New FCC Opt-Out Rules: What Changes for Your Customer Calls and Texts

If your company sends automated texts or calls to customers, such as appointment reminders, delivery notices, payment reminders, service alerts or promotions, a customer’s reply of “STOP” is a legal event. How you handle it decides whether you can keep reaching that customer, and handling it wrongly can be expensive.

The rules for that moment just changed. Most companies have a few weeks to decide how they want to use the new flexibility, and the decisions belong to leadership as much as to IT.

What the FCC decided

On September 30, 2026, the Federal Communications Commission voted to modernize its opt-out rules under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, the federal law on automated calls and texts. The order (FCC 26-67) was released on October 1. The rules apply to what the FCC calls robocalls, which it defines as any call or text sent using an automatic dialing system, or any call using an artificial or prerecorded voice. To see why this matters, start with the rule it replaces. In 2024, the FCC required companies to accept an opt-out made by “any reasonable method” and to honor it within ten business days. A further piece of that 2024 rule, often called “revoke all,” would have made one opt-out apply to every automated call and text from that company, of every kind. That piece was delayed twice, most recently to January 31, 2027.

The new order replaces “revoke all” with three main changes.

Opt-outs from informational messages can be limited to that kind of message. If a customer replies STOP to an appointment reminder, you may treat that as applying only to that category of informational message, not to every message you send. Informational means the message contains no advertising or telemarketing.
Marketing opt-outs still stop all marketing. An opt-out sent in response to a marketing message still ends consent for all future marketing calls and texts from that company.
You can choose how customers opt out. A company may designate one or more of three methods as the only way to opt out: a voice or keypad option on the call; a reply text using one of seven standard words (stop, quit, end, revoke, opt out, cancel or unsubscribe); or a website or phone number the company names. The catch is that the method must be “clearly and conspicuously” disclosed on the call or in the text. If you do not designate a method, you must keep honoring opt-outs made by any reasonable means.

The order also gives banks and credit unions more room to send fraud alerts to mobile numbers obtained from reliable sources. If you are a financial institution, that part deserves its own conversation with counsel.

What did not change

The ten-business-day deadline to honor an opt-out stays in place. So does the cost of getting it wrong: the law lets consumers sue for $500 per violation, and a court can triple that if it finds the violation willful or knowing. Because damages are counted per violation, the totals for a single campaign can add up quickly.

When it takes effect, and what is still open

The new rules take effect 30 days after the order is published in the Federal Register, and they replace the January 31, 2027 date. As of October 5, 2026, we have not found the order published in the Federal Register, so the exact date is not yet set.

The FCC is also asking for comment on further changes, including a shorter deadline for honoring opt-outs and requiring that customers be able to opt out by replying to a text. The FCC’s fact sheet on the draft listed cutting the ten business days to seven, and requiring a way to opt out of all automated calls and texts at once. Comments are due 30 days after Federal Register publication. In other words, the rules may shift again, and any process you build should be easy to adjust.

The decisions that belong to leadership

The new flexibility helps only if your systems can act on it. A few business decisions come first.

1. Decide what your message categories are. Category-specific opt-outs only work if you have categories. Appointment reminders, billing notices, shipping updates and service outage alerts might each be one. Someone has to own that list, and your attorney should review it.

2. Separate marketing from information. The narrower opt-out applies only to messages with no advertising. By the FCC’s definition, a reminder that also carries a promotional offer is not informational. Ask counsel how to treat any message that mixes the two.

3. Choose whether to designate an opt-out method. Naming one method can make opt-outs easier to process and track. It also puts the burden on you to disclose that method clearly in every message. The FCC has said a text can satisfy the disclosure by naming just one of the seven standard words, but all seven must still be honored.

4. Find every system that sends messages. Marketing tools, billing systems, scheduling software, your phone or contact center platform, and vendors that message customers on your behalf often keep their own opt-out lists. An opt-out recorded in one system has to reach every system that sends that category of message, within the deadline.

5. Check your vendors’ contracts and roadmaps. Ask each platform whether it can track opt-outs by category, apply your designated method, and adjust if the deadline drops to seven business days. If it cannot, that is a gap to close before the rules take effect, not after a complaint.

This is not legal advice. The TCPA is heavily litigated, and how these rules apply depends on your industry, your messages and how you collected consent. Talk to your attorney before you change how you process opt-outs.

Questions to ask this month

Who in our company owns customer consent and opt-outs, end to end?
Which systems and vendors send automated calls or texts to customers, and does each keep its own opt-out list?
Have we listed our informational message categories, and has counsel reviewed them?
Do any of our “informational” messages contain promotional content?
Will we designate an opt-out method, and does every message disclose it clearly?
Can our platforms honor an opt-out across every system within ten business days today, and within seven if the rule changes?
Who is watching for the Federal Register publication that starts the 30-day clock?

If the phone, texting or contact center platforms behind these messages are part of the question, our free telecom and circuit assessment is a practical place to start.