL is already fully funded bytelemarketing companies, any costs associated with probing andenforcing the guidelines around it are still funded by the government.
New legislation introduced in the House of Commons last Thursday wouldallow the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission(CRTC) to recover those costsdirectly from the telemarketing industry.
There are about 10.6 million phone and fax numbers registered on theDNCL and the CRTC has meted out over $2.1 million in fines in the pastthree years to telemarketing firms that violated the rules.
Established in 2008, the DNCL allows consumers to register on the listif they want to cut down the amount of telemarketing calls theyreceive. A recent study by Acrobat Research and Advanis found that 78per cent of Canadians surveyed feel they’re now getting fewertelemarketing calls.