Summary#
This bill would require employers to give 120 days notice before moving a call center or contracting call center work to a location outside the United States. The Secretary of Labor must keep a public list of employers who relocate or contract call center work overseas. Employers on that list would be ineligible for federal grants or guaranteed loans for 5 years, with limited exceptions and narrow paths to be removed from the list. Employers who fail to give the 120-day notice may face a civil penalty up to $10,000 per day.
The bill defines which operations count as a call center and which employers are covered (generally employers with 50 or more call center employees or equivalent hours). It also requires that federal contracts include a condition that any call center work performed under the contract or subcontracts be done inside the United States, and that agencies give preference to bidders not on the public list.
The bill requires the Secretary of Labor to report to Congress within 1 year on where federal call center work is done, how much is done by federal employees versus contractors, and any job losses tied to use of artificial intelligence for customer service. The bill defines artificial intelligence for this purpose.
For customer service communications generally, the bill requires business entities to have each employee or agent disclose their physical location at the start of the call or electronic communication. If the agent is outside the United States, the agent must also tell the consumer they may request an immediate transfer to a U.S.-based agent. If artificial intelligence is used, businesses must disclose that a nonhuman system is being used and that the consumer may request transfer to a human agent in the United States. Consumers who request a U.S.-based human agent must be immediately transferred. Businesses must certify yearly to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) whether they complied with these requirements. The FTC will enforce violations under its authority over unfair or deceptive acts or practices.
What it means for you#
- If you contact a business for customer service, the person or system answering must say where they are physically located and, if AI is being used, that fact. You may ask to be transferred to a human agent who is physically located in the United States and must be transferred immediately under the bill.
- If you work in a covered call center, your employer would need to give 120 days notice before moving operations abroad or contracting call center work overseas. Employers that relocate or contract out covered work may appear on a public list and face limits on receiving federal grants or guaranteed loans.
- If you are a business that uses customer service agents, you must add these disclosures to communications, allow transfers to U.S.-based human agents on request, file a yearly certification with the FTC, and follow the 120-day notice rule before relocating or contracting call center work overseas.
Expenses#
- Civil penalty for failing to provide the 120-day notice: up to $10,000 per day (as specified in the bill).
- Employers placed on the Secretary of Labor's public list are generally ineligible to apply for or receive any direct or indirect federal grants or federal guaranteed loans for 5 years after being added to the list.
- For employers that received a federal grant or guaranteed loan and are later added to the list, the bill requires a monthly penalty equal to 8.3 percent of the total grant or loan payments dispersed to the employer as of the date the first penalty is due. Agencies must stop further disbursements to such employers while they are on the list, and may cancel the grant or loan if the employer remains on the list one year after the first penalty payment is required.
- The bill allows an employer on the list to become eligible for a grant or loan earlier if it certifies and meets the removal criteria within specified timeframes; failure to meet those terms can trigger clawbacks and cancellation.
- Penalty amounts paid to an awarding agency are available to the agency for the related grant or loan program without further appropriation, but cannot be redistributed to the same employer.
- The FTC will enforce the disclosure requirements under its existing authority; the bill does not include a separate budget estimate or broader federal cost estimate. No publicly available information on overall federal implementation costs is provided in the bill text.
Proponents' View#
No publicly available information.
Opponents' View#
No publicly available information.