I’ve had all my telephone numbers registered with federal government’s Do Not Call program for years. And for years, it’s worked like a charm. Never to be disturbed, nor abused by wankers. Of course, the partial wankers during the election cycle were polite and stopped calling when asked.
But for the past few months, these telemarketeers, masquerading as research firms conducting surveys, have found a way to skirt the law. Thank God for Caller ID (it shows up on the TV screen) so we let such calls go to voicemail. Of course, they don’t leave a message, but they keep calling for weeks on end. At some point they either stop, take a breather, or tag team with other “research firms” who then start calling. Ad Infinitum.
Tonight the call came from 270 643 0222. The number and dates from the Google hits indicate those calling from this number have been abusing people for years. The correct process is to register a complaint with donotcall.gov. Been there. Done that. Nothing happens. Just the more than one million Google hits on this number (did I say going back years?) is prima facie evidence the FTC is either naive, impotent, understaffed, misdirected or ordered by some politico higher up the food chain not do do anything about it.
It doesn’t do any good to adequately reason with the schmucks who are conducting these “surveys.” They’ve got the script down pat. Probably need the job, especially in this economy. Still, is there anything one can do? Can I threaten to call them abusers and tell them I will blow my police whistle into the receiver if they call me again?
same problem here, I just let my answer machine handle it and delete later. I have also tried answering and just putting down the phone and recheck if any one is talking every 5 minutes or so. This won’t work if its a recording. And finally if its a real person, they probably have a headphone on, get a really shrill, high pitched whistle, and blow yourself happy. Just make sure its not your mom calling first!
The magic phrase is ‘Put me on your internal do not call list’. These companies call for several other companies, and the internal list stops ALL the companies they call for. Ask for the name of the company and the caller’s name-they are required to give you this information. The name of their supervisor is a good idea as well. Write these down with the time of the call and the phone number.
It takes about 24 hours for the list to kick in. If they call again after that, you simply turn the number into the FCC… and the calling company gets a nice $11,000 fine per call. It doesn’t take them long to catch on.
Trust me… letting the machine take the call or sitting the phone down does nothing. And blowing a whistle in the ear of someone just trying to make a living is beyond rude, to me. These are human beings, doing whatever they have to do to put food on the table.
They are legally required to do this, yes. However, the recordings don’t usually allow this option. And if you press 1 to talk to the salesperson, they won’t give this information, they’ll just hang up on you.
People who choose to telemarket have given up their rights to be respected, as they don’t respect the rights of others.
I can sympathize with a lot of the telemarketers. Being unemployed or on state aid a lot of them have no choice.
I know people on food stamps in Illinois have to work for them. Well most do unless there is good reason not to and they are put into programs and guess what, telemarketing is one that gets used a LOT. The other thing that uses welfare recipients is ex-con programs.
So it may come down to, to get your food stamps you need to work them off at minimum wage by doing telemarketing. Or credit collections is another one that is big on welfare and ex-cons.
These are people that would like better jobs but in order to comply with conditions of their programs they have to do some work and there aren’t many industries who will just employ anyone. These type of industries will
I agree that I don’t like pushy sales people or telemarketing, but it must work 'cause people keep buying from them
Never-mind that, I saw a discovery channel show where the people manning the phones were in prison. They switch to a non-prisoner supervisor when they take your personal information but the pitchman is getting paid, in credits, for luxuries from the prison store. I don’t know how widespread this is, but this will never stop being cost effective, if you don’t really have to pay the telemarketer.
My parents several years ago used to have an option (through their phone company?) where if your number was not on their “approved” list, a recording came on and informed you that you would have to say your name at the beep and they would decide whether to pick up. (I called them from a hotel) I would imagine this puts a crimp in most telemrketing calls, especially recorded ones.