How to Charge Telemarketers for Calling You: Damages Per Call

You can charge telemarketers for calling you illegally by suing them in small claims court under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, which awards $500 for each illegal call or text and up to $1,500 per call if the company acted willfully.¹ Congress deliberately set those damages high enough that one person with a call log and a small filing fee can make it worth a company’s while to pay. The work is in the documentation and identifying who to sue.

Which Calls You Can Actually Sue Over

Not every unwanted call gives you a claim. The TCPA covers marketing calls or texts to your cell phone made with an autodialer or a prerecorded or artificial voice, and prerecorded marketing calls to residential landlines, in each case without your prior consent. Text marketing sent through automated technology requires prior express written consent, which is a higher bar than a verbal okay.¹

A separate track covers the National Do Not Call Registry. Once your number has been on the list for 31 days, telemarketers are barred from calling.² Companies you’ve recently done business with can still call for up to 18 months after your last purchase, payment, or delivery, but the moment you ask them to stop, that exception ends.³ Write down the date you make that request. It becomes evidence.

Some calls fall outside the rules and can’t be turned into a claim:

Political campaigns, parties, and PACs are exempt from the Do Not Call Registry, though prerecorded political calls to cell phones still need consent.⁴
Tax-exempt nonprofits are excluded from the TCPA’s definition of “telephone solicitation.” A for-profit telemarketer calling on behalf of a charity must still honor your entity-specific do-not-call request.³
Surveys and polls that don’t sell anything generally aren’t telemarketing. A “survey” that pivots into a sales pitch doesn’t get this protection.
Companies whose fine print you consented to can call you until you revoke that consent.

One more limit worth knowing: to sue under the Do Not Call provision, you must have received more than one call within a 12-month period from the same company.¹ A single unwanted call doesn’t trigger damages under DNC, though it may still violate the autodialer or prerecorded-voice rules independently.

How Much Each Call Is Worth

The TCPA has two damage tracks. For violations of the automated-calling and texting restrictions, you can recover $500 per violation or your actual financial loss, whichever is higher. If a judge finds the company acted willfully or knowingly, that number can triple to $1,500 per violation.¹

For Do Not Call Registry violations, damages run up to $500 per call, with the same treble multiplier available for knowing or willful conduct.¹

The math compounds quickly. Ten illegal robocalls from the same company works out to $5,000 in statutory damages, or $15,000 if the judge finds the company knew it was violating the law. Small claims court limits vary by state, so if your total exceeds your state’s cap, you’ll either cut your claim down to the cap or file in a higher court.

Documenting Every Call

Documentation decides these cases. Start logging each unwanted call the day it happens, because a memory of details from six months ago won’t hold up.

For each call, capture:

Date and time down to the minute, matching your phone’s clock.
The caller ID number and any callback number given during the call.
The company name and product, even if the caller’s name sounds fake.
Whether a live person spoke or you heard a recording. This decides which TCPA provision applies.
What you said in response. If you asked to be put on the company’s do-not-call list, note the date. Any call after that date is a separate violation.

Back the log up with your phone’s call history. Screenshots work; exporting the call log to a PDF is cleaner. Your carrier can also provide official call records, which carry more weight than a handwritten list. If you’re on the Do Not Call Registry, note your registration date and confirm it at donotcall.gov.²

The strongest cases combine a personal log, carrier records, and Registry confirmation. A judge will compare the three and look for consistency.

Finding Out Who to Sue

This is where most claims collapse. Illegal callers rarely announce their full legal name, and caller ID can be spoofed. If you can’t identify a defendant, your evidence goes nowhere.

When you pick up, stay on the line long enough to gather information. Ask for the company’s full name, address, and website. If you’re transferred to a “sales representative,” ask again. Brand names dropped during the call often trace back to a parent company through a web search.

Once you have a name, search the Secretary of State’s business entity database in the state where the company is registered. Most states offer a free online search that shows the official legal name, the registered agent, and an address for service of process. The registered agent is the person or service the company has designated to accept legal documents. That’s where your demand letter and, later, your lawsuit go.

If a U.S. company hired an overseas call center, the domestic company can still be held liable for the calls made on its behalf. Listen for clues about which American brand is behind the campaign.

Sending the Demand Letter

A demand letter puts the company on notice and gives it a chance to pay before you file. Legitimate businesses that got sloppy with a calling list will often settle at this stage rather than deal with a lawsuit.

Your letter should include:

Your name and contact information.
A list of each call by date, time, and phone number, with a statement that the calls were made without your consent and an identification of which TCPA provision each call violated.
Your damages calculation. Multiply the number of violations by $500, or $1,500 if you believe they were willful. Show the math.
A payment deadline. Thirty days is standard.
A statement that you will file suit if the company doesn’t respond.

Send the letter by certified mail with return receipt requested, addressed to the registered agent. Since the company designated that agent to accept legal communications, there’s no argument later that it never got the letter. Keep the letter, the certified mail receipt, and the return receipt card.

Some companies pay quickly. Others ignore demand letters entirely, especially outfits operating on the fringes of the law. If the deadline passes without a response, file.

Filing in Small Claims Court

Small claims court was built for this kind of case. Procedures are simplified, you don’t need a lawyer, and filing fees typically run between $30 and $75 depending on your jurisdiction and claim size. The TCPA’s damages were set at levels meant to make this route worthwhile.

File in the small claims court with jurisdiction over the company. That’s usually the court in the district where the company does business, though some states let you file where you received the calls. Get the complaint form from the clerk’s office or the court website. List yourself as plaintiff, the company’s full legal name as defendant, the amount you’re claiming, and a brief description of the violations.

After you pay the filing fee, the court issues a summons, which then has to be formally delivered to the defendant. That step is service of process, and most courts allow it through the sheriff’s office, a professional process server, or certified mail. Professional servers typically charge between $20 and $100. Follow your court’s rules exactly; improper service can end your case before it begins.

Watch the deadline. The TCPA doesn’t set its own statute of limitations, so filing time depends on your state’s rules for statutory penalty claims. In most states, you have between one and four years from the date of each violation. Fresh documentation is easier to defend, so don’t sit on your evidence.

What Happens at the Hearing

Small claims hearings are informal, but you still need to present the case clearly. Bring organized copies of everything: your call log, phone records or screenshots, Do Not Call Registry confirmation, your demand letter, and the certified mail receipts.

Tell the judge what happened in plain terms. Explain when the calls started, that you didn’t consent, that your number is on the Registry if it is, and that you asked the company to stop. Then walk through the damages calculation. Third-party witnesses generally aren’t necessary. Your phone records and log are the evidence.

The company has one notable defense for Do Not Call claims: if it can show it had reasonable procedures in place to prevent violations and exercised due care, that’s a statutory affirmative defense.¹ In practice, a company that kept calling after you told it to stop will struggle to prove those procedures were reasonable.

When You Can’t Collect

A judgment and actual money are two different things. Against an identifiable U.S. company, enforcement is usually straightforward. If the company ignores the court order, you can garnish bank accounts or place liens on property.

Spoofed numbers and overseas operations are harder. Transmitting misleading caller ID with intent to defraud or cause harm carries penalties of up to $10,000 per occurrence, but the FCC enforces those penalties, not private plaintiffs.⁵ You can’t serve a lawsuit on a phantom.

When you suspect an overseas caller, look for the U.S. company that hired the call center. The domestic company that outsources telemarketing to a foreign operation remains liable for TCPA violations made on its behalf. If no U.S. entity is identifiable, a lawsuit isn’t the tool. Filing complaints with the FCC and FTC hands the matter to agencies with enforcement powers you don’t have.

A Note on Taxes

Money you collect from a TCPA settlement or judgment is taxable income. The IRS excludes only damages received for physical injuries or physical sickness from gross income.⁶ TCPA statutory damages compensate you for unwanted calls, not a physical injury, so they’re taxable. If a settlement is $2,000 or more, expect a 1099-MISC. Set aside a portion of any recovery for the tax bill.

1
Federal Communications Commission. Telephone Consumer Protection Act 47 USC 227
2
Federal Trade Commission. National Do Not Call Registry
3
Federal Trade Commission. Q&A for Telemarketers and Sellers About DNC Provisions in TSR
4
Federal Communications Commission. Political Campaign Robocalls and Robotexts Rules
5
United States Congress. Truth in Caller ID Act of 2009
6
Internal Revenue Service. Tax Implications of Settlements and Judgments