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Telemarketer Shut Down For Violating "Do Not Call" Rule

Court imposes five-year ban on telemarketing to consumers

By James Limbach
ConsumerAffairs.com

July 30, 2009

In November 2007, as part of a multi-case crackdown on Do Not Call violators, the government charged Global Mortgage Funding, Inc. and its owner, Damian Robert Kutzner, with unlawfully calling consumers on the Do Not Call Registry in an attempt to sell financial products, including mortgages and related financing services.

The complaint also contained charges of violating the FTC's Do Not Call Rule by failing to transmit accurate caller ID information, failing to pay fees required to access the Registry, and abandoning calls by not connecting consumers to a representative within two seconds after they answered the phone.

Following a lengthy investigation by the FTC, the lawsuit was filed and litigated by the Department of Justice on the Commission's behalf.

The agreed-upon court order bans Kutzner and anyone working with him from participating in telemarketing to consumers, and from helping others involved in telemarketing to consumers, for five years.

It also permanently bans Kutzner from violating the Telemarketing Sales Rule, as well as its Do Not Call provisions, which include calling consumers on the National Do Not Call Registry, failing to provide accurate caller ID information, calling consumers who have said they do not want to be called, and abandoning calls.

The order imposes a $6 million civil penalty against Kutzner and Global Mortgage and imposes reporting and record-keeping provisions to help monitor Kutzner's compliance. Finally, the order ensures that Global Mortgage will not resume its operation or benefit from its past conduct.

Both Global Mortgage and Kutzner had a previous run-in with the FTC, which sued them in 2002 for allegedly sending "spoofed" e-mails that offered mortgages and purported to be from legitimate banks.

Global and Kutzner signed a consent decree in 2003 in which they agreed to pay over $60,000 to resolve that litigation and accepted a court order prohibiting them from future "spoofing" and other misrepresentations.

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