Texas Court Ruling Provides Legal Clarity On Texting And Email Delivery

According to the judge, text messages are “far less intrusive than phone calls.”

A federal judge in Texas has issued a decision that offers some legal clarity for debt collectors using digital communication channels, ruling that text messages do not carry the same inherent intrusiveness as telephone calls and reaffirming that the “mailbox rule” applies to modern email.

The decision in Robertson v. TrueAccord Corp., handed down in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas, addresses a recurring friction point in Fair Debt Collection Practices Act and Telephone Consumer Protection Act litigation: whether digital outreach follows the same restrictive rules as traditional voice contact.

In the case, the plaintiff alleged that TrueAccord’s text messages constituted harassment under the FDCPA. The court rejected this argument, noting that the agency sent 11 messages over two months — a volume it deemed insufficient to prove intent to harass. The court also pointed to the inclusion of an opt-out mechanism (“Reply STOP to opt out”) as evidence that the consumer maintained control over the communication flow.

“This conduct does not approach a level that would allow the court to infer an intent to harass, especially because text messages, like letters, are easily ignored and far less intrusive than phone calls,” the court stated in its opinion.

The ruling is particularly noteworthy for its treatment of the mailbox rule. Traditionally, this legal doctrine creates a rebuttable presumption that a document is received once it is placed in the mail. The Robertson court confirmed this logic extends to email.

When TrueAccord provided business records showing a validation notice was emailed without a bounce back or undeliverability error, the court found the burden shifted to the consumer to prove they did not receive it.

The plaintiff attempted to rebut this by showing screenshots of an inbox search conducted after litigation began. The court found this insufficient, noting, “Because plaintiff has presented evidence only of email searches performed some indeterminate time after this litigation began, she has not rebutted the presumption created by the mailbox rule.”

Beyond FDCPA claims, the case also addressed the definition of an Automatic Telephone Dialing System (ATDS) under the TCPA. Following the precedent set by the U.S. Supreme Court inFacebook v. Duguid, the court looked at the content of the messages to determine the nature of the dialing technology.

Because the texts contained personalized information, such as specific debt amounts unique to the plaintiff’s account, the court concluded that the system could not have been a prohibited random or sequential number generator. The court noted that the inclusion of account-specific data makes it “implausible that defendant sent them to her using a device that randomly generates the phone numbers to be contacted.”

For an industry that has seen FDCPA litigation increase 26.5% year-over-year in early 2026, according to recent WebRecon data, the Robertson decision provides a defensive framework for agencies moving toward digital adoption.

“In Branham v. TrueAccord, TrueAccord spearheaded case law finding that email is not as intrusive as a phone call, and now we have a companion case that finds the same is true about text messages,” Katy Neill, general counsel and chief compliance officer for True Accord, wrote in a blog post.

The Robertson decision aligns with long-standing industry efforts to modernize communication standards under Regulation F. For years, ACA International has advocated for a regulatory environment that recognizes the shifting preferences of consumers toward digital channels.

Recent data from the TransUnion Debt Collection Industry Report shows that text/SMS adoption in the industry jumped from 45% in 2024 to nearly 60% in 2025.