Complaint Seeks Robocall Enforcement Against Insurance Companies
The FCC should go after insurance companies that buy sales leads from robocallers and users of spoofed numbers, said communications attorney Arthur Belendiuk, of Smithwick and Belendiuk, in a complaint filed on his own behalf Monday in docket 20-195. “Starting as early as 8 a.m. and continuing into the evening hours, Complainant is barraged with a steady stream of unwanted telephone calls on both his mobile telephone and office telephone number, seven days a week,” said Belendiuk. The FCC “has the statutory authority to eliminate this scourge on American consumers,” said the complaint, comparing robocalls to “a plague of locusts” and calling for a forfeiture of $500 million for each company involved.
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The complaint targets Premier Producers Group, a telemarketing company that sells life insurance policies and teams with multiple insurance companies, including Prosperity Life Insurance, Liberty Bankers Life Insurance and American Amicable Life Insurance Company of Texas. “Beyond a doubt these companies make their living by harassing millions of Americans with an endless barrage of spoofed telephone calls,” said Belendiuk in the complaint. Neither PPG nor any of the insurance companies named in the complaint responded to requests for comment. Belendiuk, an attorney who frequently represents clients before the FCC’s administrative law judge, previously sought FCC intervention against radio stations broadcasting Russia-sponsored news channel Radio Sputnik (see 2204070002). The FCC, US Telecom and CCIA also didn’t comment.
PPG said its service is based in Indiana and is “opt-in” and TCPA compliant, but Belendiuk said he never opted in, and observed numerous calls from PPG that are spoofed. “If these calls are TCPA compliant and only people who opt-in are called, why is there a need for spoofed robocalls and repeated calls after PPG has been told that Complainant has no interest in purchasing insurance?” said the complaint.
The FCC should pursue the insurance company partners of PPG because they're more substantial targets -- “brick and mortar enterprises with assets,” said the complaint. The companies “are not ignorant of the methods PPG uses to sell insurance to senior citizens on fixed incomes, and they should be held liable for the actions of their trusted marketing partner.” The Enforcement Bureau should issue a letter of inquiry and subpoena PPG’s records and contracts with the insurance company partners, the complaint said. If PPG and its insurance partners are found to have violated FCC rules and laws against robocalling and spoofing, the agency should issue an order "to provide written notice to all voice service providers about suspected illegal calls and require them to take immediate steps to effectively mitigate suspected illegal robocall traffic made by or on behalf of PPG," said the complaint. "Surely, American Home Life and the other named insurance company partners know the means used to generate the greater majority of their revenues,” Belendiuk said.