Revoking Consent Under the TCPA: Calls After You Said Stop

Consent can always be taken back

Whatever you agreed to on a website, a loan application or a store checkout, you can withdraw it. The FCC’s rule, in effect since April 11, 2025, says a called party “may revoke prior express consent, including prior express written consent, to receive calls or text messages … by using any reasonable method to clearly express a desire not to receive further calls or text messages from the caller or sender” (47 CFR 64.1200(a)(10)).

The FCC first said consumers could revoke “in any reasonable manner” in a 2015 ruling. The 2024 TCPA Consent Order wrote that principle into the rule, added specific methods that always count, and set a deadline for callers to comply.

Methods that always count

Under 64.1200(a)(10), each of these is a reasonable method “per se”:

• Using an automated, interactive voice or key-press opt-out during a call (“press 9 to be removed”).
• Replying to a text with “stop,” “quit,” “end,” “revoke,” “opt out,” “cancel,” or “unsubscribe.”
• Using a website or phone number the caller designated for opt-out requests.

Once you use any of these, “that consent is considered definitively revoked.” A reply text with other words, such as “leave me alone” or “wrong number, don’t text me,” must be treated as a revocation “if a reasonable person would understand those words to have conveyed a request to revoke consent.”

Other ways to say stop

You are not limited to the caller’s preferred method. Under 64.1200(a)(11), if you revoke some other way, such as a voicemail or an email to a number or address meant to reach the caller, the law presumes you revoked once you show the request was made. The caller then has to prove otherwise under a “totality of circumstances” test.

Current rules also say callers “may not designate an exclusive means to request revocation of consent.” That is one of the rules the FCC may change on September 30, 2026. See below.

The ten-business-day deadline

A revocation “must be honored within a reasonable time not to exceed ten business days from receipt of such request.” Business days usually skip weekends and federal holidays, so ten business days is roughly two calendar weeks.

Check any holiday in the window. Columbus Day, October 12, 2026, is a federal holiday that would push the deadline back a day. One text confirming your opt-out is allowed, with no marketing in it. If it arrives within five minutes, it is presumed fine (64.1200(a)(12)).

A separate ten-business-day rule covers live telemarketing calls. When you ask a telemarketer to put you on its company do-not-call list, it must honor the request within ten business days and keep it for five years (64.1200(d)(3) and (d)(6)). That rule applies even if no autodialer or recording was used.

What is delayed: the “revoke all” rule

The 2024 rule says that once you revoke, “the caller may not send additional robocalls and robotexts.” The FCC read that to mean a stop request in response to one type of informational message, say a payment reminder, would cover all robocalls and robotexts from that caller on unrelated matters, such as fraud alerts. Banks, utilities and others asked for time.

The FCC has delayed that one piece twice. A 2025 order pushed it to April 11, 2026. Order DA 26-12, released January 6, 2026, extended the delay to January 31, 2027. The order stresses that the waiver covers only that scope question and “does not alter the status quo relating to any other prior Commission rules or rulings addressing revocation of consent.” The ten-business-day deadline, the stop words, and the any-reasonable-method rule are all in effect today. Our news report on the 2027 delay tracks the order.

What may change on September 30, 2026

On September 9, 2026, the FCC released a draft Report and Order for its September 30 open meeting. The FCC describes the draft as tentative and “subject to change.” If adopted as circulated, it would:

• Let callers treat a stop request made in response to an informational call or text as covering only “the specific category of informational robocalls” it was directed at, replacing the delayed revoke-all rule.
• Keep the rule that a stop request in response to a telemarketing call or text revokes consent to “all future calls or text messages” containing advertising or telemarketing from that caller.
• Let callers designate one or more of three methods as the exclusive way to revoke: the automated key-press opt-out, a reply using the standard stop words, or a designated website or phone number. The caller would have to disclose the method “clearly and conspicuously” on the call or in the text.
• Keep the ten-business-day deadline, and seek comment on shortening it, possibly to seven business days.
• Seek comment on requiring two-way texting so every text can be answered with STOP.

The new rules would take effect 30 days after Federal Register publication. Until then, the current rule stands. We will update this page after the vote.

What this means for you in practice: use the caller’s own opt-out when you can. A key-press opt-out, a STOP reply, or the company’s listed opt-out number counts under today’s rule and would count under the proposal too.

Revocation and the Do Not Call rules

Revoking consent is not the same as joining the National Do Not Call Registry, and each does something different:

• Revocation ends the consent a company relies on. The rule covers robocalls and robotexts under 64.1200(a)(1) through (a)(3), and the written permission a seller relies on to call a Registry number under (c)(2).
• Telling a telemarketer to stop also ends any established business relationship exception for telemarketing, “even if the subscriber continues to do business with the seller” (64.1200(f)(5)(i)).
• The Registry makes sales calls from companies you have no relationship with unlawful, but it does not block them. Our Do Not Call law guide explains the difference.

How to revoke so it holds up

1. Use the caller’s opt-out first. Press the removal key, reply STOP, or use the opt-out link or number in the message.
2. Say it plainly on live calls. “Stop calling this number. Put me on your do-not-call list.” Note the time and the agent’s name.
3. Put it in writing if you can. An email or letter to the company creates a record with a date.
4. Screenshot everything. Your STOP reply, the confirmation text if one arrives, and every text or call after that.
5. Count from the date of your request. Anything after ten business days is what matters.

Record each step in our call and text evidence log. Keep the log going. Calls that continue after a clear stop request are the kind of fact that can support a finding that a violation was willful or knowing, which lets a court raise damages to as much as $1,500 per call.

When a stop request does not end the calls lawfully

• Some calls do not need consent in the first place, such as live, hand-dialed informational calls. Revocation does not reach them, although the company-specific do-not-call list rule still covers sales calls.
• Exempt calls to cell phones, like bank fraud alerts and package notices, have their own opt-out rules that require the sender to honor your request immediately (64.1200(a)(9)).
• Debt collectors are also governed by the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act; see debt collector call violations.

If the calls keep coming after you said stop

Count the calls and texts that arrived more than ten business days after your request. Save the proof of your request. If the caller is a company you can name, you may have a claim for each one. Read about spam texts after STOP if the problem is texts, then see our guide on how to sue a telemarketer for what a claim involves.