Hold on - forget all of this stuff. Think about it economically.
Why do people take jobs as telemarketers? Because the reward they receive (which is typically monetary) is worth the grief it costs them in terms of time, presence at work and their conditions.
By making a telemarketer miserable in their job, this tips that balance. In order to stay in their job, they will require greater benefits. If they don’t get them, they’ll quit.
If telemarketers start demanding such salaries that it’s not worth it to companies to employ them, there will be no more telemarketing. Everyone will agree that this is a net social benefit.
Therefore, by making the job of every telemarketer an absolute living hell, you not only enjoy yourself at their expense, you’re doing good for your entire community.
So heap on the abuse! Find out where they live and call them at home! Set their cars and pets on fire! I’d suggest that you turn their loved ones against them, but we all know that no-one would love a telemarketer. As long as they understand that this isn’t personal and that all the grief will cease as soon as they stop being a telemarketer, you’re just using basic market economics to make the world a better place.
All I do is:
Them: Hello, blahblahblah
Me: Hi, I’m on the federal do not call list and you have generated a complaint against your company.
Them: Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know blahblahblah we’ll certainly blahblah (or I’m not selling anything blahblah)
Me: Regardless, I am not interested in your products or services, you will be reported to the FCC, and I do not wish to be contacted again.
And I do report every single one. Light a candle, y’know.
I always say the same thing: “I’m not interested, but good luck with the rest of your calls today.” 9 times out of 10 they thank me and hang up. If someone goes beyond that, I say “I’m going to hang up now” and then I do.
Like a lot of other people, if there’s that pause, or if it’s a robo call, I can’t hang up fast enough!
I put my answering-machine message in Esperanto only, which worked as dissuading telemarketers. Unfortunately, it also dissuaded enough of my friends that I had to make it bilingual again.
Bingo. That’s exactly why the more abuse is heaped on telemarketers, the better.
The more telescammers you can get to quit mean more help-wanted ads, more time spent interviewing new employees, more paperwork for the new employees (hiring forms, etc), training for a new employee (even if it’s only a couple of hours, it’s still non-productive time) and so on. So, by getting you to quit after only one productive week, the people who made you disgusted A) cost the company 2 weeks of your salary, B) 3 weeks of accounting/hr/etc, and C) helped lower employee morale–because when your co-workers keep disappearing around you, your morale ends up in the toilet.
I used to run an inbound tech-support call center and call-times and quality are directly driven by employee morale. Have a room full of unhappy, sullen people, you can watch their productivity drop.
So if you can make a telemarketer quit and get a less obnoxious/disgusting job (say, selling crack to schoolchildren) you’re making it less profitable for telemarking companies and hopefully driving them out of business.