You Badly Need to Work : Telemarketing?

[Quasimodem]

@DrDeth

I don;t see where that doesn’t make them con-men that specialize in preying on the old and lonely.
No normal, intelligent adult does anything but hang up on telemarketers. It;s the old folks who are lonely and who think it’s rude to hang up on people that they target.

I have to respond to this, if only to admit to some erroneous thinking:

First off, I agree with RickJay that legitimate telemarketing is done by script.

Secondly, I think there is such a thing as “reverse telemarketing” (I call it the “double-whammy”) where I call to order a product and am suddenly caught up in an effort to get me to buy something else, and even if I say “no” that script is written so cleverly that the telemarketer smoothly goes on to the next item they want you to buy.

Sometimes they do this by making you wait to give them your credit card info (very risky for the elderly) so that you HAVE to listen to spiel after spiel after spiel.

Finally, I read DrDeth’s post, and my first thought was, “Nah, how could they
know the person on the other end is elderly???”

See how naive I am?

But before I jumped back into this thread, I thought I’d better do some reading, and, lo and behold, not only are tele-marketers sold names and phone numbers, they are also given demographics! So yeah, Dummkopf Quasi, the elderly are targeted because they can’t hang up:

http://www.police.covington.va.us/Tele_Fraud.htm

Again, see how my naivete’ gets me in trouble?

So to conclude: I’m fixin’ to to turn 60 myself and with what’s going on with me mentally already, it’s a “no-brainer” that I, too, could be at risk!:smack:

And guess what?

Once again I’ve hijacked my own thread!

Amazing how I keep doing that!

Thanks

Quasi

[firstname]

I worked as a telemarketer for a couple of months. It was boring, but they paid me $5 and hour more then my other job, and i got to sit in a comfortable chair in Air conditioning all through summer.

Most people were really quite polite, I just couldn’t believe people would buy the stuff they sold, it wasn’t a scam, just the sort of thing people buy on a whim and never use.

[kambuckta]

I first got into telemarketing as a way of juggling the kids, studying and trying to pay the bills simultaneously: no mean feat I can tells ya.

Ten years later, and I’m still tele(fundraising). Whilst sometimes it can be an incredibly tedious way to pass the day, it offers a decent pay-rate and the flexibility that is not often found in a normal job. Being ‘casual’ work, there are no penalty-rates, nor sickleave or annual leave (a disadvantage when the industry closes over the Yule period) but it also means that one can work however many hours per week they like or need.

I have always worked for registered charities, so selling a commercial product is not part of my repetoire. The overwhelming majority of people I call (both cold, and ‘hot’ calls) are most polite, even when unable or unwilling to subscribe to the cause. So while people rant and rave on messageboards and IRL about how much they loathe being rung by the likes of me, the reality is quite different judging by their responses on the phone. I consider it good karma and make it my personal mission to leave the person smiling at the end of the call. Works well for me anyway.

Charities in Australia are not bound by the DNC legislation, but we respect the wishes of people we call and take them off our list if they request it. I also remove people who are very elderly, disabled or a close relative of someone with a disability, and those who froth at the mouth when asked for their support.

Here, LISTS are a thriving commercial enterprise unto themselves. ‘List Brokers’ accumulate names via various sources that are then broken down into various classifications: family composition, average mortgage value, education level/s, number of cars per household etc etc. Direct marketing orgs and charities then ‘buy’ a list according to their specific requirements. Of course, some lists are better than others, and some are not worth using as dunny paper.

I know I’ll get howled down by the holier-than-thous here, but telemarketing suits my income needs and my lifestyle more than adequately. It can be a fun job, you get to meet an interesting assortment of people both at work and on the phones, and provided you work for an ethical company I see many benefits and few disadvantages.

That answer ya question Quasi?

Oh, PS…nowadays I work from home, so I’ve got even better working conditions than having to traipse to and from the office. Win-win.