Chapter
216
2003
-- S 0669 AS AMENDED
Enacted
07/15/03
AN ACT
RELATING TO BUSINESSES AND
PROFESSIONS - TELEPHONE SALES SOLICITATION ACT
Introduced By: Senator Michael J.
McCaffrey
Date Introduced:
February 13, 2003
It is enacted by the General
Assembly as follows:
SECTION
1. Section 5-61-3.5 of the General Laws in Chapter 5-61 entitled
"Telephone
Sales Solicitation Act" is
hereby amended to read as follows:
5-61-3.5.
Do not call lists. -- (a) No salesperson or telephonic seller shall
make or cause
to be made any unsolicited
telephonic sales calls to any residential, mobile or telephonic paging
device telephone number unless the
salesperson or telephonic seller has instituted procedures for
maintaining a list of persons who
do not wish to receive telephonic sales calls made by or on
behalf of that person, in
compliance with 47 CFR 64 or 16 CFR 310.
Additionally,
no person or entity conducting business in this state shall transmit or cause
to be transmitted a text message
advertisement to a cellular telephone or pager equipped with
short message capability or any similar
capability allowing the transmission of text messages. A
text message advertisement is a
message, the principal purpose of which is to promote the sale of
goods or services to the
recipient, consisting of advertising material for the lease, sale, rental, gift
offer, or disposition of realty,
goods, services, or extension of credit.
(i)
This section shall apply when a text message advertisement is transmitted to a
telephone number assigned for a
cellular telephone or pager service to a Rhode Island resident.
(ii)
This section shall not apply to text messages transmitted at the direction of a
person
or entity offering cellular
telephone or pager service if the subscriber is offered an option not to
receive those text messages.
(iii)
This section shall not apply to text messages transmitted by a business that
has an
existing relationship with the
subscriber if the subscriber is offered an option not to receive text
messages from that business.
(iv)
This section shall not apply to text messages transmitted by an affiliate of a
business
that has an existing
relationship with the subscriber, but only if the subscriber has provided
consent to the business with
which he or she has the relationship to receive text messages from
affiliates of that business.
“Affiliate” means any company that controls, is controlled by, or is
under the common control with,
another company.
(v)
This act shall not impose an obligation on a person or entity offering cellular
or pager
service to control the
transmission of a text message unless the message is transmitted at the
direction of that person or
entity.
(b)
Any person who violates any provision of this section is guilty of a
misdemeanor,
and upon conviction shall be
punished by a fine of not more than five hundred dollars ($500) per
violation.
SECTION 2. This act shall take effect upon
passage.
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LC02256
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