We provide this free financial resource to visitors of the Community Room of SeniorSSuperStoreS in an effort to keep baby boomers, seniors and the elderly informed of matters that can affect their lifestyle.

Maybe you enjoy receiving telephone calls about subjects that interest you or products and services you may need or want. And, for sure, we know you enjoy being interrupted at dinner time when these calls invariably come!

The Telephone Preference Service (TPS), a free consumer service sponsored by the Direct Marketing Association, is designed to assist those of us consumers who want to decrease the amount of national unsolicited non-profit and commercial calls we receive at home.

You may register with the name removal file by mailing your name(s), home address, telephone number (remember your area code) and signature in a letter or on a postcard to:

Telephone Preference Service
Direct Marketing Association
P.O. Box 9014
Farmingdale, NY 11735-9014

The MPS does not accept e-mail.)
Your request will remain on file for five years.

When you register with TPS, your name is placed on a "delete" file which is made available to companies four times a year - January, April, July, and October. You should expect to notice a decrease in the amount of advertising calls approximately three months after your name is entered into the file. Registering with TPS will not end all advertising calls. You will continue to receive calls from companies with which you do business and from charitable or commercial organizations which do not choose to use TPS. In addition, you may continue to receive calls from many local merchants, professional and alumni associations and political candidates.

You cannot request deletion from specific lists through TPS since the TPS is general in nature. You may reduce the number of direct marketing solicitations you receive from a specific company by writing directly to that company and asking to be put on the company's in-house suppress file.

If you continue to receive unwanted calls after a few months, the Direct Marketing Association suggests that you request your name be removed from a company's list when they call.

Finally, your registration with TPS does not stop advertising calls from coming to you at work since business names and addresses are not placed on the TPS file, and companies which make calls of a business-to-business nature do not use the consumer file.

We understand that the Federal Government will soon enact a government-endorsed program you can use to remove your phone number from tele-marketing lists, but until then, this information may serve to make your life more bearable.