so i just upgraded from Tech to General last month and ive been trying to figure out exactly what frequencies im allowed to use and i keep going in circles reading Part 97. like i understand theres phone and CW and data but the band charts are really confusing to me. for example on 40 meters am i allowed to do SSB voice anywhere in the general portion or is there more to it than that. also someone at my club told me i need to identify every 10 minutes but i thought it was every 15 and now im not sure. i dont want to get in trouble with the FCC before i even really get started lol

also separate question kind of - does the FCC actually monitor this stuff or is it more like an honor system situation. asking because a guy on a net i listened to last week was being really rude and someone said they were gonna report him but nothing seemed to happen

the 15 minute thing is right, your club guy is off on that one. part 97.119 says you gotta ID at least every 10 minutes during a contact AND at the end - wait no that IS every 10 minutes, my bad. so actually check 97.119 directly because im second guessing myself now. point is its not every 15, pretty sure its 10.

on the 40m question, as a General you get phone privileges from 7.175 to 7.300 MHz so yeah SSB is fine in there. the lower chunk of 40m is CW/data only for generals, Extra class gets a bit more. the ARRL band plan chart is way easier to read than the actual FCC document, just google ARRL band plan and use that until you get a feel for it.

as for enforcement - the FCC does have agents but realistically they mostly go after the really egregious stuff, like people running illegal power or jamming. day to day rudeness on a net they're not gonna care about. the amateur community kind of self-polices which works with varying degrees of success depending on who you ask

yeah went through the same confusion when i upgraded honestly. one thing that helped me was just downloading the actual Part 97 PDF and using ctrl+F to search for whatever im trying to look up rather than trying to read the whole thing. its dense but if you know what section youre looking for its manageable.

the FCC enforcement question is kind of a whole thing. they do issue NOVs and fines sometimes but it takes a lot usually. there was a case a couple years back where someone got hit pretty hard for repeated interference but like... it took a while and someone had to actually file a formal complaint with recordings and documentation and all that. casual jerk on a net probably isnt gonna see consequences unless someone really pushes it