The Overlooked Compliance Risk in SMS: Quiet Hours and Emergencies

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. SMS regulations, including quiet hours and emergency restrictions, vary by jurisdiction and can change without notice. Always consult your legal counsel to ensure your messaging practices comply with applicable laws.

If you’re sending SMS campaigns across the U.S., you’re also managing a quiet, creeping problem: quiet hour and emergency compliance.

Texting laws vary by state, change without warning, and depend on things like natural disasters and local time zones. And yet most sales and marketing teams still rely on spreadsheets, guesswork, or default platform settings to stay compliant.

That’s not just inefficient—it’s risky.

Let’s break down what the rules really are, how they impact your outreach, and how teams can stay compliant without slowing down.

What Are SMS Quiet Hours?

Under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), marketing text messages must not be sent before 8:00am or after 9:00pm in the recipient’s local time zone—if they are sent using an automated system and the recipient hasn’t provided prior express written consent.
(FCC TCPA Rules – 47 CFR § 64.1200)

This 8am–9pm restriction is the federal baseline, but some states enforce stricter quiet-hour rules.

Here’s where things get tricky:

• Quiet hours vary by state and may change over time

• "Local time" refers to the recipient’s location, not the sender’s

• Many states span multiple time zones, which complicates scheduling

Because of this, most teams default to the 8am–9pm rule—and use tools to automate enforcement—rather than risk accidental noncompliance.

Emergency Messaging Restrictions Are Real

States can declare emergencies—due to natural disasters, power outages, fires, or extreme weather—that trigger temporary SMS restrictions.

When that happens, outbound texts may need to pause immediately. But few teams have a process in place for that. Consider this: 

• Over 1300 state-level emergencies declared in the U.S. in the past 5 years
• In 2023 alone, 34 states issued at least one emergency impacting consumer communication
• Emergencies are often declared late at night or on weekends—when teams are offline
  
  

What Happens If You Get It Wrong?

Sending messages outside legal windows or during emergencies can lead to:

• Hefty TCPA fines (up to $1,500 per violation)
• Carrier filtering or throttling
• Damaged trust with your audience
  
• Legal exposure, especially in regulated industries
  

Many teams think quiet hour enforcement is “baked in” to their platform—but in reality, most platforms leave the configuration up to you.

Why Staying Compliant Is So Hard

• State rules change
• Emergency alerts don’t follow a set schedule
• Multi-time-zone states like Texas or Florida need special treatment
• Internal delays in pausing campaigns add legal risk
  

And while legal teams might understand the rules, they’re not the ones launching the campaigns.

The result? Confusion, delays, and risk—right when you're trying to scale your outreach.

Meera's Compliance Control Center Makes It Easier

Instead of hoping your team gets it right every time, Meera bakes compliance into your messaging workflow:

• Preloaded quiet hour defaults by state
• Support for multi-time-zone logic
• Manual or automatic Emergency Pause
• Legal acknowledgment prompts and audit trails
• 24/7 instant replies to inbound messages (always allowed)

Everything lives in a single dashboard. No more toggling between spreadsheets and CRM. No more racing to pause a campaign when something goes wrong.

The Compliance Burden Is Real—But It Doesn’t Have to Be Yours

If your team is managing high-volume SMS campaigns, compliance is not a side task—it’s mission-critical.

Check out how Meera’s Compliance Control Center helps you manage the risk without guesswork.