FDS Restaurant, Inc. v. All Plumbing, Inc., No. 16-CV-1009, 2020 WL 1465919 (D.C. Mar. 26, 2020)
In a recent TCPA junk-fax case, the District of Columbia Court of Appeals drew the intuitive conclusion that businesses do not incur TCPA liability whenever their products are advertised via fax. The proposition that strict vicarious liability does not apply to advertised businesses is a simple one, but—as the D.C. Court of Appeals noted—courts have diverged as to the proper standard to apply for assessing vicarious liability for faxes sent in violation of the TCPA. In FDS Restaurant, the D.C. Court of Appeals had to decide for itself which standard to apply in this context.