This has been our hot topic at work today (slow day). The pay is not bad for a part time job and there is no experience required. What do you think?
Of course I would. Then again, I’m psychic.
I had a feeling you were going to ask me that!
No, but I have a strange desire to call one up.
“Now, what is your name?”
“No! YOU tell ME!”
It would be an interesting experience. The customers are, by definition, so stupid they’ll believe anything you tell them.
“Oh, my my my! The cards say you’re going to fellate a chihahua tonight.”
Ah, the power!
No, I just can’t bring myself to take advantage of the suckers that call the psychic lines. I could never make a living trying to fleece them of the wages they make washing dishes, cleaning restrooms or flipping burgers. I would try and convince them that psychic lines were a bunch of bull and advise them to spend their money on something with an honest return on the dollar.
And I will never, ever do it again.
Sure, the pay was good, I didn’t have to leave the comfort of my couch and pajamas. But you can’t even imagine the level of idiocy one deals with. I thought it would be fun, I’d give people advice, etc., but damn.
Plus, I just couldn’t deal with the fact that people were paying 4.99 a minute to talk to me. I felt like I was doing something wrong, like I was cheating people. Sure, these people aren’t forced to call, but the people I talked to were not too bright and desperate for help, and I didn’t feel properly equipped with my deck of tarot cards to dispense the advice they needed.
The money was pretty good, though, and you set your own hours. Damn conscience.
I couldn’t. I can’t. I wouldn’t.
There are just so many people out there who take that stuff as gospel, which is what the business depends on, that I would not want to risk hurting or ruining someone’s life. It’s not worth the money to become a false hope for the desperate truly seeking some mystic solution to their problems or worries.
I’m not a real psychic, so I couldn’t do it. They only use real psychics you know.
And just like Mishell, I couldn’t take it on my conscience. Quit after one night. Of course that was back in my college days when I’d just take any job for the hell of it. I thought it would be a bunch of laughs, but it’s heartbreaking how many people will call for an hour just to have a friendly ear (I had 3 people talk for an hour - the most they’ll keep you connected on the one night I worked.)
I never worked on a psychic hotline, but I did work on one of those chat lines. The pay was good, but I couldn’t deal with all those damn perverts who thought they could change the focus of the chat to their penis.
I’m particularly qualified to work on the Psycho hotline, however.
Mishell and tatertot, can you give us any insight into how the system works? Do they randomly send calls to your number? Do you have to call and let them know when you will be available?
This is something I’ve been wondering. And then I saw this topic . . .
I wasn’t sure what to do with this thread until I called Dionne Warwick. Her advice was to move it to IMHO. So … off it goes. Thanks, Dionne. And it was a bargain at only $1.99/minute.
I found the company over the internet. In order to get the job, I emailed them to set up a time for an audition and interview. I passed the audition, where I basically just did a reading for the interviewer. There was no test to see if I actually have precognitive abilities, basically, I just had to sound like I did.
If I remember correctly, it was a couple years ago that I did this, they decide whom to send calls to on the basis of length of service. The longer you’re there, the more calls you receive. Also, a customer may call and request to speak to you. To start receiving calls, you would dial an 800 number and enter in a code number, then hang up. When you were finished for the night, you would dial the 800 number again and enter in the code number, then hang up.
They asked that you work at least 7 hours a week, but aside from that, they had no policies regarding when you worked or how much you worked. They did recommend that I start out working late at night, because that’s when they get most of their calls, and I’d have a better chance of getting some. You’re paid on the basis of actual minutes talking, not how long you’re logged in, and my wage was 25 cents a minute. I believe my first and only night on the job, I was logged in for 3 hours, and I received 2 calls.
Anyway, it pays well, I got 25 cents a minute, but I couldn’t handle feeling like I was ripping these people off.
I would no more work on a psychic hotline than I would rob little old ladies of their life savings.
Oh, wait. Psychic hotlines have been known to do that…
Thought. Briefly. I decided, like tatertot and Mishell that it wasn’t ethical to be charging that much, and based on the way pay was determined, I was NOT gonna be sitting around waiting for a few calls a day that might not amount to more than $20.
It would have been more economical to get a job at minimum wage.
The question now is, are there REAL psychics?
Personally, I don’t believe one bit of it.
One would expect to see them at the race track rather than answering telephones for a quarter a pop.
If I get laughed off the board for this, I don’t care. For what it is worth, I believe that it is possible. I know I have uncannily predicted things that were about to happen or known about things that were happening in another place with people who were close to me. One example happened several years ago:
There was a time when a friend of mine and I were not talking for some reason or another (not fighting, just drifting in and out of each other’s lives). During this time she found out she was pregnant when she miscarried, and she went through a tough break-up with her boyfriend during that two week period. The next time we talked, I told that I had dreamed about those things and asked if they had happened. She confirmed that my dreams were true and that the times were accurate.
Consequently, I believe that those powers exist, and it may be possible for some people to harness those powers, though I can’t, for the life of me, intentionally use them, nor do I really try.
Like you, though, I believe that most of those psychic hotlines are a sham. Maybe some of them are legit, but I won’t be wasting my time trying to find the few that might be.
Your mileage may vary.
Nope. Definitely not.
I saw an interview with one recently and they are trained to just keep people on the line for as long as possible. There isn’t even mention of supposed psychic ability during the interview.
It reeks of dishonesty and even people’s gullibility doesn’t make it right.