In Michel v. Credit Protection Assocation, 2017 WL 3620809, at *4–5 (N.D.Ill., 2017), Judge Dow granted summary judgment for a debt collector who held two different creditors’ accounts, and was autodialing a debtor.  The Court explained that a debtor’s revocation of consent to be called when the debt collector called on only one of the accounts did not revoke consent to be called as to both accounts.  Since consent was separately given with respect to each account, consent must be separately revoked as to both accounts.
The Court agrees with Defendants that revocation of consent for one creditor is not revocation of consent for all creditors, and thus even if Plaintiff can prove that he revoked his consent for CPA to call on behalf of Comcast when he called CPA in January 2013, he did not revoke his consent for calls from ComEd or from CPA on behalf of ComEd. When Plaintiff allegedly provided his cell phone number to Comcast and ComEd to set up accounts with these creditors, he granted each creditor prior express consent to call his cell phone regarding that creditor’s specific debt. See 2008 TCPA Order, 559, 564, ¶ 9 (“[T]he provision of a cell phone number to a creditor, e.g., as part of a credit application, reasonably evidences prior express consent by the cell phone subscriber to be contacted at that number regarding the debt” (emphasis added)). When Comcast placed an account with CPA to have CPA collect the debt Plaintiff owed Comcast, CPA then acquired consent to call Plaintiff, but only regarding the Comcast account. See Toney, 75 F. Supp. 3d at 735 (“[A] third-party contractor performing services for the entity to which a plaintiff provided her cell phone number stands in the shoes of that entity in a consent analysis.”); Kolinek v. Walgreen Co., 2014 WL 3056813, at *3–4 (N.D. Ill. July 7, 2014) (“[T]he scope of a consumer’s consent depends on its context and the purpose for which it is given. Consent for one purpose does not equate to consent for all purposes.”). Thus, CPA did not have consent to call Plaintiff regarding another creditor’s account, as “prior express consent provided to a particular creditor will not entitle that creditor (or third party collector) to call a consumer’s wireless number on behalf of other creditors[.]” 2008 TCPA Order, at 565, ¶ 10 n.38; see also Andersen v. Harris & Harris, Ltd., 2014 WL 1600575, at *10 (E.D. Wis. Apr. 21, 2014). In other words, the consent was creditor-specific, as it was established through the creation of a specific debt. See 2008 TCPA Order, at 564–65, ¶ 10 (emphasizing that “prior express consent is deemed to be granted only if the wireless number was provided by the consumer to the creditor, and that such number was provided during the transaction that resulted in the debt owed”).   When Plaintiff called CPA in January 2013 and allegedly asked CPA to stop calling his cell phone, he was returning a call that CPA made regarding the Comcast account, and therefore revoked his consent only for calls made on behalf of Comcast. That is, Plaintiff’s revocation was creditor-specific, just as the consent was creditor-specific. Plaintiff could not anticipatorily revoke consent for all calls to be placed by CPA on behalf of potential future creditors, such as ComEd. Rather, CPA separately acquired consent to call Plaintiff on behalf of ComEd when the ComEd account was placed, and that creditor-specific consent exists because CPA’s calls on behalf of ComEd are treated as if ComEd itself placed the calls. See Frausto v. IC System, Inc., 2011 WL 3704249, at *2 (N.D. Ill Aug. 22, 2011) (holding that the defendant debt collector was the equivalent of the party to whom the plaintiff had provided her cell phone number for purposes of the TCPA); Greene v. DirecTv, Inc., 2010 WL 4628734, at *3 (N.D. Ill. Nov. 8, 2010) (plaintiff, who gave Equifax her phone number for a fraud alert, consented to an automated call made by defendant, a third party who received the phone number from Equifax). Plaintiff never clearly revoked the consent he allegedly gave to ComEd. Therefore, CPA cannot be held liable for its calls to Plaintiff on behalf of ComEd.
*5 Although it may have been tedious for Plaintiff to discern that CPA was calling on behalf of two different creditors, this does not change the fact that CPA obtained Plaintiff’s prior express consent separately through each creditor. Plaintiff still must revoke his consent separately for each creditor.6 Nor is the Court persuaded by Plaintiff’s argument that CPA was required to cross-reference accounts submitted by creditors to determine if a consumer had revoked consent for a different creditor simply because CPA has the technical capacity to do so. Rather, when Plaintiff allegedly revoked his consent for calls on behalf of Comcast, the TCPA simply required CPA to refrain from calling Plaintiff using an ATDS regarding the debt Plaintiff owed to Comcast.