Can They Call Me Now? Calling-Hours Checker for Telemarketers and Debt Collectors

Pick where the person called is, and see their local time, whether a sales call or a debt collector is inside the federal 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. window, and what 15 states with their own statutes add. Everything runs in your browser.

Published 2026-10-27 · By Andrew Pickett, OmegaIT · Not legal advice

Not legal advice. This page summarizes public rules and states which statutes we read. It does not model consent, business relationships, exemptions or legal holidays, and it cannot tell you whether a particular call broke the law. For a dispute, read the statute and ask a lawyer or your state attorney general.

Who is calling?

A telemarketer or sales callA debt collector

Where is the person being called? State

Time zone there

Or start from their area code

Typed here, used in your browser, never sent to us.

When?

Right nowA time I choose, on their clock

Choose a state and time zone, or type an area code, to see the answer.

The federal rule in one paragraph

For sales calls, the FTC's Telemarketing Sales Rule (16 CFR 310.4(c)) and the FCC's TCPA rule (47 CFR 64.1200(c)(1)) both set 8 a.m. to 9 p.m., measured at the called person's location, not the caller's. For debt collectors, the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (15 U.S.C. § 1692c(a)(1)) and the CFPB's Regulation F treat a time before 8 a.m. or after 9 p.m. as inconvenient unless the collector knows otherwise, and a collector must also honor times you say are inconvenient. None of these texts names a day of the week. Our guide, what time can telemarketers and debt collectors call, walks through the wording, the exceptions and a conversion table.

The checker treats the window as 8:00 a.m. up to, but not including, 9:00 p.m. It reads the time from your browser's clock and the time-zone database, so it follows daylight time (March 8 to November 1 in 2026) and the places that do not change their clocks.

The 15 state telemarketing rules we verified

Each row is a statute whose text we read in the legislature's or a code publisher's published text between October 24 and 27, 2026. We list only states whose hours differ from the federal window or add a day limit; a state not listed is unverified, not rule-free. Many statutes have exceptions, so read the section before relying on it.

State	Hours allowed	Applies to	Statute
Connecticut	9:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Telephonic sales calls to consumer residential, mobile or paging numbers.	Conn. Gen. Stat. § 42-288a(c)
Florida	8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Commercial telephone solicitation calls by commercial telephone sellers and salespersons, including automated and recorded calls. No more than three solicitation calls from any number to one person in 24 hours on the same subject.	Fla. Stat. § 501.616(6)
Maryland	8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Telephone solicitations, including automated and recorded calls; the statute lists exemptions. No more than three calls to the same person in 24 hours on the same subject.	Md. Code, Com. Law § 14-4502(c)
Massachusetts	8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Unsolicited telephonic sales calls to a consumer, measured at the consumer's location.	M.G.L. c. 159C, § 3
Michigan	9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.	Unsolicited commercial telephone calls, live or recorded, soliciting business or contributions (a misdemeanor under the penal code).	MCL 750.540e(1)(f)
Minnesota	9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.	Commercial telephone solicitation and automatic dialing-announcing devices; the statute does not say whose local time applies.	Minn. Stat. § 325E.30
Mississippi	8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., no Sundays (Central Standard Time (UTC-6) all year)	Authorized telephone solicitations to consumers; the statute fixes the hours in Central Standard Time.	Miss. Code § 77-3-723(1)
Nevada	9:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Soliciting a person by telephone at his or her residence between 8 p.m. and 9 a.m. is a deceptive trade practice.	NRS 598.0918(3)
Oklahoma	8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Commercial telephone solicitation calls by commercial telephone sellers and salespersons, including automated and recorded calls. No more than three calls from any number to one person in 24 hours on the same subject.	15 O.S. § 775C.4(A)
Oregon	8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Telephone solicitations, unless the caller has an established business relationship with the party (a previous transaction within 18 months). No more than three separate solicitations to one party in 24 hours.	ORS 646.563(1)(b)
South Dakota	9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., no Sundays	Unsolicited consumer telephone communications to a residence by telemarketers, received at the consumer's local time.	S.D. Codified Laws § 37-30A-3(2)
Texas	9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., Sundays from 12:00 p.m.	Unsolicited consumer telephone calls to residential numbers; calls made at the consumer's express request, about an existing debt or contract, or to someone with a prior or existing business relationship are excluded.	Tex. Bus. & Com. Code § 301.051
Utah	8:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., no Sundays, no legal holidays	Telephone solicitations to residential or cellular numbers without prior express consent: not 9 p.m. to 8 a.m., not on a Sunday, not on a legal holiday.	Utah Code § 13-25a-103(3)
Washington	8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Commercial telephone solicitors, at the recipient's local time.	RCW 19.158.110(4)
Wyoming	8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.	Unsolicited telephonic sales calls, at the consumer's location.	Wyo. Stat. § 40-12-302(d)

Federal law does not preempt state laws that are more restrictive on telephone solicitation within a state (47 U.S.C. § 227(f)(1)), so when a state window is narrower, both must be met. For debt collectors, the FDCPA likewise leaves in place state laws that protect consumers more (15 U.S.C. § 1692n); we have not verified any state's hours for collectors.

How the checker works

Whose clock. The rules use local time where the person called is. The checker uses the time zone you pick, with the zone lines from 49 CFR Part 71. States split by a zone line ask you to pick the side.
Area code shortcut. Typing an area code looks up its zone in NANPA's area-code report. A code is where a number was first assigned. Mobile numbers are not tied to a place (the CFPB's Regulation F commentary says so), so a person may be somewhere else. See area code time zones. To go from a ZIP code to its area code and zone, use the area code finder.
Mississippi sets its hours in Central Standard Time year-round, not local time; the checker follows the statute.
Privacy. Nothing you choose is sent to our servers or put in the page address. The page uses your browser's clock and time-zone database only.
What it does not model. Consent, established business relationships, nonprofit and political-call exemptions, legal holidays, caller-set limits on how many calls are allowed in a day or week, and text-message rules. Our FDCPA guide covers the seven-calls-in-seven-days presumption.

If a call came outside the window

Write down the number, the date, the time and your time zone.
Look the number up to see whether others reported it.
Report sales calls at donotcall.gov and unwanted calls or texts to the FCC; report a debt collector to the CFPB and your state attorney general. Our reporting guide has the steps.
Read the TCPA guide for consent and remedies.

Sources

Statute text last read October 24 to 27, 2026. Laws change; check the current text.

FAQs

Can telemarketers call me at 8:30 p.m.?

Under the federal rules, yes: the window runs from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. local time at your location. Several states are stricter and end sales calls at 8 p.m., including Florida, Maryland, Massachusetts, Oklahoma and Washington. Check your state in the checker.

Does the 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. rule apply to texts and to my cell phone?

The FCC's rule text applies its telemarketing rules, including the hours limit, to telemarketing calls or text messages to wireless numbers to the extent described in its 2003 order. Regulation F times a collector's text or email from the moment it is sent. This tool checks the clock only; consent and other exceptions are not modeled.

What if I gave a company permission to call me?

Consent changes the answer. The FTC rule begins “without the prior consent of a person,” the FCC's definition of a telephone solicitation leaves out calls made with your prior express invitation or permission, and the debt-collection statute lets a collector contact you outside the window with your consent given directly to it.

Why does the checker say a state is not verified?

We only list state rules whose statute text we read ourselves. A state missing from the table may still have its own hours. Ask your state attorney general's consumer protection office.