Sponsored Content WEBINAR: ELECTION 2008: E-mail Tips from a Political Insider   WEBINAR: Becoming the Illusionist: The Magic of Using "Brand" to Drive Response without Results Disappearing in the Process   WEBINAR: Score and Win Through Cooperation   TOOLS OF THE TRADE: Holiday's are prime-time for email marketing - maximize your ROI by getting to the inbox   ON DEMAND WEBINAR--MASTER CLASS: High Performance Online and Off-line Strategies for Large Scale Customer Acquisition   FREE WHITE PAPER - Direct Mail and the Internet Find any supplier you need - agencies, CRM, fulfillment, lists, e-commerce, paper, printers, telemarketing, and more. Featured Categories Lists and Data Telemarketing Database Marketing E-commerce Web Marketing Agency & Creative Services Print, Production & Paper Lists and Data Processing :: view all categories Get free access to more than 50,000 list data cards - one of the most comprehensive databases in the industry. >> Search Now DIRECT Buzz Blog Webinars Buyer's Guide Calculators JobZone ListFinder Promo Calendar Research Store E-Newsletters Print Magazine This Month in Direct Magazine Deal With It Direct had a full house for this year's list roundtable. Considering all the additional responsibilities on brokers' plates, that's impressive... See Full July Issue

The Direct Marketing Association praised the House of Representatives Tuesday for passing two pieces of legislation governing the telemarketing National Do Not Call Registry.

If signed into law, the Do Not Call Improvement Act (H.R. 3541) would make registered numbers permanent on the Registry, while requiring the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to remove invalid numbers and report to Congress on their progress none months after enactment, according to the DMA.

A second measure, H.R. 2601, would reauthorize the FTC to administer the registry while capping the fees that marketers are required to pay to access the registry.

Launched in 2003, the Registry now contains more than 145 million telephone numbers. But nearly half of the registered numbers are unusable or redundant because of other laws and regulations that govern the use of phone numbers for business purposes, according to the DMA.

The FTC instituted the five-year expiration date of registered phone numbers during the rulemaking process as their only effective means of purging the list of unused and inaccurate numbers, the DMA noted.

Both bills passed on voice votes. They still need Senate approval.