Pretty quick ruling for you folks.

Plaintiff had an insurance contract with the Defendant. Plaintiff cancelled the policy. Defendant added Plaintiff’s number to a winback campaign and tried to bring him back into the fold.

Plaintiff sued arguing that the termination of the policy also constituted a termination of the EBR. That is, Plaintiff argued that the formal termination of the policy necessarily cut off the EBR and neutralized the presumed 18 month run off period afforded by the CFR.

The Court disagreed. Concluding that the DNC’s EBR rules are clear, the Court found that the termination of the policy did not destroy the EBR defense. Instead the Plaintiff would have had to clearly ask for calls to stop in order for the EBR to evaporate.

The case is Rowan v. US Dealer Services, 2022 WL 2803103, Civ. No. 21-09945 (KM)(LDW)(D. N.J. 07/18/2022).

Rowan is a great little case that continues the trend of cases holding that “implied” revocation is not effective in the TCPAWorld. Most of the time “implied” revocation looks at consent, however. Rowan applies the same doctrine to the DNC’s EBR defense, which is pretty nice to see.

Bottom line, the termination of a business relationship is not the termination of the EBR defense. You have 18 months from the date of the last transaction to try to win back your customers under the federal DNC rules–just remember to do it manually (and watch out for states like Florida that lack an EBR defense)!