No to cold caller

[AmethystAnne]

31 years ago, I was a brand new bride. We had just set up housekeeping, and had just purchased a rug that was on clearance for $60 for the living room.

Somebody called to offer a great deal for steam cleaning , only $100.  I laughed and told the cold caller that I had one rug in our house and it had been in the $60 clearance aisle. She laughed too and thanked me for my time.

[Dragonflygypsy]

I am on the DNC list here in Australia but as mentioned earlier it doesn't stop politicians or charities calling. If it's a charity I just tell them that I don't want to waste their time and that I already have a set number of charities that I already subscribe to. I usually get a thankyou.

I did get caught out one Christmas before the DNC register was available and we had the India/Pakistan cold calling happening. I worked out that they were auto dialing and there was a sound gap for them when they couldn't hear me. I would pick up the phone and say hello, there would be silence and then either they would hang up or I would. Unfortunately I had a girlfriend trying to call me from the States and I was hanging up on her, too! She ended up emailing me to see if everything was ok. Boy, I was embarressed and told her the story and we prearranged a time to call (I think I ended up calling her as I could get cheaper calls and I felt soooooo bad).

[Itza]

Hi, didn't want to hijack the other tread, but here another cold caller:

Him: bla bla .... phone deal....
Me: I'm sorry, now is not a good time, i'm a little busy
Him: May I ask why it's not a good time? (i don't remember how he frased it exactly, but he wanted to know what I was doing)
Me: .... *stunned silence* No, of course not! *laughs*
*then we say our goodbyes and hang up*

What kind of answer would he expect? I'm doing a crossword? Potty training my child? In my bedroom having... er never mind.

Funny thing was, only a little while ago I would feel obliged to answer and would probably stutter out a quickly made up worth-while excuse. And sound like a total fake, of course. Ah well, hope he didn't think i was brushing him off. I just thought it was a totally inappropriate question.

I'm sorry, but if some cold caller interrupted me like that and dared to ask why it's not a good time, I'd have been tempted to say, "Because I'm scraping poopadities of my disabled son's bottom!"

I know that sounds gross e-hellions but that's my life *shrugs*

[kherbert05]

Oh, here in the UK, double glazing is the window with two panes of special glass and a gas inbetween for insulation. Cuts down on heating bills but the constant cold sales drive me nuts.

Lately the call centres have been relocated to India and the Phillipines so you get folk from the tropics trying sell insulation against the cold!

From the sub-tropics here it works in the reverse - keeps the heat out and ac in.

[emeraldsage85]

I was really not happy to recieve a telemarketing call the other night. It was 9:00 pm and I was asleep because I had to get up for work at 5:00 am. The phone startled me out of my sleep. I got up thinking, this better be an emergency of some sort! I'm afraid I was very short with the telemarketer on the other end of the line.

[cass2591]

I was really not happy to recieve a telemarketing call the other night. It was 9:00 pm and I was asleep because I had to get up for work at 5:00 am. The phone startled me out of my sleep. I got up thinking, this better be an emergency of some sort! I'm afraid I was very short with the telemarketer on the other end of the line.

I'm afraid that I'm missing your point.

[emeraldsage85]

I usually try to be curteous and polite with them. This time I just said, "I'm not interested" in a very irritated tone of voice and hung up.

[hellgirl]

I just don't understand the recorded messages with no contact details! I've had one, and I listened very carefully for the company name (so I could lay a complaint about their advertising methods).

If I had actually wanted to give them my business how would I contact them? 

I try and answer the telemarketing (or market research) calls, because DH will be quite short and hang up. I go for "Sorry, I'm not interested" or "Sorry, we have no need of that", interrupting them as soon as I can, so as not to waste their time.

Often this involves "Excuse me, but are you looking for donations? Yes? I'm sorry, but *whatever reason is appropriate*. Have a good day!"

It irks me when people are rude to people who are trying to do their job, even if that job seems designed to annoy.

But then again, I'm friendly and polite to people giving me fines and companies who have given atrocious service. Although for the latter the 'friendly' may slip after the 3rd phone call 

[cass2591]

I usually try to be curteous and polite with them. This time I just said, "I'm not interested" in a very irritated tone of voice and hung up.

My point was that there was really no reason for your first post. None of us is perfect and more than likely we've all been less than courteous with someone. Had you said something along the lines of "usually I'm courteous but this person woke me up and I was short with him/her but I felt bad about it in retrospect" I'd have no issue with you.

[Coruscation]

Telemarkerter: Hi, I'm ringing to offer you a chance to attend a money making seminar this month

Me: I'm sorry, I'm not available at the time the seminar in on

Pause

Slightly confused, cute sounding telemarketer: I haven't told you when its on, how do you know you won't be available (I think he was new)

Me: Well, I'm waiting here for my husband to take me to the hospital to be induced and I'm told I'll be pretty busy once the baby's born. I have a few moments to chat, though, I'm all packed.

Telemarketer Who Has Totally Lost All Control Of The Conversation : Ah, no I think I'll leave you be then. Thank you for your time.

 Hangs Up.

I wasn't even lying.

[JoW]

In the US the Do Not Call list does not apply to charities, politicians, companys you have dealt with recently, or folks you owe money to. 

If you are getting calls I suggest looking them up a this link.  http://800notes.com/  Its a message board, folks report their pests and share how they got rid of them.  I bumbled across it when some deadbeat gave my cell number to Wells Fargo bank, then stopped making car payments.  At one point Wells Fargo was calling my cell 3 times/day.  I ended up assigning them their own ring tone - no ring.  Or Google the number.  That often takes you to the website of the company that is calling.  Either method will give you enough information to take the next step.

The next step is to report the caller to the FTC.  There's a link on the DoNotCall site to the correct form.  They can file criminal charges, and may do that if a single caller makes lots of illegal calls. 

Normally when I get a telemarketer or other pest I listen long enough to confirm its not a wrong number, (I'll politely forgive an honest slip of the fingers).  Then I say "goodbye" and hang up.  It doesn't happen often. 

[ChristiKayAnn]

In the US the Do Not Call list does not apply to charities, politicians, companies you have dealt with recently, or folks you owe money to. 

If you are getting calls I suggest looking them up a this link.  http://800notes.com/  Its a message board, folks report their pests and share how they got rid of them.  I bumbled across it when some deadbeat gave my cell number to Wells Fargo bank, then stopped making car payments.  At one point Wells Fargo was calling my cell 3 times/day.  I ended up assigning them their own ring tone - no ring.  Or Google the number.  That often takes you to the website of the company that is calling.  Either method will give you enough information to take the next step.

The next step is to report the caller to the FTC.  There's a link on the DoNotCall site to the correct form.  They can file criminal charges, and may do that if a single caller makes lots of illegal calls. 

Normally when I get a telemarketer or other pest I listen long enough to confirm its not a wrong number, (I'll politely forgive an honest slip of the fingers).  Then I say "goodbye" and hang up.  It doesn't happen often. 

I had a very similar situation with Wells Fargo. this is how you stop the calls:
1)Answer the call,
2)ask for a supervisor,
3)tell them that Mr deadbeat is not at your number and if Wells Fargo calls again you are reporting them to the police for harassment
4)if they call again report them to your local police(non emergency number) who will contact them and tell them to knock it off (and send Wells Fargo a copy of the police report)

This did work in fact the supervisor took care of the problem without me having to resort to step 4 because my tone of voice was exasperated enough that he knew I was serious.

[Shoo]

Telemarkerter: Hi, I'm ringing to offer you a chance to attend a money making seminar this month

Me: I'm sorry, I'm not available at the time the seminar in on

Pause

Slightly confused, cute sounding telemarketer: I haven't told you when its on, how do you know you won't be available (I think he was new)

Me: Well, I'm waiting here for my husband to take me to the hospital to be induced and I'm told I'll be pretty busy once the baby's born. I have a few moments to chat, though, I'm all packed.

Telemarketer Who Has Totally Lost All Control Of The Conversation : Ah, no I think I'll leave you be then. Thank you for your time.

 Hangs Up.

I wasn't even lying.

That is a very cute story!

[JoW]

Actually, I let them hang up on my voice mail 3 times/day for 2 weeks.  Then I answered one and said "may I ask what this is about?".  She said no and I told her I had googled the number and knew she was from Wells Fargo and the person she was looking for is not available at my number.  I haven't heard from them since. 

[JadeAngel]

I don't agree with being rude to telemarketers, my uncle boasts of his habit of asking them to hold and then simply leaving them hanging there until they give up and hang up the phone, but I happen to think (and I have told him this) that that is appalling behavior, usually they are just people trying to make a living like the rest of us, and being rude to them doesn't have the effect of changing any of the policies of the companies which employ them.

That being said there have been a couple lately which have taken the biscuit.

Usually my method for dealing with cold callers at work is to tell them that the person they want to speak to is unavailable and to invite them to leave a message. They usually decline since you can't call in to these call centres and say they will call back later. Two or three rounds of this and they have their three 'no's' and usually give up and cease calling back.

But sometimes...

The first woman was from a 'business development company'. I used my usual tack of telling her that Mr Big Boss (BB) was unavailable and asking her to leave a message and as always she declined. At one point she got through to Mr BB (he was expecting a call from a woman with a similar name) and began her spiel regarding a 'business development seminar' they were running that she had been instructed by her 'managing director' to ring and invite him to attend. At this point my boss politely declined the offer and instead of saying 'thank you for your time' this woman proceeded to argue with him telling him that he didn't understand how important it was that he attend this seminar and that he needed to put down his name for tickets immediately. He firmly told her no and hung up the phone.

She's since rung back three times asking to be put through again and (as instructed) each time I tell her he's unavailable and invite her to leave a message. Two weeks ago I told her that Mr BB was on an extended business trip (which is true) and wouldn't be back for weeks (by which time the seminar date would have well and truly passed) and yet she has still rung me three more times since.

Perhaps she's expecting me to produce Mr BB from an expanding file 'Oh look he was here all along! Silly me.'


The second was a woman who worked for a 'recruitment agency' and had noticed our employment ad in the newspaper (for the position I currently occupy which was last advertised over a year ago) she rang to offer her 'qualified candidates' for an interview and I thanked her and told her that we weren't currently hiring and that when we did we generally didn't use employment agencies.

Her response was 'well then can I make a time to come in next week to discuss your salary and get a copy of your standard contract. (!!!)

She seemed genuinely surprised when I told her that information was confidential and I couldn't divulge my salary or the terms of my contract.

On what planet does anyone give out that information?