# Oh noes! I offended a telemarketer!
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [June 26, 2006, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235 "2006-06-26T17:40:22Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 5
### Author:  [@DiosaBellissima](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DiosaBellissima)
#### Post date: [June 27, 2006, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/81 "2006-06-27T22:30:04Z")
> [@Giles](#):
>
> I’m sure you didn’t intend this, but both the IRS and firms like H&R Block perform socially useful functions.
Thank you for pointing this out. You are completely right that my intentions weren’t to attack either group, as I understand the necessity and functionality of both. I just assumed that **Uncle** was of the opinion that I regularly hear from our clients: the IRS is eeeevvvvvill and unnecessary, while H&R Block is just trying to screw people over (many of our clients are ex clients of Block’s, with tax problems that were caused by improperly prepared returns). That said, I’m certainly not of this opinion, but I made a mistake in assuming that **Uncle** is.
Also, any negativity expressed from me about either is nothing more than anecdotal. There are plenty of people that are tremendously happy with the services of both (Ok, maybe Block a bit more than the IRS 😉 )
---
### Author:  [@Viridiana](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Viridiana)
#### Post date: [June 27, 2006, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/82 "2006-06-27T22:32:51Z")
I simply insist to all of them that there are no adults present to speak to them.
I wish I had a more of a big, burly man-voice to drive the point home. 😃
---
### Author:  [@DiosaBellissima](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DiosaBellissima)
#### Post date: [June 27, 2006, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/83 "2006-06-27T22:36:15Z")
**Viridiana** , I once had one (at home) as me if there was a grown up there she could talk to. She sounded older, so rather than jumping on her, I calmly informed her that I am, in fact, the grown up.
She said, very slowly, _“Sweetie. . . put. . . your. . . mommy. . . on . . . the . . . phone.”_
I said, “Well, considering I haven’t lived with my mother for a few years and the fact that she lives in another state. . . would you like her phone number?”
More stern, she says, _“Little girl. . . let me talk to your mother. NOW.”_
Long story short, she was calling to see if I would like to get my carpets cleaned by her company. Yeah. . . no.
---
### Author:  [@Smeghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smeghead)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/84 "2006-06-28T00:11:00Z")
> [@Miller](#):
>
> Post number 23.
Oh, bugger me.
To make up for it, I’ll share my favorite telemarketer story. My brother-in-law got a call from a carpet cleaning company. He listened to their pitch, then said “We don’t have any.”
“You don’t have carpets?”
“We don’t have floors.”
There was a moment of silence, then one or two erms and uhhs, then they hung up.
---
### Author:  [@DiosaBellissima](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DiosaBellissima)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/85 "2006-06-28T00:39:57Z")
**Smeghead** - carpet cleaners! My mom always used to hand me the phone when they’d call:
Me: _Why hello, friend. Tell me about your services._
Carpet people: Blah blah blah
Me: \*Ooh, interesting. We just may be able to use your services. Just delightful. \* _Mmmm hmmm._
Carpet people: : perking up: REALLY?
Me: _Yup, allow me to ask you something, friend. Can you get blood out of carpets?_
Carpet people: Oh yes!
Me: _Oh EXCELLENT! Now, can you get pig’s blood out of carpet?_
Carpet people: Um. . . sure!!
Me: _Oh, even better! Now, even if the pig’s blood is really, really ground into the pad. Like, hypothetically, ya know, lots of pigs have been sacr-- uh- - - slaughtered in there and it is really ground in there. You could get that out?_
Carpet people: Um, there might be a fee.
Me: _Oh, understandably! Now, let me ask you one more thing, dear friend. What about the blood of a virgin? Could you get that out of my carpet? Because if so, do I have the room for you!_
: click :
---
### Author:  [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/86 "2006-06-28T03:03:01Z")
> [@pinkfreud](#):
>
> One of the telemarketers that I hung up on was so infuriated that he called back and demanded to speak to “the manager.” I hung up on him again. He called back a third time and screamed “I fucked your daughter!”
I’d be really tempted to respond:
“Oh, Thank you, thank you – you’ve cured her of that silly _lesbian_ phase!”
---
### Author:  [@gazpacho](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gazpacho)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/87 "2006-06-28T03:22:17Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#):
>
> I’d be really tempted to respond:
>
> “Oh, Thank you, thank you – you’ve cured her of that silly _lesbian_ phase!”
He didn’t say when he fucked her. Maybe he is the cause of the lesbian phase.
---
### Author:  [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/88 "2006-06-28T04:32:47Z")
Increased employee turnover is a disincentive for telemarketing companies. Three guesses how ongoing abuse of telemarketers affects employee turnover. If telemarketing companies operate so as to offend the people they call, abuse of telemarketers will increase. If telemarketing companies operate so as to not offend the people they call, abuse of telemarketers will decrease. Abuse of telemarketers is no more than feedback that smart telemarketing companies should consider.
---
### Author:  [@furlibusea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furlibusea)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/89 "2006-06-28T05:23:28Z")
> [@Lissa](#):
>
> They’re sales-people. It’s little different than selling other products-- they’re just doing it over the phone.
No. There is a huge difference between a telemarketer and other sales people. In the latter, I have chosen a convenient time to go into a place that sells something I am interested in buying. In the case of the former, I have not chosen the time, or the product.
I still think my favorite telemarketers were the ones selling auto glass. Like I wouldnt think to replace the broken out windshield in my car if they didn’t call me.
---
### Author:  [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/90 "2006-06-28T05:33:38Z")
> [@galt](#):
>
> Why were you forced to be rude and talk over that poor telemarketer in your example, then? A self-righteous prig once told me that being rude to a telemarketer is not justified.
Rude and assertive are two different things. For example, your first comment was an assertive attempt to point out what you felt was a contradictory part in my logic. Your second comment was rude.
---
### Author:  [@galt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/galt)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 5:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/91 "2006-06-28T05:51:59Z")
> [@Lissa](#):
>
> Rude and assertive are two different things.
Sorry, but cutting people off while they’re trying to talk is a rude way of being assertive. Of course, you had to do it, because they were being rude in the first place by using the telemarketer tactic of not letting you talk.
> [@](#):
>
> Your second comment was rude.
You’re very perceptive.
---
### Author:  [@think\_quick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/think_quick)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/92 "2006-06-28T06:05:36Z")
> [@Enginerd](#):
>
> It’s a shitty job, but that doesn’t mean I have to waste my time on it. I’ll say “no thank you” once, but I get mad if they persist.
My favourite is when they mispronounce my name when asking for me. “Is Mrs Mispronounced there?” “No, there are no Mispronounceds here, sorry.” I’m not lying, I’m not rude, but it’s fun.
---
### Author:  [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/93 "2006-06-28T06:12:49Z")
> [@galt](#):
>
> You’re very perceptive.
Thank you.
---
### Author:  [@dnooman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dnooman)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/94 "2006-06-28T06:57:43Z")
My roommate and I usually don’t answer, sometimes hang up before the computer routes us to a person, and very rarely have some fun with them. We’re never rude to them (except the one time I said I was getting the “head of the household” and farted loudly into the receiver and hung up). I’ve known a few telemarketers, all were there briefly, all were sucked into the job by a disingenuous ad in the paper, and all felt sorry they had ever done it.
Anyways, we have, on occasion, started really loud fake fights while “getting” the person that they asked for. Some were meant to sound like drunken fights, some guys fighting over a video game, etc. My favorite was when this guy called up after we had both had about three beers. My roommate said “Sure, just a second.” in his most effeminate voice, and set the phone down. He pointed to the phone indicating that there was a telemarketer on the other end.
We proceeded to bicker on and on about everything from who ate the last pirce of bruschetta, to why that hot model guy Michel never called me back. There was even a sissy slap fight in there. All this in our best gay-diva accents.
I don’t know if the guy knew we were joking or not, but by the time we got back to the phone to tell him we couldn’t find the guy he wanted, he was beside himself laughing. My roomie picked up the phone and said “Ssssir…” and the guy almost choked and hung up.
I don’t like the idea of telemarketing in general. I figure that the poor person on the other ends gets enough hangups and rude people all day. So, I get a laugh out of it, and maybe they get a good story to tell their friends about.
Damn, I should have recorded some of those.
---
### Author:  [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/95 "2006-06-28T08:00:08Z")
dnooman: That sounds very close to one episode of (IIRC) Mad TV. (I’m fairly certain it wasn’t SNL.) Do you recall the episode where the woman couldn’t find a polite way to stop a phone conversation and asked her husband to help her? He started with, “Bitch! Are you STILL on the PHONE?” It went downhill from there but all of it very funny.
---
### Author:  [@sneezy5660](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sneezy5660)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/96 "2006-06-28T08:59:53Z")
My husband is my Do Not Call List. When a telemarketer calls, he talks to them. No, I mean he _talks_ to them: How’s the weather there? Do you use this product? Do you like it? On and on (he likes to talk). They don’t call back. 😃
---
### Author:  [@Leah\_M](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leah_M)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/97 "2006-06-28T09:02:49Z")
I worked for a telemarketing company once, when I was about 20, uninsured, and had so many medical bills from long-term illness that collectors were threatening legal action. The state of Vermont’s job assistance program is actually what placed me with the company, because I went to them after I couldn’t find a job.
I lived in rural Vermont, where there were nearly zero jobs available. I had to travel 20 minutes just to get to this one. I was trained on ‘Political Surveys’ my first day.
Our call center did half a dozen things. Ordering overflow for catalogue companies, political surveys, solicitations for car insurance. Ordering overflow for infomercials and Vermont Teddy Bear. Some tasks were much easier than others.
The two weeks of day training in political surveys made me sick. You’re instructed to read a script, and if you don’t follow it to the letter, they threaten to fire you. If you say anything not on the script, your job can be terminated. They monitor calls, and tell you that randomly the politicians you’re working for will be listening in. We called people in Georgia and were instructed to lie and make them think we were local. I don’t know how a Northern Vermonter was supposed to sound like a Georgian anyway, but that’s besides the point.
We were monitored, they started putting keyloggers in our computers and told us we weren’t allowed to have newspapers or books near our cubicles because it was ‘unprofessional’. We weren’t allowed to talk to other coworkers because they said it encouraged ‘gossip’ and was unprofessional.
We basically had to sit in our cubicle with our headset on and stare at the wall if we didn’t have any calls. At night, often a lot of the callers would be drunk, high, or perverts. I once got threatened by some guy who tried to solicit sexual talk over the phone, and told me if I hung up that he would come kill me.
I was never rude to any of the people I called, although plenty were rude to me. I was cursed at, screamed at, and insulted repeatedly. Turnover was high. A lot of people quit. Most of the people working with me were elderly, disabled, or single moms. For some of them it was a 2nd job to support their kids.
Sometimes the head honchos would visit, and if there wasn’t enough work, they would send everyone but one or two people home without pay for the rest of the day. We shared cubicles between shifts, and were told that if we didn’t like what we got, we could leave and be replaced.
One time our autodialer broke and rang back everyone we called, every 2 minutes. I wanted to walk out, that day.
During the Holiday season they enforced 12 hour mandatory overtime. I worked several 15 to 18 hour shifts with a 104 fever and two infected ears. After they had us work all that overtime, they issued us our paychecks.
Which promptly bounced. So all the checks I wrote out to pay bills also bounced, and I was slammed with fee after fee for my bounced checks and overdraft fees. They called a meeting and ‘explained’ to us that their funds had ‘crossed’ in the bank, and that it would never happen again.
Two weeks later, it happened again. I was told by my senior coworkers that it was a regular occurrence. My supervisor had had six of her paychecks bounce in six months. They had been instructed not to talk about it, though.
I immediately called them and told them I would not be coming back to work. Ever.
I tried to get the money that was due me, and the fees that they put in writing that they were going to pay, but whenever I called them they told me that the person I needed to talk to was ‘unavailable’ and they would ‘call me back’, which they never did.
Since then, there has been some sort of civil suit against the company, but I’ve since moved away, and lost track of what was going on.
I could have probably done something about it, but I was only 20, and didn’t really know much of anything at the time.
I also decided I would rather starve or go to jail than work that kind of job again.
Because of that, I’m generally very nice to telemarketers, but I have no qualms about hanging up if they pester me. I will never, ever be rude to one, though. Frankly, tech/customer support people piss me off more than telemarketers ever will, but that’s a different ballgame.
---
### Author:  [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/98 "2006-06-28T11:41:03Z")
> [@Lissa](#):
>
> It’s not their _choice_ to persist. They’re given a list of “rebuttals” and if they don’t recite them, they can get in trouble. (The managers often monitor the calls.)
>
> I once worked as a telemarketer for four days. We were only supposed to call places of business, not residences. We didn’t like it any more than the recipients of the call, but it was the rules of the telemarketing center.
>
> Look, I’m not saying you have to sit there and listen to them. Simply saying, “No thank you. Please remove me from your calling list,” and hanging up is sufficient. (The telemarketer will probably be grateful not to have to repeat the rebuttals for the twentieth time that day.) My objection is to people who take out their frustration on the telemarketer by being nasty to them. There’s no reason to do that.
>
> Many centers are computerized. If the call is ended before the telemarketer hangs up, it’s automatically bounced back to the dialer. (Which is why the magic words “remove me from your calling list” are so important.) Some centers actually instruct the telemarketers to call back manually if the call is “disconnected.”
>
> Guys, they’re not doing this for shits and giggles, nor do they get jollies out of the idea they’re annoying people. All they want is a paycheck.
After dealing with telemarketers at work and at home for year, I say tough shit.
---
### Author:  [@UncleRojelio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleRojelio)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/99 "2006-06-28T13:14:52Z")
> [@Giles](#):
>
> I’m sure you didn’t intend this, but both the IRS and firms like H&R Block perform socially useful functions. The IRS gathers money so that it can be spent on things that our representatives have agreed are socially useful, like health, education, roads, social welfare. And firms like H&R Block help ordinary taxpayers comply with the complex laws surrounding this process. Both very socially useful, in much the same way as your firm is useful, and as most telemarketers are not. (And I’ve never worked in the tax business, on either side, so I’m completely unbiased here.)
Here again, both the IRS and H&R Block are unnecessary middlemen. If the government needs tax money if should simply be able to decree that every citizen should send a check to the Treasury and then every citizen would do so, without any bitching, whining, stalling, or griping. No one would need any complicated laws interpreted and no one would need any complicated forms filled in. The IRS and H&R Block are drains on the process of gathering money to the Treasury. Will there every be a human society where things would be that simple? I doubt it, but it would be nice.
---
### Author:  [@D\_Odds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Odds)
#### Post date: [June 28, 2006, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235/100 "2006-06-28T13:39:57Z")
> [@UncleRojelio](#):
>
> Here again, both the IRS and H&R Block are unnecessary middlemen. If the government needs tax money if should simply be able to decree that every citizen should send a check to the Treasury and then every citizen would do so, without any bitching, whining, stalling, or griping. No one would need any complicated laws interpreted and no one would need any complicated forms filled in. The IRS and H&R Block are drains on the process of gathering money to the Treasury. Will there every be a human society where things would be that simple? I doubt it, but it would be nice.
What color are the skies in your world?
[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235.md?page=4)
[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-noes-i-offended-a-telemarketer/362235.md?page=6)