If they try to press on after I say “Sorry-not interested”, it becomes Telemarketer Season.
This is pretty much me. Word-for-word: “Thank you, I’m not interested. Please take my name off your list.” Click.
I say that as soon as I hear it is something - anything - I did not request or someone I do not know.
I worked for 2 weeks as a telemarketer before the experience cut so deep in my soul I just stopped showing up. The interesting part was that I wasn’t so much moved by the super angry, profanity-laced tirades but rather the troubling amount of elderly that I was calling who didn’t want to buy but still lonely/polite enough that they just wanted someone to talk to.
Luckily I only worked 2 weeks. What I understand is that the long-term workers are so jaded and calloused that they prefer you to end it within the first 15 seconds so they can move on to a sucker that will actually buy rather than waste time with the frivolities of niceties.
Surveys I will do, but always check if they are selling anything before we start. If they assure me they aren’t, and then it becomes clear they are, I say “You just said you weren’t selling anything - why would I do business with you if you lie to me?” Then hang up.
Sellers (and charities) - the first time it’s “put us on your do-not-call list” click. After that it becomes progressively more abusive.
If it’s those assholes from Account Services, I am very abusive indeed. Very, very abusive. It doesn’t help, but it amuses me.
Regards,
Shodan
Don’t have a landline, so I don’t get many (any?) anymore.
However, at work there is some idiot carpet cleaning place that has robocalls with some guy yelling about great deals to have your carpets cleaned. Everybody at work hates those calls and if the owner of that business came to our workplace, I think his body would never make it out alive.
Me too. I let them get their pitch out. I compliment the pitch and I end the call.
“It sounds great, but I’m not interested. Thanks and please remove me from your call list.” I only get those calls once in a while at my mom’s house. She doesn’t have caller id.
I have a couple times gotten the “your computer has viruses” scam, and I definitely play with those calls. I have put them on speaker and pretended to be going through my pc and doing what they say. By the time they get to the part where I have to go to a website to grant them access, the jig is up and I have to laugh and tell them I know it’s a scam and hang up.
Funny thing though, one time, when I was working in sales, management introduced a new program which was basically a scam. It involved selling tech support to poor schmucks who inadvertently click an add that would do a scan on their pcs and find tons of “problems”. Management tried to convince us this wasn’t a scam. Of course, eventually it became so blatantly obvious that it was, they stopped the program.
They stopped it with us but they moved it to our Indian call centers. So now, when I get a scam call from someone in India, I do wonder if they are *totally *scamming or working for someone who tries to convince them that it’s not *really *a scam.
I usually just notify the caller that I’m going to do him a favor and let him get to his next call.
Or her; it could be a “her.”
I talk over them, especially if its a bill collector otherwise I just hang up but my uncle has a different method for spammer/scammer telemarketers lol he wastes their time to the point they actually hang up as some have done before.
Forgot: I did give one lady the full-on Boiler Room treatment - made her go through her pitch while giving pointers, told her she did a great job, and then said I wasn’t interested in her product. I kind of felt bad about that one, but I’m pretty sure I boosted her sales.
For sales calls, I say “I’m not interested, thanks”, then I wait a couple of seconds before hanging up. That way it’s up to the telemarketer whether the ending is polite or not.
If the caller says, “Okay, have a nice day” and hangs up, then it was a perfectly nice phone call.
If the caller starts launching into a spiel, then I’ve just hung up on him in mid-sentence and it was less nice.
I just don’t answer my phone if I don’t recognize the number. Actual people who have legitimate reason to contact me will leave a message.
While I despise telemarketers, whose purpose is to take advantage of the fact that people have to respond to their telephone (if a “telemarketer only” phone line was installed netx to everyone’s “family, work, and emergency” line, no one would ever answer it), I find myself being ruder to wrong number callers than to telemarketers.
This is because wrong number folks are usually quite rude and/or presumptive themselves, whereas telemarketers don’t start out rude, except for the nature and timing of their calls.
Seller: “I’m not interested. Good bye” and hang up.
Survey: I will take the survey if I have time.
Scammer: I mess with them as much as possible. The last time one called (from “Card Services”), I had my son blow the guy’s ears out with his Boba Fett blaster.
That’s what we do most of the time, too. (Should have been a poll option, of course.) Occasionally I’ll pick up, then immediately hang up, if I don’t want to hear the phone keep ringing. And every now and then, for a lark, I’ll pick up and see what they want.
While I never pick up if I don’t recognize the number*, it can be worse when they do leave a message.
‘GOOD AFTERNOON. WE ARE CALLING TO INFORM YOU THAT THE WARRANTY ON YOUR CAR HAS EXPIRED. PLEASE CALL US AT XXX-XXX-XXXX TO IMMEDIATELY RENEW YOUR WARRANTY. beep…click…GOOD AFTERNOON. WE ARE CALLING TO INFORM YOU THAT THE WARRANTY ON YOUR CAR HAS EXPIRED. PLEASE CALL US AT XXX-XXX-XXXX TO IMMEDIATELY RENEW YOUR WARRANTY. beep…dial tone’
Usually obnoxiously loud. Sucks ass if you were trying to watch a movie or play a game or have a conversation. I want to throw the entire landline out and never have an answering machine again. I haven’t won this battle yet.
*Ok, i do pick up if the same place calls me over and over and it’s a person. Usually I can tell them SORRYI’MNOTINTERESTEDDON’TCALLHEREAGAIN and then hang up and it works.
Here is how I deal with those vermin.
Unfortunately I can’t go by caller id - I work for various temp agencies, and my husband gets calls from various places, and the chances of an unknown number being a valid call are about 50/50. I don’t like the phone ringing and ringing and ringing, so I answer and deal with it as quick as possible (sometimes I just answer and hang up immediately, if the number is from the Bahamas or something so obviously belonging to a telemarketing company).
The Do Not Call registry is also a big fat joke - the exemptions to it are so large that it might as well not exist, in my experience.
This serves me fine at home, but I own a small business and cannot make myself trust that it’s not a potential client calling (sometimes - when the name line says “Call Center” or “TELEMRKT” I can let it ring). One time in twenty five picking it up has been the right move.
When I do pick up I never start out rude. And most of the time I’m not rude at all, but if I’ve been polite and politely repeated my answer three times I hang up on people. I do say “I’m ending this call now” first.
I was getting spam calls on my cell phone-I think my ex gave my number to some folks, for I do not-and they quit after a registered the number with the do not call folks.
Mr. Rogers.
“I’m not interested, thank you anyway. Have a nice day!”
Then I hang up.