FCC, America’s Credit Unions meet to discuss industry priorities

America’s Credit Unions Head of Regulatory Advocacy James Akin met with Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Brendan Carr’s staff Thursday, engaging on credit union priorities.  

Earlier this year, credit union advocacy secured a win as the FCC announced a one-year delay of a concerning provision of its revocation of consent rules under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) which would bar credit unions from sending any future autodialed or prerecorded calls or texts to a member once the member withdraws consent to any call or text. America’s Credit Unions encouraged the delay in meetings with the FCC, emphasizing that consumers should be protected from unwanted robocalls and texts, but credit unions must be able to contact members with important information. America’s Credit Unions will continue to push for this provision to be revoked entirely.

America’s Credit Unions also engaged with the FCC in response to its public notice seeking comment on what agency rules it should review or potentially eliminate, joining with other financial trades to outline concerns.  

Several recommended changes to the TCPA rules include:  

• A revision of its February 2024 order on revocation of consent to ensure callers and text senders can accurately and efficiently process customer requests to revoke consent to receive autodialed or prerecorded voice calls;
• Removal of the limitation, adopted in 2022, that permits callers to place, over a 30-day period, only three exempt informational prerecorded or artificial voice calls to residential numbers; and
• Removal of the condition that permits a caller to place an exempt fraud alert or data reach notification (among other categories of calls exempted) only if the call is placed to a number that was provided by the customer.

America’s Credit Unions will continue to engage the FCC to ensure the credit union industry’s voice is heard.