On April 6, 2016, the FCC submitted an amicus curiae brief to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in a TCPA case in which the plaintiff alleges that the defendant violated the TCPA by placing a robocall to a residential phone line (Bank v. Indep. Energy Grp., LLC et al., Case No. 15-2391 (2d Cir. Apr. 6, 2016)).
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York granted summary judgment for the Defendant, finding that the TCPA did not apply because the Plaintiff used the residential line for business purposes. Plaintiff appealed the decision, and then filed a petition with the FCC seeking clarification on the issue of whether “the TCPA’s restrictions on artificial or prerecorded voice calls apply to calls made to a telephone line used for a home business so long as the line is registered with the service provider as a residential line.” Plaintiff then asked the Court to stay its proceeding pending resolution of the FCC petition.
In its brief, the FCC acknowledged that the Commission’s rules do not define the term “residential telephone line” and that it has not “resolved the question of whether, or under what circumstances, a telephone line in a home can support business activities and remain a ‘residential’ line.” As such, the Commission supported the Plaintiff’s request for a stay to allow the Commission an opportunity to address these issues.