Bob from Bangladore called today...

[REWahoo]

...to give us the good news that we were the lucky recipients of a "free government grant". Of course it was some sort of a scam since we had to pay a processing fee, etc.

There is nothing notable about the above statement. However, there was much humor and more than a little justice involved in the conversation that took place between dear old Bob and the young man who answered the phone: my 8 year old grandson (have you guessed it yet?) Grant. Grant didn't understand what Bob was telling him (How can I win "me"?) and Bob appeared to find the question a little difficult to answer. But we sure got a kick out of listening in on the conversation.

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Wow. For the last 18 months I've been developing the perfect contact point for telemarketers and tech support people and I didnt even realize it.

I can get him to mow the lawn, get me another beer AND talk to Bob from India.

SWEET!

[sailor]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cute Fuzzy Bunny Wow. For the last 18 months I've been developing the perfect contact point for I can get him to mow the lawn, get me another beer AND talk to Bob from India. SWEET!

Lucky you CFB,
Mine (21 months) mows the lawn, talks to telemarketers , but drinks my beer instead of fetching it

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

When our caller ID shows it's a telemarketer, we'll sometimes grab some treats, tell Sophie to sit, put the phone to her muzzle, tell Sophie to SPEAK, and then click open the call.

Her large bark followed by slurping down her treat usually does the trick.

[Scrooge]

One of the advantages of a cell phone (I dropped my land line a few years ago) is that you never have to deal with telemarketing calls

[MJ]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scrooge One of the advantages of a cell phone (I dropped my land line a few years ago) is that you never have to deal with telemarketing calls

I just got my 1st (emergency) cell phone ever. Why wouldn't you ever have to deal with them?

[MJ]

It's been ages since I got a telemarket phone call. When I used to get them on occasion, I would tell them to wait a moment, put the phone down and go back to what I was doing, wait 5or so minutes, then check if they were still on, if they were (very rare) I would tell tehm again to continue to hold on.

[sailor]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scrooge One of the advantages of a cell phone (I dropped my land line a few years ago) is that you never have to deal with telemarketing calls

Not true.
I agree that you would get less calls, since the cell numbers in US are not publicly listed.
But your cell number might get swiped from any of the banks dbs easily (I'm assuming since you dropped the land line you give banks your cell number) or you can just get hit with a sequential dialer.
You've just been lucky.

sailor,
who writes telephony software for living

[Scrooge]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vagabond I just got my 1st (emergency) cell phone ever. Why wouldn't you ever have to deal with them?

As our friends at the FTC explain:

Quote:

FCC regulations prohibit telemarketers from using automated dialers to call cell phone numbers

And then "Automated dialers are standard in the industry, so most telemarketers don't call consumers on their cell phones without their consent".

The only telemarketing call that I have recieved on my cell phone over the last 2+ years was a manually dialed one from my bank. They wanted to see if they could help me manage my money better. I explained to them that if they called my cell phone again, they wouldn't have to worry about managing my money again -- ever -- which seemed to dampen their enthusiasm *

[Scrooge]

Quote:

Originally Posted by sailor you can just get hit with a sequential dialer.

I thought that sequential dialers worked off a pre-defined list? Not that I know anything about the field, but how would the software be able to avoid cell phone numbers (see the law above) otherwise?

[sailor]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scrooge And then "Automated dialers are standard in the industry, so most telemarketers don't call consumers on their cell phones without their consent".

There are exceptions, for example charities and political organizations can still call you, also companies which have a business relationship with you. Surveys too.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scrooge I thought that sequential dialers worked off a pre-defined list? Not that I know anything about the field, but how would the software be able to avoid cell phone numbers (see the law above) otherwise?

Sequential = being fed with a sequential list, typically used for advertising local businesses. They for example they would dial XXX-YYY-0001, than XXX-YYY-0002 etc
Predictive and power dialers (a.k.a. automated dialers) are working from pre-defined lists, but you can pre-define (and/or buy) whatever numbers you want I think.
As far as avoiding - real "telemarketers" would avoid "cell phone spamming", because it's expensive (used to be $5k fine per documented incident), but as I said there are exceptions which I mentioned above.