Pennsylvania telemarketing law in 2026: what changed on 18 October

Pennsylvania’s telemarketing law changed on 18 Oct 2026. Sales calls and texts to people in the state may now be made only from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m., never on a Sunday or a legal holiday, and the law now covers texts, voicemails and ringless voicemails as well as calls. Robocalls need prior express written consent.

The changes come from Senate Bill 992, which amends the Telemarketer Registration Act of 1996. The Governor approved it on 20 Jul 2026, and its last section says it takes effect in 90 days. The bill history and the final text, Printer’s No. 1649, are the sources for everything below, as of October 2026.

The calling window is two hours shorter

The old rule barred telemarketing after 9 p.m. or before 8 a.m. The amended section 5(a)(1) bars a telephone solicitation on a Sunday, after 7 p.m. or before 9 a.m. Section 5(a)(10) separately bars them on a legal holiday.

If you schedule call blocks by state, compare it with the others in our guide to state telemarketing calling hours.

Worked example. An SDR team in Chicago works a list of Pennsylvania contacts. Pennsylvania is on Eastern time, one hour ahead.

Day	Allowed in Pennsylvania	Same window in Chicago
Monday to Friday	9:00 to 19:00	8:00 to 18:00
Saturday	9:00 to 19:00	8:00 to 18:00
Sunday	No calls	No calls
Legal holiday	No calls	No calls

The trap is the late block. A team that ran a 17:30 to 19:30 Central “after work” session for Pennsylvania mobiles was inside the old 9 p.m. limit. From 18 Oct, everything after 18:00 Central is out.

What now counts as a telephone solicitation

The old definition was a “call”. The new one is a telephone call, voicemail, ringless voicemail or text message to a residential, business or wireless telephone subscriber, made to sell consumer goods or services or to gather information for that sale.

Five things are excluded, as before, with one change to the first:

1. A call or message made under the subscriber’s prior express written consent. This replaces the old “express request” exclusion.
2. A call about an existing debt, contract, payment or performance.
3. A call to someone with whom the seller or telemarketer has an established business relationship in the past 12 months.
4. Calls on behalf of certain tax-exempt organizations and veterans organizations.
5. Calls on behalf of a political candidate or party.

Prior express written consent is defined in the act. It is a written agreement between the called party and the seller that:

• names the phone number the person agrees to be called or texted on;
• clearly says the person consents to telephone solicitations, including robocalls and texts;
• says consent is not a condition of buying anything;
• is signed, and an electronic signature under the federal E-SIGN Act counts.

That closely follows the federal definition in 47 CFR 64.1200(f)(9), which also requires a signed written agreement naming the number and saying consent is not a condition of purchase. Our guide to TCPA prior express written consent walks through a consent form that meets it.

Myth check: “Pennsylvania now covers B2B cold calls”

You will see this claim in vendor posts. The text supports half of it.

The amended act adds “business” subscribers to the definitions of telemarketer, telephone solicitation and the do-not-call list. But the purpose test did not move. A telephone solicitation is still a call to sell “consumer goods or services”, and the act defines those as property or services “used for personal, family or household purposes”.

So a call from a rep selling payroll software to a finance director reads differently from a call selling home solar to the same person on their mobile. The first is about a business purchase, the second a household one. Where your program sits, and whether any of your products could be bought for personal use, is a question for your counsel. Don’t decide it from a blog post, including this one.

Two things apply either way. Federal rules still apply to your calls, and Pennsylvania’s caller ID and deception rules below are written broadly.

The other new rules, in one table

Rule	Section	What it says
Robocalls need written consent	5(a)(11)	No robocall to any residential, business or wireless line without prior express written consent, except emergencies or other exemptions in the act. A robocall uses an automated dialing system to deliver prerecorded or artificial voice calls or messages.
Company-specific opt-outs cover texts	5(a)(2)	Once someone says they don’t want solicitations from you, stop. For texts, STOP, QUIT, END, REVOKE, OPT OUT, CANCEL or UNSUBSCRIBE counts.
Say who you are, early	5(a)(5)	During the first contact, disclose the purpose of the call, the telemarketer’s name and what is being sold.
End the call when asked	5(a)(8)	Now covers messages too.
No tricks to get consent	5(a)(12)	No unfair or deceptive practice to obtain consent.
No deceptive synthetic messages	5(a)(13)	No technology or synthetic or computer-generated messaging to defraud, deceive or mislead a subscriber.
Caller ID	5.1	No action meant to hide or falsify your name or number, or to get around a subscriber’s call-screening product. The old “if your equipment can send it” qualifier is gone.
Federal rules adopted	5(a)(9)	Breaking the federal Telemarketing Sales Rule, the Truth in Caller ID provisions of 47 U.S.C. § 227(e) or FCC caller ID rules is now also a Pennsylvania violation.

The caller ID row matters for any team that rotates numbers or relies on tricks to avoid spam labels. Pennsylvania now treats getting around a person’s screening tools as a violation in itself. Read our guide to removing a Spam Likely label for the clean way to fix a flagged number.

Do-not-call and registration

Pennsylvania keeps its own do-not-call list, and the act lets it include business subscribers as well as residential and wireless ones. Telemarketers making telephone solicitations must get the listing every quarter, or use a service provider that does. A new entry becomes binding 30 days after the first quarterly list that includes it. Our article on the national do-not-call registry for B2B calls covers the federal side.

Telemarketers must also register with the Office of Attorney General at least 30 days before selling. The exemptions moved into a new section 3(b.1) and include a B2B one: a business that has operated for at least 3 years under the same name with at least 50% of its dollar volume from repeat sales to existing businesses. A new exemption (13) covers anyone whose calls do not meet the definition of a telephone solicitation.

A checklist for Pennsylvania lists this week

1. Tag every contact with a Pennsylvania number or address.
2. Move Pennsylvania call and text blocks inside 9:00 to 19:00 Eastern, Monday to Saturday.
3. Stop Sunday sends and Sunday dialing to those contacts.
4. Decide with counsel which of your campaigns sell consumer goods or services.
5. For those, check consent records against the four-part written consent test and pull the state’s quarterly do-not-call list.
6. Add the seven text stop words to your opt-out handling.
7. Make sure every rep’s opener gives their name, the company and the reason for the call.

How DialSavvy handles this

DialSavvy runs compliance checks before every call: calling hours in the contact’s time zone and your do-not-call list. Per-state US rules, such as Pennsylvania’s 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. window and Sunday ban, are coming, as are public-holiday calendars and national DNC registry checks. Until then, keep Pennsylvania contacts in their own list and schedule their blocks inside the state window. Every call shows a real, registered caller ID that we run as the carrier.

If you call into Pennsylvania, book a demo and bring a sample list. We’ll show you how the time-zone checks handle it and where you’ll need your own rules for now.