And there was a great cry of rejoicing throughout the land.
The CRTC opens its anti-telemarketer service Tuesday, the 30th of September. You can sign up your phone numbers on this service. After a month, telemarketers will not be allowed to call them.
Details:
from Wikipedia: National Do Not Call List - Wikipedia
from the CRTC: http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/dncl.htm (English), Erreur 404/404 Error | CRTC (French)
This is great news.
This part bothers me though:
I assume this means my bank will still be pestering me every other day for some new service or other, they’re by far the biggest culprits for me.
ETA: Lost part of my quote, but this is from the gov site indicating which companies are exempt from the do not call list.
Great, and I’m definitely signing up. My number is already unlisted, but that doesn’t seem to matter to the pushier telemarketers.
There are too many exceptions to the new law, though. I’ve already had one call to tell me that since I have an “established business relationship” with the company (my cellphone provider, and guess what line they called me on?), I can’t avoid their calls after September 30. I simply hung up, and I will continue to do so if they call again. I’ve since resolved to become just as rude with other companies who hide behind such things as “established business relationships.” By taking advantage of this provision and calling me even though I tell them not to, they’re worse than the random telemarketers.
I’m glad we now have a do not call list, but I think the whole question should have been specifically opt-in–in other words, nobody selling anything, or soliciting for charity, or a political party, or a company with whom I have already done business may call me for any reason unless I specifically state that they can. If we had a law like that and enough people didn’t opt-in, we could get rid of the telemarketers.
The streets would be overrun with them, for the sake of public safety we must keep some of them contained. Imagine hordes of out-of-work telemarketers crowding around your car waving their squeegees at you at every intersection :shudder:
That’s already taken care of in Ontario: the Safe Streets Act. And it’s been declared constitutional by the Ontario Court of Appeal: cite.
Ew. It’s bad enough in Toronto already.
I’m okay with the exceptions:[ul][li]political parties (I don’t mind talking to peoplw reting to convince me to vote for them)[]polling companies (doesn’t happen a lot, but I’m okay with them)[]newspapers selling subscriptions (a rather odd exemption)[]companies with existing business relationships (nothing I can do about that)[]charities (don’t get many calls from them[/ul]This will cut down on the calls from Anna the Mover, who claims she’s local, but caller ID shows a number in the 641 area code, and I don’t even know where that is; or “Card Services” (a known fraud, especially since I don’t have a credit card); or that fraudy number that babbles a brief message in Spanish and tries to get you to call back (I think I get this one because I put a message in Esperanto on my answering machine to scare the telemarketers off); or the ductwork cleaners (sorry, I have rads); or the carpet-cleaners (sorry, hardwood floors throughout); or the dozen that don’t leave a message, especially the ones that come up with a fake caller-ID number that isn’t even a real phone number, like “000-000-0000”; or… I think you get the idea.[/li]
I’d say a good 90% of the calls to my home number are telemarketers. I get two or three a day, sometimes after 9PM.
Okay, so I just registered my number online. There seemed to be absolutely no confirmation that the number was actually mine to register - so I could if I wanted sign up all of Saskatoon? Be a bit tedious, granted, but still, seems odd to me.
I understand the established relationship and charity exemptions, but why the hell do newspapers get an exemption? I guess I’ll just have to see if I can get the Star Phoenix to take me off their call list voluntarily.
Done! I’ve registered my home and cell numbers. 
I’m almost gonna miss some of the telemarketers since I learned to have some fun with them. A few months ago I had a call from one (it wasn’t the first time they’d called either), after they said who they were and why they were calling I exclaimed “Finally, I’ve been waiting for you to call!” and started reading from whatever I had on my computer screen at the time, a blog or something. I haven’t been able to do it again because I can’t keep from laughing, I was just in the right mood that day. It was funny listening to the telemarketer trying to get me to shut up so he could talk, he eventually hung up. Most of the exempt groups don’t bother me that much though, so I’ll have to retire that schtick.
I just registered my home number and forgot to do my cell :smack:, thanks for the reminder Sunspace.
I registered for the DNC list as soon as it became available. I’ve had a lot of success in getting businesses to quit calling me, even if we have a pre-existing business relationship. I just tell them that we prefer to be contacted by mail, as we work very odd shifts and will not tolerate telespam…we’ll switch companies if they keep on calling us. Generally I ask to talk to a supervisor.
Is that the sound of great cheering I hear coming from the north? Y’all are going to be amazed at how much nicer life is going to be.
Its a start, but I wont be satisfied until political parties , charities and so forth are optional on my part.
So far this is about 70 percent there.
Declan
Stateside, it has indeed been effective getting rid of telemarketing calls. Unfortunately, it seems to have led to an increase the asshole fraudulent “card services” and “car warranty” calls.
Unfortunately, the Canadian Do Not Call list does nothing to stop American telemarkers from calling into Canada, and the American national Do Not Call list does not accept Canadian area codes any more.
Yes it is.
Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah! … (continues until voices get hoarse and start to squeak…)
When I lived in NJ the telemarketing calls were intolerable, so the do not call list was a godsend. If I never speak to another telemarketer for the rest of my life I’ll consider it a blessing. Telemarketers suck . If the current problems on Wall Street are going to put anyone out of business I hope its telemarketers.
I’ll cheer too. It’s about time you caught up.
Too bad they waited too long in the USA. People will never be nice on the phone again, and you can blame the shift directly on being hassled for years by telemarketers.
I’m puzzled by the fact that they gave the newspaper subscriptions an exemption. Actually, scratch that… I’m seriously annoyed by that.
Every other telemarketing call at our house is someone trying to sell me the Toronto Star (the other half are from SPECIAL OFFERS!! related to my HBC credit card, which I’m ready to outright cancel out of frustration). Inevitably, I get someone whose grasp on English is ummm… tenuous… at best. The last one would pause for 30 seconds at a time trying to find the appropriate objection handling statement, until I finally just wished her a good day and hung up.
I miss the days when I could trip up the newspaper guys with “Sorry, I don’t read.” Flies right over their heads now. 
Thanks for the reminder - I just signed up.
Probably won’t stop the majority of the calls we get (I’m looking at you, Scotia Visa) but at least it feels as though I’ve done something…
I was afraid of this. I think the really scammy ones are coming from the States. And I’ve read of scammy operations in Toronto targeting the States.