# Ask the person who calls people--telephone surveys

**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-person-who-calls-people-telephone-surveys/638056
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [October 17, 2012, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-person-who-calls-people-telephone-surveys/638056 "2012-10-17T20:07:52Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 9

<div class="post-metadata">

### Author: ![Flyer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/flyer/32/7298_2.png) [@Flyer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flyer)
#### Post date: [October 18, 2012, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-person-who-calls-people-telephone-surveys/638056/9 "2012-10-18T00:14:37Z")

</div>

> [@janeslogin](#):
>
> When there is a death in the family and the persons answering the phone are grieving do you continue to call?

I personally will take the number off the list in such a case, and I believe that most other people will as well.

> [@Ludovic](#):
>
> If you called me a telephone survey I’d feel a bit dehumanized 🙂

I’m very sorry, sir–I’ll call you a taxicab right away.  
😃

> [@Lanzy](#):
>
> Persistance in that “we” did not use the right wording to tell surveyors to stop calling is a pretty dickish thing to do. After all it is impossible to understand it any way other than to do what ever it takes to stop calling us. Why does anyone want to call people back that have no interest in being called? Because it is a company rule? Any company that acts like this is extremly lame and slightly retarded.

Based on personal experience and a small amount of cursory research, it seems that most survey companies act the same way. Not interested in doing the survey? Too bad–do it anyway or be bugged until that particular project ends.

> [@Ludovic](#):
>
> Is the money awsome?

This particular company starts you out at $8/hour. Considering the type of work, it’s my opinion that anything above minimum wage is relatively awesome.

> [@snowthx](#):
>
> Here is my question - what is the secret wording that will get companies like yours to stop calling? Is all we have to say is “Please take me off your list.”? Are there other iterations of this that we should know and keep by the phone?
> 
> Also, does your company keep track of “live” phone numbers? One way we avoid picking up the phone is due to caller ID. But if I pick up the phone to tell you not to call here, do you capture that somewhere? I presume phone lists are sold and resold amonst these companies, so a phone number identified with people who actually pick up would be useful, yes? Or would it be better to never pick of the phone with an unknown number?
> 
> And, please do not take this the wrong way, your job is an annoyance to just about everyone, so do not be surprized when people are not happy to hear you and are not following the script.

Your last point first–  
I personally consider this type of job to be several rungs up from telemarketing (which is something that I would be extremely reluctant to do). All in all, I’m satisfied with my job. Plus, I’ve never been one to really care what other people think. So your comment doesn’t bother me at all.

As far as “secret wording” goes–regardless of the type of company, either “Take me off your list” or “Put me on your Do Not Call list” will usually work. Some companies simply have a list of people to call, and if you’re not on the list, you won’t get called. Other companies have an internal Do Not Call list, and they call everybody who’s not on it.

We “grunts” are given very little information about how the company gets the numbers that we call. For a few surveys, we’re actually told that it’s random dialing. For some surveys, I’m fairly certain that we simply get lists of registered voters. But for the most part, we’re not directly told where the numbers come from.

At my company, at least, it doesn’t matter whether you answer or not. We’ll simply keep calling until the project ends. We have the ability to see how many times we’ve called a particular number, and I’ve seen cases where the answering machine has picked up 5 or 6 times.

---

_[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ask-the-person-who-calls-people-telephone-surveys/638056)._