Is parallel dialing legal? The rules, with their sources.

Two federal rules set the same window. The FCC bars telephone solicitation to a residential subscriber before 8 a.m. or after 9 p.m. local time at the called party’s location, and paragraph (e) extends that to wireless numbers.[1] The FTC’s Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) sets 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. at the called person’s location.[2]

Florida is tighter. It allows no commercial telephone solicitation before 8 a.m. or after 8 p.m. local time, and no more than three calls to one person in 24 hours on the same subject.[7]

Every one of those clocks runs where the other person is. Five at a Time skips a lead when it is before 8am or after 6pm in the lead’s local time, which it reads from the area code. An area code does not always show where someone is, a number whose time zone cannot be read is still dialed, and the dialer does not count how often you call the same person. Our Terms call the skip a safeguard, not a guarantee, and the three-call count in Florida is yours to keep.

Of everything here, this rule sits closest to what a parallel dialer does. Under the TSR, a call is abandoned if a person answers and is not connected to a sales representative within two seconds of the person’s completed greeting.[2]

The rule has a safe harbor. A seller is inside it when it does all four of these:

• abandons no more than 3% of the calls answered by a person, measured per campaign over 30 days;
• lets the phone ring for 15 seconds or four rings;
• promptly plays a recorded message with the seller’s name and number when no rep is available;
• keeps records.

The FCC has parallel rules at 47 CFR 64.1200(a)(6) and (a)(7).[1]

The second person who answers

On a parallel dialer several numbers ring, one person answers and gets the rep, and the lines still ringing are hung up. The definition starts when a person answers, so a line nobody picked up is a different thing from a line somebody did. (What each line does, step by step.)

The hard case is two people picking up in the same batch. The rep can talk to one. On Five at a Time the second person hears a short automated apology and the call ends, which is in section 2.4 of our Terms. Hold that second call against the definition above: a person answered, and no sales representative came on the line. Vendors disagree about whether it counts as an abandoned call. This page does not settle it.

It is also unsettled whether and how these rules reach business-to-business calls at all. The TSR exempts most calls to a business, which is the next part. The FCC’s paragraph (a)(7) is written for “all telemarketing calls” answered live and is not limited to residential lines on its face.[1] If your calls are covered, our Terms leave staying inside the rules to you (section 7.5). Solo mode rings one number at a time, so on solo there is no second line for anyone to answer.

Selling to businesses changes some of the rules and leaves others alone. The TSR exempts calls “between a telemarketer and any business to induce the purchase of goods or services”.[3] The exemption has limits: sellers of nondurable office or cleaning supplies do not get it, and parts of section 310.3 still apply. The FTC’s guidance also says the National Do Not Call Registry provisions do not apply to business-to-business calls.[4]

The FCC’s rules use different words. Its registry rule protects a “residential telephone subscriber”,[1] and its abandoned-call rule is written for “all telemarketing calls” answered live. A mobile phone used for work can still count as a residential line.

So “we only call businesses” describes who you meant to reach. A list sold as B2B that is mostly personal cell phones is the case to take to a lawyer before you load it.

The FCC’s rules restrict calls to cell phones made with an automatic telephone dialing system or with an artificial or prerecorded voice.[1] In Facebook v. Duguid, decided April 1, 2021, the US Supreme Court held that an autodialer must have the capacity to use a random or sequential number generator.[5]

Five at a Time dials the leads in the list you load, and our Acceptable Use Policy bans dialing numbers generated in sequence or at random. We are not going to tell you what that makes it under the TCPA, and state laws use their own definitions: Florida’s speaks of an automated system for selecting or dialing numbers. That one is for your lawyer.

Prerecorded audio is its own category. Prerecorded telemarketing calls need prior express written consent.[1] A voicemail drop is a prerecorded message, and section 10.3 of our Terms treats it as one.

Florida bars unsolicited “telephonic sales calls” made with an automated system for selecting or dialing numbers, or with a recorded message, unless the person gave prior express written consent.[6] The term covers calls to a consumer about goods or services normally used for personal, family or household purposes. The penalty is $500 a violation, and up to three times that if the violation was willful.

A separate section sets the 8 p.m. cutoff and the limit of three calls in 24 hours described under calling hours.[7]

Oklahoma’s Telephone Solicitation Act took effect on November 1, 2022 and follows Florida’s model: written consent for sales calls made with an automated dialing system, no calls between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m., and three calls in 24 hours. We took that from a law firm’s summary and did not read the statute.[8]

Other states have their own rules. Check each state you call.

Canada’s National Do Not Call List has a plain business exemption: “The National DNCL Rules do not apply to telemarketing calls made to businesses.”[9]

The exemption comes with duties. Exempt callers must still keep their own internal do not call list, add a number to it within 14 days and keep it there for 3 years, and identify who the call is for at the start.[9] Organizations that make telemarketing calls must register with the National DNCL operator even when their calls are exempt, and must follow the Telemarketing Rules and the Automatic Dialing-Announcing Device (ADAD) Rules regardless.[10]

This page prints no Canadian calling hours and no Canadian abandoned-call figure, because we could not verify the current CRTC text. Read the CRTC’s Unsolicited Telecommunications Rules, or have your lawyer read them, before you call Canadian numbers.

Five at a Time records calls by default, so this part applies to every customer. US federal law allows recording where the person recording is a party to the call or one party has consented.[11] Some states require everyone on the call to consent. California is the example: it requires the consent of all parties to a confidential communication.[12]

In Canada, the Criminal Code allows interception with the consent of one party.[13] Privacy law adds a notice duty. Under PIPEDA, an organization must tell the customer the call is being recorded and why.[14]

Consent to record is your job under section 10.1 of our Terms. If you do not have it, ask us to switch recording off for your business before you call.

On October 28, 2025 the FCC proposed deleting its own abandoned-call rules. It is a proposal, and the FTC’s rule stays.[15] We took that from a law firm’s summary, and we will change this part when the FCC acts on it.