Answers

Is it legal for a small business to use an AI voice to call customers or leads?

Ascent Vision · Published October 25, 2026

Only with the person's consent. In a February 2024 ruling, the FCC's position is that AI technologies that generate human-sounding voices fall under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act's limits on artificial or prerecorded voices, so a caller needs the called person's prior express consent. Marketing calls need written consent. Other rules can apply too. This is a plain summary, not legal advice.

What the FCC ruled

In a declaratory ruling adopted on February 2, 2024, and released on February 8, 2024, the Federal Communications Commission took the position that the Telephone Consumer Protection Act's limits on an "artificial or prerecorded voice" cover current AI technologies that resemble human voices. It said voice cloning and similar tools produce "artificial" voice messages "because a person is not speaking them".

The FCC also said the law has no carve-out for technology that claims to provide the equivalent of a live agent.

Consent, identification and opting out

Place calls with an AI voice only with the person's consent. The ruling says callers must get the called party's prior express consent before a call that uses such a voice, absent an emergency purpose or exemption. A footnote adds that if the call introduces an advertisement or contains telemarketing, the FCC's rules require prior express written consent.

The ruling also says the FCC's rules require these calls to identify the entity responsible for the call, and, when the message advertises or is telemarketing, to offer ways to ask to stop. This is a plain summary, not legal advice, and other federal and state rules can apply as well.

Existing customers and cold leads

Other rules apply on top. The FTC's guide to the Telemarketing Sales Rule says telemarketers making outbound sales calls must promptly disclose the identity of the seller and that the purpose of the call is to sell, and that sellers must not call numbers on the National Do Not Call Registry or on their own Do Not Call list. The guide describes an established-business-relationship exception to the registry, but limits it to live calls from a sales agent, not automated or prerecorded calls; for prerecorded sales calls it requires the person's "prior signed, written agreement". So an existing customer is not a shortcut around consent for an AI voice. These are the agencies' positions; ask a lawyer before building a calling program.

Answering is a different question

The ruling concerns calls a caller initiates. Using AI to answer incoming calls is a different question: see the related answer on answering services and AI receptionists, and the related answer on consent to record customer calls. Texts have their own answer, the related answer on texting a new lead.

Sources

1. Federal Communications Commission, Declaratory Ruling, "Implications of Artificial Intelligence Technologies on Protecting Consumers from Unwanted Robocalls and Robotexts" (FCC 24-17, adopted February 2, 2024, released February 8, 2024)
2. Federal Trade Commission, "Complying with the Telemarketing Sales Rule"

Related answers

• Should a small business use an answering service or an AI receptionist?
• Can you text a new lead or a past customer, and what consent do you need?
• Do you need consent to record calls with customers?