Some sales made at your home, at your workplace or at a seller's temporary location come with a federal right to cancel. The rule is the FTC's Cooling-Off Rule, 16 CFR Part 429. The window is short: it ends at midnight of the third business day after the sale.
The detail that trips people up
Under the rule, a business day is any calendar day except Sunday and federal holidays. Saturday counts. The FTC's own example on its consumer page: for a sale on a Friday, with no federal holiday on the Monday or Tuesday after it, the deadline is midnight on Tuesday.
Which sales the rule covers
The rule reaches a sale when the seller personally solicited it and the agreement was made somewhere other than the seller's place of business. The rule's examples: your home, a hotel or motel room, a convention center, a fairground, a restaurant, your workplace or a dormitory lounge. The price has to be at least $25 for a sale at your home, or at least $130 elsewhere. The purchase has to be primarily for personal, family or household purposes; courses of instruction or training are covered whatever the reason you take them.
The rule also has exclusions. Among them: a sale conducted and completed entirely by mail or telephone with no other contact before delivery; the sale or rental of real property, insurance, and securities or commodities sold by a registered broker-dealer; and a sale made after prior negotiations during your visit to the seller's permanent store. The template lists every exclusion and exemption in the rule, with its conditions and the section it comes from.
What the free template contains
A worksheet for counting your three business days, including how federal holidays are treated.
A checklist of the rule's coverage conditions, exclusions and exemptions.
A fill-in notice of cancellation.
What the rule requires of the seller within 10 business days after it receives your notice, and what it requires of you for goods already delivered.
The rule's own statement on state law: it does not annul state laws that give a cancellation right the same as or greater than the federal one.
If the seller gave you a completed Notice of Cancellation form, that form is itself a way to cancel under the rule: sign and date one copy and send it. The template covers everything around it, and gives you a notice to send if you do not have the form.
How the rule says to send it
The rule's own cancellation form describes mailing or delivering a signed and dated copy, or sending a telegram. The FTC's consumer page says a letter sent without the form must be postmarked within three business days of the sale, and describes certified mail with a return receipt as a way to have proof of when it was mailed and delivered.
The template (PDF, free):
Checked against: 16 CFR 429.0 to 429.3 (eCFR, text current as of 5 October 2026), and the FTC consumer page "Buyer's Remorse: The FTC's Cooling-Off Rule May Help" (read 7 October 2026).
Our product: Never Opted In also makes the Letters Kit, a paid set of templates for other federal consumer rules. It is not on sale, and this free template is complete without it.
Consumer information — not financial or legal advice. It does not create a lawyer-client relationship. Your state may give you rights beyond the federal rule described here.