Tele-zapper doesn’t work on all auto-dialers. Just an FYI.
Yes, I know that. But between the ones it has screened, and the DNC list, we get very few telemarketing calls.
I get the telemarketer calls reasonably often. I’m always polite but my answer is always “No thank you. I’m not interested”. I understand that the salesmen have a prepared script and will make several attempts to persuade me. That doesn’t worry me - it’s their job. I simply object to being asked to commit money - often quite large sums of money - when my mind isn’t focussed on the issue. The whole thing is arranged for their convenience, not mine and that doesn’t suit me. If the offer sounds like something that may be useful to me, I ask for some details to be sent to me through the post. Genuine sellers will be happy to do so.
Back when I got telemarketing calls, I used to respond to every single call that was from anyone I didn’t already know with this line, without waiting for even one sentence of the speil.
"Please put this number on your “do not call list”, Thank you.
Then I hung up, without waiting for an answer.
Tris
Why do telemarketers use non-American operators? I got a call once from a guy who must have been in India-he was almost unnintelligible. He was trying to get me to try a “all expense paid weekend”-free, except you had to listen to a time-share spiel. I politely said i wasn’t interested and hung up.
I’m on the do not call list, so I don’t get many telemarketer calls. Amazing how well that list works. I do get the occasional call from the local law enforcement charities. I’m usually not interested in listening and have never donated so I was a little surprised when the last telemarketer thanked me for my support in the past. I know she was reading from a script but it was an obvious lie. I said “I’m sorry, but I’m quite sure I have never supported you in the past”. She started to reply, but I hung up. I don’t like telemarketer calls, but I usually tolerate them until the lies or obfuscation starts. Usually about 15 seconds.
Presumably labour costs are cheaper. It does lead to some communication problems though. I had a call a couple of days ago from India (I think) urging me to buy something. I think it was insurance-related but I really couldn’t understand most of what the caller was saying. After about the third repeat of “I beg your pardon” it got so ludicrous that I just had to hang up. I can’t imagine how this form of selling can be cost effective.
Yep, same here. It’s a wonder that everybody isn’t on that list.
Being in the IT business, however, I get about a call a day from salesmen trying to sell me software or services or whatever, at work:
“Hi! How’re you doin’! How was the weekend! Nice weather, huh!” (etc)
“I’m not your pal, man, just tell me watcha sellin.”
A lot of those, I tell you.
I get very, very few at home, except for surveys and political junk. I get all of my really annoying telemarketer calls at work.
I’m currently doing some telemarketing (summer job- I don’t like it, but the hours are really good, as is the pay). At the end of each call, we have to click on one of the following: Not interested, Wrong Number, Hung Up, Temporary Hold for Callback, Do Not Call, Callback, Follow up in 10 Days, Languag Barriere, or Not Qualified. The computer records all of this stuff, and my supervisor can look at the statistics and see how many calls in each category I have. We get in trouble if we have too many Not Interesteds; we’re supposed to keep trying, using rebuttals, etc. It’s better if we keep working at the customer, using rebuttals and such, until they hang up, so that we can click Hung Up instead of Not Interested. I personally hate this, but that’s the way it works. I’d much prefer that whoever it is hangs up at the beginning of the call if they’re not going to buy the vacation I’m selling.
By the way, if anyone is interested in the pay scale, it’s $8 an hour plus an additional $5 for each vacation I sell.
I worked telemarketing one summer selling backup software it IT guys. Actually it was a pilot program at the company to go through lots of cold numbers to generate leads that the sales guys would follow up on. I have to say that it was far nicer than I would have expected. Unlike calling people at home, most of the people I talked with wanted to hear about what we did. Only maybe a tenth wanted follow up contacts but almost no one was actively annoyed at us. It felt really good the one time I called someone, told them what we were selling, and they replied, “Thank God you called, you wouldn’t also happen to sell all the hardware to run this on for an entire school district, would you?” I think that was the call that got it changed from a “pilot program” to a “program”.
Calling people at home though? I don’t think you could pay me enough.
Once at the office I got a call from someone who swore she was with “AT&T” and we could save money by switching over to her company. I asked her for her phone number, and got “1-800-xxx-BELL.” I then put her on hold, called the number, and got a Maryland art dealer.
I connected the two calls, put them on speaker, and hilarity insued. I think the Sunshine Phone Company got sued too.
That’s what I do. As soon as I realize you’re a telemarketer, it’s “Sorry, I’m not interested, thanks, bye <click>”. The key is to not wait for “permission” to hang up.
And the do not call list. That really does work well.
Done telemarketing in both incoming calls (Ticketmaster, required to upsell entertainment guides and CDs) and outgoing calls (CUC, wonder if they are still around).
About scripts: At CUC, we were given manila folders containing the exact scripts for the initial pitch and for nearly every conceivable rejection. These scripts were approved by clients, and we were absolutely not permitted to deviate from these scripts. You could not stick by the script and have a conversation with the person at the other end of the line.
About refusals: Agree that the initial “No” is universal. I worked at CUC for three months, and got a sale on approximately 1% of my calls (better when we were selling coupons for restaurants; much worse when we were selling credit reports). Nearly all of them started out with a “no.” We were not allowed to hand up until we’d received two refusals (although “not interested,” at CUC, was good enough). Thank God it wasn’t three.
About the do-not-call list: If the person at the other end asks to be placed on a do-not-call list, there was a script for that too. The script said that “there will be a processing period of two to three weeks, during which time you may conceivably receive an additional call.” The only exception - which would get you off our list quickly - is if you threaten to prosecute.
About the delay between pick-up and hearing a voice: The management walks a tightrope between getting as many calls out as possible and not causing victims - err, would-be customers - to wait. The computer placing the calls had an adjustable parameter called an “abandon rate.” A short abandon rate means that the computer will hang up quickly if no telemarketer is available. This results in a pause of about 30 seconds between calls for the telemarketer - good for the telemarketer, good for the customer, bad for getting a large volume of calls out. A long abandon rate means that the computer will keep the victim waiting for a while, as long as 10 or so seconds. This causes a queue to build up, and no breaks between calls. Makes for cranky telemarketers, victims who are already irate before you even say “hello,” but it does help fulfill the contractual agreement with the client to make a lot of calls.
Toward the end of my tenure at CUC, I would take a breather of my own between the time the customer hung up and the time I signaled I was ready for another call. Sometimes as long as two minutes. I didn’t care - I considered my work to be a burden to society, and if they fired me, so what? I was making shit money.
Some of the other telemarketers really creeped me out. When new telemarketers came on board, we’d write down our names and a comment about ourselves as an introduction. A few would make good remarks, such as “Remember, you’re more than this job.” The majority, however, would write chilling remarks such as “I love being 100% scripted.”
When I worked at Ticketmaster, I did deviate from the script - slightly more tolerant environment. The Entertainment Guide pitch went something like:
Management knew the pitch was worthless - basically asking customers if they wanted to pay to get junk mail - so while their official policy was to stick to the script, nobody got in trouble for wandering from it as long as they got sales (I usually did) and didn’t say anything that was patently false.
This reminds me of a telemarketer call I got shortly after I signed up for the Do Not Call list. I got a call from an autodialer which hung up on me after I picked up. So I did a *69 and somehow got back in the queue. I got a girl on the phone who started a spiel. I informed her how I got on the phone with her, told her I was on the Do Not Call list, and that it was therefore highly illegal for her to be calling me. I also said (lied) that I had their number, could do a reverse look up on the internet, and have the police over there very quickly if she prefered.
She said, “Fuck this shit. I quit.” So I got rid of one of them. Just think, if we can all make at least one quit, soon there won’t be any left. Come on, people! Do your part!
Maybe, but I still think it’s the most efficient use of your time. When I get a solicitation I call from a company I don’t know, I immediately say “Please put me on your do-not-call list” and hang up. It takes me less than 10 seconds. No reason to get irritated about it.
Since I am already on a national (USA) do-not-call list, I figure that the people that don’t respect that list probably won’t respect removal requests either.
I never mess around with telemarketers, I feel sorry for the poor souls. Wrong numbers, on the other hand, have sometimes offered me amusement. (Like the guy that woke me up, yelling at me about a problem with his order with company X. After two tries of telling him “you have the wrong number”, I just told him “I’m sorry sir, if that’s your attitude, we don’t want to do business with you any more” and hung up on him. I hate to think what happened when he dialed the right number and got company X on the phone.)
Yes, but this doesn’t make the world a better place. You’ve already been disturbed, so that’s a given. What you need to do is delay and detain the telemarketer as long as possible, without buying anything, of course. Feign interest, ask lots of questions, get them to hold while you answer the door, pretend to be conversing with your spouse about the deal, whatever it takes. While they’re talking to you, they’re not bothering someone else. A good deed goes around the world.
I am surprised that we still have these threads on this board. Hasn’t the do not call list killed this in the states. I only see one person in this thread from out side the US, that is not enough to keep the thread going. Is it just residual anger over interrupted dinners?
That would interfere with the phone call I am expecting any minute now from a lottery official informing me that I have $100 million waiting for me.
No, it hasn’t. My parents are on the DNC list and still every night there are three or four calls.
What they’ve done is get caller ID, on which telemarketers show up as “unavailable”. We see that and we don’t pick up.