Federal Trade Commission Raises Do Not Call Registry Fees

If you feel like spam calls are multiplying faster than streaming subscriptions, you’re not alone.
Behind the scenes, though, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is quietly tweaking one of its most
important tools for fighting telemarketing abuse: the fees that companies must pay to access the
National Do Not Call (DNC) Registry. And yesthose fees are going up again.

For most consumers, the headline is simple: the Do Not Call Registry still helps reduce unwanted
sales calls. For telemarketers and businesses that rely on outbound calling, however, the latest
fee increase means it’s time to revisit compliance budgets, subscription strategies, and overall
outbound marketing plans. In this in-depth guide, we’ll break down what changed, why the FTC is
raising Do Not Call Registry fees, who’s affected, and how smart organizations are adjusting
without losing their mindsor their margins.

What Is the National Do Not Call Registry, Really?

The National Do Not Call Registry is a nationwide list maintained by the FTC that lets consumers
say “No thanks” to most telemarketing sales calls. Once a phone number is registered, most
telemarketers are prohibited from calling it, with a few exceptions (like political calls,
charities, or businesses you have an existing relationship with).

To comply with the Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR), telemarketers and certain sellers must check
their calling lists against the Registry on a regular basis. That’s where the fees come in:
companies pay the FTC for access to the Registry data by area code. The idea is that if you’re
going to call people in a particular geographic region, you need to know who is off-limits first.

In other words, the Registry is both:

• A shield for consumers who are tired of dinner being interrupted by “great limited-time offers,” and
• A compliance checkpoint for businesses that don’t want to end up on the wrong side of an FTC enforcement action.

What Changed: The New Do Not Call Registry Fees

The FTC has announced another round of fee increases for accessing the Registry. These changes
apply starting with Fiscal Year 2026 (which begins October 1, 2025), and they follow a familiar
pattern of small, incremental increases that track inflation.

Key Numbers You Need to Know

• Per-area-code annual fee: increases from $80 to $82 per area code.
• Half-year additional area code fee: increases from $40 to $41.
• Maximum annual cap per entity: rises from about $22,038 to $22,626.

These numbers may look modest at first glance, but for large outbound operations that purchase
hundreds of area codes or hit the annual cap, even a few dollars per code adds up over time.
The pattern is consistent with recent years, where the per-area-code fee has crept up from
the high $70s into the $80-plus range.

Practically speaking, if you’re a telemarketer or seller:

• You’ll pay more to renew your existing area-code subscriptions.
• Adding new area codes mid-year will cost slightly more per code.
• Organizations that rely on the nationwide cap will see their total annual bill increase as well.

Why the FTC Raises Do Not Call Registry Fees

The FTC doesn’t raise fees just for funor to fund an office coffee upgrade. The fee adjustments
are required by the Do-Not-Call Registry Fee Extension Act of 2007, which directs
the Commission to adjust fees annually based on changes in the Consumer Price Index (CPI).

In plain language: as the cost of running the Registry and related systems increases with
inflation, the fees increase too. The changes are framed as technical updates rather than
major policy shifts. The FTC periodically issues a Federal Register notice and a press release
laying out the new numbers, and those new fees typically take effect on October 1 of the upcoming
fiscal year.

The money collected goes toward:

• Maintaining and securing the Registry infrastructure,
• Processing and storing billions of phone-number records,
• Supporting enforcement efforts and complaint handling, and
• Ensuring ongoing access for legitimate businesses and service providers.

Think of it as a subscription that funds the “no spam calls, please” backbone of American
consumer protection. Not glamorous, but very necessary.

Who Has to Pay These Higher Fees?

Not everyone who makes phone calls to customers is on the hook for Do Not Call Registry fees.
The FTC focuses on telemarketing and sales calls, so the primary payers are:

• Telemarketers and sellers: Companies that place outbound sales calls to residential or certain wireless numbers.
• Service providers: Vendors that help multiple clients with outbound calling and need access to Registry data for each client.
• Organizations using autodialers or call centers: Especially those operating across multiple states or nationwide.

Each entity that accesses the Registry must obtain a Subscription Account Number (SAN) and pay
the appropriate fees. A telemarketer or service provider cannot simply buy the Registry once
and then hand the data to all of its clients for freeeach seller must have its own subscription
or be appropriately covered under the rules.

On the other hand, consumers never pay to register their numbers or file complaints.
Signing up for the Registry and renewing registrations is still free for individuals. The fees
are squarely aimed at the businesses that rely on outbound calls as part of their sales strategy.

Do Higher Fees Actually Help Consumers?

It’s fair to ask: if the FTC keeps raising Do Not Call Registry fees, is that money making a
difference? According to recent National Do Not Call Registry Data Books, consumer complaints
about unwanted calls have been trending downward compared to earlier peaks, even though billions
of calls are still placed every year.

There are a few ways the fee structure supports consumer protection:

• Encouraging serious players only: The cost of accessing the Registry acts as a
  filter. Fly-by-night operations that have no intention of following the rules are less likely
  to invest in proper access.
• Funding enforcement: Higher fees help sustain the infrastructure that supports
  investigations, data analysis, and enforcement actions against bad actors.
• Maintaining up-to-date data: Reliable data is essential for companies that do
  want to comply. The fees support the technology and security needed to keep the Registry accurate
  and available.

Of course, not every nuisance call disappears overnight. Robocallers that completely ignore the
law are a separate challenge, often tackled through parallel enforcement, call-blocking technology,
and coordination with other agencies. But for legitimate businesses that want to stay on the right
side of the rules, these fees are simply part of the cost of doing business.

How Businesses Can Adapt to the New Fees

While the per-area-code increase may not sink your budget, it’s still smart to treat these new
Do Not Call Registry fees as a wake-up call for better compliance planning. Here are practical
ways to adapt.

1. Audit Your Area-Code Strategy

Many organizations default to “just buy everything” and subscribe to every U.S. area code,
whether they actively call those regions or not. With fees inching upward, that lazy approach
gets more expensive every year.

Instead:

• Review where your actual customers and prospects are located.
• Match your subscriptions to your genuine calling footprint.
• Consider consolidating campaigns to the regions where your conversion rate justifies the cost.

If you’re routinely paying the nationwide cap but only meaningfully call in half the country,
you’re leaving money on the table.

2. Partner Strategically with Service Providers

Many businesses rely on third-party dialers, call centers, or marketing platforms that handle
Registry access on their behalf. That can be efficient, but make sure your contracts clearly define:

• Who is responsible for paying the fees and maintaining the SAN,
• How often lists are scrubbed against the Registry, and
• What documentation you’ll receive to prove compliance if regulators ask questions.

Higher fees sometimes show up as line items or higher platform costs. Understanding that link
helps you negotiate better and avoid unpleasant surprises.

3. Tighten Internal Compliance Controls

If you’re paying more to follow the rules, you might as well squeeze every ounce of value out of
that effort. That means:

• Training sales and customer service teams regularly on Do Not Call rules.
• Keeping internal do-not-call lists in sync with the National Registry.
• Documenting your processes, including how often you scrub lists and how you handle opt-outs.

Well-documented compliance doesn’t just reduce enforcement riskit can also help you respond
quickly to customer complaints or regulator inquiries, potentially limiting damage if something
goes wrong.

4. Rethink Your Outreach Mix

For some organizations, the rising cost of telemarketing compliance is a nudge to diversify.
If you’re heavily dependent on cold calls, this might be the moment to invest more in:

• Email marketing with proper consent management,
• SMS campaigns that respect opt-in and opt-out rules,
• Content marketing and inbound lead generation, and
• Retargeting and digital ads that attract warmer prospects.

You don’t have to abandon phone calls entirely, but shifting your strategy can help ensure that
the calls you do make are more targeted, more welcomed, and more cost-effective.

What This Means for Consumers

For everyday people, the headline is less about a couple of dollars’ increase per area code and
more about the ongoing investment in keeping unwanted calls under control. Consumers should:

• Verify that their numbers are registered with the National Do Not Call Registry.
• Continue reporting unwanted sales calls, especially those that ignore opt-outs.
• Use call-blocking features and apps when necessary, particularly for robocalls or scam calls.

Higher fees don’t guarantee total silence from telemarketers, but they support the infrastructure
that keeps pressure on lawful callers to respect your choiceand helps regulators go after those
who don’t.

Real-World Experiences with Higher Do Not Call Registry Fees

Numbers on a fee schedule are one thing; the day-to-day experience of living with those numbers
is another. Here’s how different players are experiencing the latest Federal Trade Commission
Do Not Call Registry fee increase in practice.

1. The Large National Call Center

Imagine a nationwide call center that routinely hits the annual cap for Registry fees. On paper,
the jump from $22,038 to $22,626 might not seem dramatic. But inside the budget meeting, that
line item sits alongside rising labor costs, higher tech vendor fees, and increased spending on
analytics and call-recording tools.

For this kind of operation, the fee increase becomes the trigger for a broader review:

• Do we really need to call every single area code we subscribe to?
• Should we shift more outreach to warm leads generated online?
• Can we use better data tools to focus calls on prospects with a higher likelihood of saying “yes”?

In practice, many of these organizations respond by tightening their targeting, trimming underperforming
campaigns, and investing more in first-party data and opt-in marketing channels.

2. The Regional Small Business

Now consider a regional home-improvement company that calls prospects in a handful of states.
The fee increase might only add a few hundred dollars a year to their costs, but the business
owner still feels it. They often respond by:

• Reviewing the number of area codes they truly need.
• Scrutinizing their outbound campaigns to ensure that every call has a strong chance of converting.
• Leaning more on referrals and local advertising, where the cost per lead is easier to control.

For smaller players, the lesson is clear: treating Do Not Call compliance as an afterthought is
expensive. Treating it as a deliberate, strategic investment pays off.

3. The Compliance Officer’s Perspective

Compliance officers often joke that their job is to “worry professionally so nobody else has to.”
From their vantage point, the higher fees are not just cost items but also leverage. When they
walk into a leadership meeting and say, “We’re paying more than ever to access this data; let’s
make sure we’re using it correctly,” it’s a powerful argument for better processes.

Many compliance teams use fee changes as a natural checkpoint to:

• Update internal policies and training materials.
• Confirm that vendors are following best practices for list scrubbing.
• Reinforce the message that sloppy calling practices could turn a modest annual fee into a
  very large enforcement penalty.

In that sense, the fee increase becomes an internal forcing functionan excuse to get everyone’s
attention and reset expectations around outbound calling.

4. The Consumer Advocate’s View

Consumer advocates generally see the Do Not Call Registry as one piece of a larger anti-robocall
puzzle. To them, modest fee increases are acceptable if the funds help the FTC maintain strong
enforcement, keep the Registry up to date, and invest in better complaint analysis.

They also point out that the cost of non-compliance can be massivefar exceeding a few extra
dollars per area code. When the FTC brings a case against a company that ignored the Registry,
the civil penalties and reputational damage can be staggering. In that context, the subscription
fees look like a bargain.

5. The Long Game: Where This Is All Heading

Looking ahead, most observers expect Do Not Call Registry fees to continue inching upward with
inflation. At the same time, advances in call-authentication technology, analytics, and AI-driven
spam filters will keep changing the economics of telemarketing.

The organizations that thrive in this environment will be those that:

• Respect consumer preferences as a core business value, not just a legal requirement.
• Invest in reliable consent, data management, and opt-out systems.
• Use phone calls strategicallyreserving them for high-intent, high-value conversations.

In that world, paying a little more each year to access the National Do Not Call Registry is less
a burden and more a cost of doing business the right way.

Conclusion: Turning a Fee Increase into a Compliance Advantage

The latest move by the Federal Trade Commission to raise Do Not Call Registry fees is not a
dramatic policy overhaulbut it is a meaningful signal. It says the costs of maintaining a strong
consumer-protection infrastructure are real, and that responsible businesses must keep pace.

For telemarketers and sellers, the smart move is to use this fee increase as a catalyst: audit
your calling footprint, sharpen your compliance processes, and rethink how phone calls fit into
your broader customer-engagement strategy. For consumers, it’s a reminder that adding your number
to the Registry (and reporting bad actors) still matters, and that regulators are continuing to
invest in keeping your phone a little bit quieter.

Higher fees may hurt your budget a bit, but they don’t have to hurt your business. With thoughtful
planning, they can push you toward cleaner data, better targeting, more respectful outreachand
ultimately, better results.