TCPA and MCA leads: what brokers actually need to ask

The short answer

Business-to-business calling is not exempt from the TCPA. Calls and texts to wireless numbers face the same restrictions whoever answers, and statutory damages run $500 to $1,500 per call. What protects you is documented consent you can produce on demand — which means the questions to ask a lead vendor are about record-keeping, not reassurance.

Almost every "how to vet a lead vendor" checklist mentions compliance and then moves on. It is worth more than a line, because it is the one area where a bad vendor creates a liability that lands on you rather than on them. Your reps make the calls. Your company is the one being sued.

Does the TCPA even apply to B2B calls?

Yes, and this is the single most common misconception in this market. B2B calling is not categorically exempt. Calls and texts to wireless numbers are subject to the same restrictions regardless of who picks up, and a small business owner’s mobile is a wireless number.

What is different for B2B is narrower than people assume. The National Do Not Call Registry does not apply to genuine business-to-business calls. That is one carve-out, and it does not extend to the TCPA’s rules on automated dialling, prerecorded messages, or state law.

Treating B2B as a blanket exemption is the assumption that gets shops into trouble. It is not one exemption; it is one narrow carve-out inside a set of rules that otherwise still apply.

What does it cost to get this wrong?

Statutory damages under the TCPA run $500 per violation, trebled to $1,500 for willful or knowing violations. The unit is the call, not the lawsuit.

What changed with the one-to-one consent rule?

Worth knowing because a lot of guidance still online describes a rule that no longer exists.

The FCC adopted a rule in December 2023 that would have required a consumer to give prior express written consent to one identified seller at a time — ending the practice of a single form granting consent to a long list of partners. On 24 January 2025, one business day before it was due to take effect, the Eleventh Circuit vacated it, holding the FCC had exceeded its statutory authority. The FCC subsequently repealed it.

What should a lead vendor be able to produce?

This is the practical core. A vendor cannot make you compliant, but a vendor with real records makes your position defensible and a vendor without them leaves you holding it alone.

• The consent language itself. The exact wording the merchant agreed to, not a description of it.
• A screenshot or copy of the form as it appeared to the merchant, including where the consent sat relative to the submit button.
• The timestamp, IP address and user agent captured at submission.
• The URL the merchant was on when they consented.
• Which parties the consent named, and how.
• How long they retain all of the above. Records that expire before a claim does are records you cannot use.

A vendor who can produce that set for any record on request is in a materially different position from one who says "all our leads are TCPA compliant." The second sentence is not a record of anything.

What is litigator scrubbing, and does it matter?

A small number of people file TCPA claims professionally. They are identifiable, lists of them exist, and screening against those lists before you dial removes a disproportionate share of your risk for very little effort.

Ask whether the vendor scrubs, or whether you are expected to. Either answer can be fine — what matters is that somebody does it and that you know which of you it is. "We assume you handle that" discovered after a claim is the bad version.

What about state laws?

This is where B2B assumptions break hardest. Several states run their own mini-TCPA statutes, and some carry no B2B exemption at all or define it differently from the federal rules.

• Florida’s statute restricts automated dialling without prior express written consent and caps calls to a given number at three in a 24-hour period, regardless of which number you dial from.
• Several states operate their own do-not-call registries with their own coverage rules.
• Some state statutes create a private right of action, which is what makes them commercially significant rather than merely regulatory.

If you dial nationally, you are subject to the strictest rule that applies to any merchant you call. Ask a vendor whether they can filter your leads by state, because that is the practical lever if your counsel advises avoiding a jurisdiction.

A short checklist to take to a vendor call

• Show me the exact consent language a merchant agrees to.
• Can you produce the timestamp, IP and URL for any record I ask about?
• How long do you keep consent records?
• Do you scrub against known-litigator lists, or is that on me?
• Can you filter my leads by state?
• Who generated this traffic — you, or somebody you buy from?

That last question quietly answers several of the others. A vendor reselling somebody else’s inventory cannot show you a form they did not build or a timestamp they did not capture.