My number one rule in phone etiquette is TO SAY GOODBYE, dammit!
My brother never ever does this. He ends phone conversations with, “Okay”, “Yep”, etc, then click. God this pisses me off.
I can usually tell if it’s a telemarketer. I haven’t bothered updating my listing in the phone book, so if I get a call saying “Hi, is Ms or Mr Maidenname there?” I usually know it’s a telemarketer, and just tell them that nobody by that name is here. They go away quicklike.
But at home, it’s just “Hello”. If it’s family, or friends, then they know who I am without having to be introduced, and if it’s otherwise “Business” (ie bills, real estate, blah blah) then they can bloody well ask for me.
I don’t have a landline anymore b/c I only used it for dial-up–I never even knew the number–so I switched to a cable modem and now have my cell phone only.
Thus nobody ever calls to talk to anyone but me; if it’s a friend, I answer with “HEY WOMAN!” or “What’s up?” or “Hey dude!” or something equally casual. Even when I do say “Hello?” it’s generally with some sort of phony over-the-top intonation. (Eliza Doolittle is a particular favorite.)
If I don’t know who’s calling, I have a hard time answering the phone…I hate hate hate talking to people I don’t know, or people who are trying to sell me something. On those occasions when I do pick up the phone, out of morbid curiosity, I just say “Hello?”
I never say who I am. If you call me, you’d better already know who I am, and if you don’t, you’re gonna tell me who YOU are first. (That way I can claim to be Audrey’s roommate who will gladly give her a message for you, in the event that I don’t want to talk to you.)
At work I answer the phone, “Bar X, this is Audrey.” We get a lot of calls for regulars at the bar, generally from their mothers/boyfriends/girlfriends/wives/friends, etc., and these people always want to know which bartender they’re talking to so that they can call back in an hour and go, “Audrey, Jane still hasn’t come by?”
As for telemarketers, I generally interrupt their spiel with, “I’m so sorry but I’m not interested,” and hang up.
I don’t get many telemarketers on my cell (although I get called for a lot of surveys for some reason) so I’m still moderately polite.
This would change, I’m sure, if they called more often.
Another one who just says, “hello”. It is the caller’s job to let me know who is on the phone, not mine to let them know who they have reached.
However, this did not go down well when I was living in Germany. Germans are trained to say their name when they answer the phone, “Schmidt”, or “Muller”.
It would drive them nuts when I would just say, “Hello.”
Their first words were, “with whom am I speaking?”
“Who are you trying to reach?”
“Well, who is speaking?”
“You tell me.”
Oh the fun I would have.
However, after a few years, I noticed some of my German friends liked the way I answered the phone and they adopted the generic, “hello” as well.
As far as telemarketers, I have no more problem. My land-line is turned on to low, I can’t hear it ring and it goes directly to the answering machine - always, even if I am at home and sitting next to the phone. My family and friends know it, so they will speak. But most people call me on my cell phone. I really don’t know why I still have the land line, other than to give out the number to utility companies and to put on applications and stuff. Nobody important ever calls me on that phone.
Here’s something that always threw me. It seemed to happen most frequently with Pakistanis calling for one of my roommates (also Pakistani) in college.
Me: Hello?
Caller: Hello?
Me: …
What were they expecting me to say to that? After I say “hello” I expect the person to state his/her purpose, ask for somebody, or hell, even ask me who I am. But what does just a return “hello?” mean?
I like being a wise guy, especially if I know who’s calling… “St. Paul’s Cathedral, Paul speaking” usually throws them off. Or do my best Mr. Humphries impression and say in a low voice “menswear”.
I used to work as an office assistant, and one of my primary duties was to answer the phone and transfer calls. Our handbook said to answer with “Good Morning/Afternoon, <Name of my university and the department I work in> Front Desk, This is Ragu, how may I help you?”
I shortened that to “Howdy, <Department name>, this is Ragu, how may I help you?” or, if I was feeling particularly harried, “<Department name>, this is Ragu.” (nobody seemed to be offended if I did this, and once I was actually On The Phone, I shifted into a very polite way of speaking (I learned this trick from my mom, who could shift from swearing in Spanish to smiling and talking pleasantly on the phone in as much time as it took for her to answer the phone).
-At one of my jobs, we’re supposed to say, “Audio-Visual, this is deskmonkey, how can I help you?” but usually I just say “Audio-Visual” in a pleasant tone. I should probably also say my name since I apparently sound like my boss, and professors occasionally get huffy about having to speak with student workers.
-My family used to answer the phone with “Namesons.” It worked until my parents got divorced…
-Now I just answer the phone as if shocked that anyone would call me. Often I get confused with my mother, and tend to be as unhelpful as possible, especially with certain people.
“GS Sr? We simply have to talk about–” “This isn’t she.” “Oh…who is this, then?” “GS” “Oh. Is she there?” “No.” “Oh. Pause Can I leave a message?” “Sure.”
What can I say? My phone skills aren’t very good, why should I strain myself for some busybody architecture nut?
Normally I answer with a “Hello.” If I’m feeling snarky, or have a good idea whom is calling, I’ll use something that amuses me, such as: “Evil Geniuses for a Better Tomorrow, Rochester Office. Loki speaking.”
I got a call the other morning that really annoyed me, though. It was the:
“Hello”
“Who’s this?” in a voice sounding very underwater, or hungover.
“Excuse me?”
“Who are you and what are you doing on this phone?”
“Dude, you called me. I suggest you tell me who you are, and then explain why you called.”
“Sorry, wrong number, or something.”
click
I don’t mind wrong numbers. I’m apparantly close to two interesting businesses in phone number: a burrito take-out place, and a religious college. The people I get calling for either of these places are quite polite and pleasant to deal with. It’s the other calls that bother me.
What’s worse is when you’ve got a common first name. So I get: “Hey, Mike!” And I wrack my brain trying to figure out which of my friends it might be. There’s a reason I prefer Loki.
I get these from time to time. I shall remember that line.
A friend of mine, Al, liked to answer the phone saying, “Hello, is Al there?” He confused a lot of people severely.
For a few years there, I was a telemarketer (Hey! Quit throwing shit at me!)
It was nice if people let me finish my opening spiel, but if not, I was certainly not offended. IIRC, I was making around 200 calls a night, there’s really not much a caller could say that I hadn’t heard before. I saw hanging up on me without saying anything an effecient way to end our “transaction”.
Keep in mind that the average employment pool for a telemarketing agency is high school and college students, a few housewives, and a random assortment of otherwise unemployable misfits. Don’t be too worried about hurting feelings.
Keep in mind though, I think we could enter a few designations on the computer, Call Back In X Days, Do Not Call Back, and a couple others. If somebody was particularly rude, they usually got a Call Back designation. What? We were kids.
I think it was on old British radio shows that I heard this – I was intrigued by the custom of answering the phone with the phone number. I suppose if the caller were listening it could save time with wrong number calls. But I was taught as a child never to give out my number to a wrong number caller, but to ask what number the caller was trying to reach.