What is Amendment 73 to the Consumer Protection Law?
Amendment No. 73 to Israel's Consumer Protection Law, 5741-1981 passed its second and third readings in the Knesset overnight on 16–17 July 2026, and was published in Reshumot, the official gazette, on 22 July 2026. It requires businesses that sell to consumers by phone to record their sales calls, retain the recordings for set periods, and deliver them to any consumer who asks.
The legislation grew out of a push against fraud and exploitation in telephone sales — especially against older people, new immigrants and people with disabilities, for whom the gap between what was said on the call and what was actually signed is hardest of all to prove.
In practice, the amendment shifts the burden of proof. Until now, a consumer who claimed something had been promised on a call had to prove it. From now on, if the business cannot produce the recording, the consumer's version is the one that stands.
Most publications — including the Tel Aviv Chamber of Commerce and the business press — call this Amendment 73, and that is the number people actually search for. The law firm Gornitzky, however, publishes the very same amendment, with the very same dates, as Amendment No. 74. Several amendments to the Consumer Protection Law were moving through the Knesset in parallel, and the final numbering follows the order of publication in Reshumot.
What is not in dispute is the substance: passed by the Knesset on 17 July 2026, published in Reshumot on 22 July 2026, in force from 22 March 2027, a threshold of NIS 750, and the sectors listed in the Ninth Schedule. If you are relying on the amendment number in a legal document, verify it against the published statute.
When does the law take effect?
The law takes effect on 22 March 2027, eight months after its publication in Reshumot. The relevant government ministers may defer application by up to four additional months for particular types of business, so timing can differ from one sector to the next.
Connecting your phone system, defining a retention and deletion policy, writing a script for your agents and actually rolling it out — all of that takes months, not days. Businesses that begin in January 2027 will find themselves competing for the attention of exactly the same vendors.
What is the NIS 750 threshold, and what counts as a transaction?
The duty applies to distance transactions priced at NIS 750 and above. A transaction below that amount is not subject to the recording requirement under the amendment.
One practical point: the final value of a deal usually only becomes clear at the end of the call — yet the duty to record covers the call in full. That is why most businesses choose to record every sales call rather than try to judge mid-conversation whether it crosses the threshold. It is also the safer approach legally.
Who is required to record?
The duty applies to businesses in the sectors listed in the Ninth Schedule to the law, among them:
- Selling goods following an outbound phone call initiated by the business (food excluded)
- Loan brokerage
- Tracing lost or unclaimed funds
- Checking eligibility for medical entitlements
- Checking eligibility for tax refunds
- Telecom and mobile services
- Internet and television broadcasting services
- Credit score improvement services
- Ongoing maintenance and repair services
- Ongoing healthcare services
- Domestic gas supply
In parallel, matching amendments to the sectoral supervision laws imposed similar recording duties on banks, insurers, supervised financial service providers and pension marketers — for marketing calls the institution itself initiated.
In most sectors the duty attaches to a call the business initiated to the consumer. A call the consumer initiated — an inbound call to a service center, for example — is not necessarily treated the same way. This is worth clarifying for your specific sector.
What exactly is required? The three duties
1. Announce and record
At the start of every relevant call, you must tell the consumer that the call is being recorded and that they have the right to receive the recording. From there, the call must be recorded in full.
2. Retain
The retention period is set by the outcome of the call:
| Situation | Retention period | Counted from |
|---|---|---|
| A deal was closed | Two years | Date of the transaction |
| No deal was closed | Six months | Date of the call |
What this means in practice: "keep everything forever" is not a policy. You need to know, for every single call, whether it led to a deal, and manage the deletion date accordingly — not least so you are not holding personal data longer than you should.
3. Deliver to the consumer
A consumer who requests the recording is entitled to receive it, along with the details of when the calls took place, within 10 business days of the request. The first delivery is free of charge; a reasonable fee may be charged for repeat requests.
What is the penalty for non-compliance?
The law has two layers of enforcement, and the first is by far the more significant:
The evidentiary sanction
A business that fails to deliver the recording or the call details as required will be treated in civil proceedings as having admitted the consumer's version of what was said on the call. On top of that, it will not be able to submit the recording or a transcript of it as evidence without the court's permission.
This is an unusually sharp sanction: it turns every consumer dispute into a case that is decided in the consumer's favor before it starts. The court may allow the business to rebut the presumption if it can show reasonable justification for the failure to deliver.
Financial sanctions
Alongside the evidentiary sanction, the law sets financial sanctions in the tens of thousands of shekels per violation, depending on the type of offender (a sole trader or a corporation).
The precise amounts were reported in different versions across the media during the legislative process. Before relying on a specific figure, verify it against the text of the law in the official statute book or with legal counsel.
Readiness checklist for your business
- 1Check whether you are in the Ninth Schedule — or subject to an equivalent duty as a supervised financial institution
- 2Map your phone sales channels — which numbers, which agents, which phone system
- 3Make sure your phone system records — and that recordings land somewhere you can actually search
- 4Add an opening announcement covering the recording and the consumer's right to receive it
- 5Set up deal tagging — every call has to know whether a deal closed, so retention can be calculated
- 6Implement a retention and deletion policy — two years / six months, automatically
- 7Build a delivery procedure — who takes the request, how you find the call, how you send it and how you log it
- 8Train your team — agents need to know what they are announcing and why
Kal Siha connects to your existing phone system, records and tags calls automatically, enforces the retention and deletion policy the law requires, and lets you locate a call in seconds and deliver it over a secure link — with a full record of the delivery.
Frequently asked questions
What is Amendment 73 to the Consumer Protection Law?
Amendment No. 73 to Israel's Consumer Protection Law, 5741-1981, is an amendment that passed its second and third readings in the Knesset in July 2026 and was published in Reshumot, the official gazette, on 22 July 2026. It requires businesses that sell by phone to record sales calls on transactions of NIS 750 and above, retain those recordings, and deliver them to any consumer who asks. Its purpose is to combat telephone sales fraud, primarily against older people, new immigrants and people with disabilities.
When does the law take effect?
On 22 March 2027, eight months after its publication in Reshumot. The relevant government ministers may defer application by up to four additional months for particular types of business.
What is the transaction threshold that triggers the duty to record?
NIS 750 and above. A transaction priced below that is not subject to the recording duty under the amendment.
Which sectors are required to record sales calls?
The sectors listed in the Ninth Schedule to the law: selling goods following an outbound phone call initiated by the business (food excluded), loan brokerage, tracing lost or unclaimed funds, checking eligibility for medical entitlements, checking eligibility for tax refunds, telecom and mobile services, internet and television broadcasting, credit score improvement, ongoing maintenance and repair services, ongoing healthcare services and domestic gas supply. In parallel, recording duties were imposed on banks, insurers, supervised financial service providers and pension marketers for marketing calls they initiate.
How long must a recording be kept?
Two years from the date of the transaction if a deal was closed, and six months from the date of the call if no deal was closed.
How quickly must a recording be delivered to the consumer?
Within 10 business days of the day the consumer made the request. The first delivery is free of charge; a reasonable fee may be charged for repeat requests.
What is the penalty for a business that does not record, or does not deliver the recording?
A business that fails to deliver the recording or the call details as required will be treated in civil proceedings as having admitted the consumer's version of what was said on the call, and will not be able to submit the recording or a transcript of it as evidence without the court's permission. The law also sets financial sanctions in the tens of thousands of shekels per violation.
Do you have to tell the customer that the call is being recorded?
Yes. The consumer must be told at the start of the call that it is being recorded, and that they have the right to receive the recording.
This guide is a general overview of the main provisions of the amendment, last updated 18 August 2026, and does not constitute legal advice. The binding text is the one published in the official statute book. Before making business decisions, we recommend consulting a lawyer who specialises in Israeli consumer protection law.
Written by the Kal Siha team at Bitomatic Software Solutions Ltd, based on tracking the legislative process. Primary sources you can check yourself: the Knesset legislation database, the Israeli Consumer Protection and Fair Trade Authority.