Announced Actions for March 28, 2001

The Commission has approved amendments to the following: Parts 2, 3 and 4 of the FTC's Regulations on Organization, Procedure and Rules of Practice. As detailed in a Federal Register Notice to be published shortly, the FTC is updating and making other technical corrections and changes to more than twenty of the Rules of Practice and related rules. The changes include electronic filing requirements, new procedures for expert discovery, in camera motions and foreign subpoenas, and changes in the format requirements for briefs. The content of each amendment will be detailed in the Federal Register notice.

The FTC is accepting public comments on the amendments for 30 days following their publication. Twenty copies of each comment should be sent to: Donald Clark, Secretary, Federal Trade Commission, 600 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W., Washington, D.C. 20580. If no further Commission action is taken after this comment period, the amendments will become effective 45 days after their publication and will govern all subsequent Commission adjudicatory proceedings. They will also govern all pending Commission adjudicatory proceedings begun 45 days after their publication in the Federal Register unless, in the opinion of an Administrative Law Judge, the application of one of more amended rules in a particular proceeding would not be feasible or would work an injustice. The vote to approve the amendments was 5-0. (FTC File No. P89907; staff contact is John D. Graubert, 202-326-2186.)

Copies of the documents mentioned in this release are available from the FTC's Web site at http://www.ftc.gov and also from the FTC's Consumer Response Center, Room 130, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20580. The FTC works for the consumer to prevent fraudulent, deceptive and unfair business practices in the marketplace and to provide information to help consumers spot, stop and avoid them. To file a complaint, or to get free information on any of 150 consumer topics, call toll-free, 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357), or use the complaint form. The FTC enters Internet, telemarketing and other fraud-related complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to hundreds of civil and criminal law enforcement agencies worldwide.