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Apology
Telemarketers are people that need to be brought under control.
We have added our phones to the “do not call” list and it is a waste of time.
Today every phone call so far was a robo call or a telemarketer. It has reached the point where we either will not even attempt to answer the phone, or we will pick up and immediately hang up.
I enjoy talking to Prevost owners, whether it is to answer questions, provide some assistance or to just chat. And I worry I am cutting off legitimate calls. If I have please call back.
I will hang up immediately or not answer if the caller ID is nothing but a string of numbers, or says “not available” or 800 number, or “blocked”. I cannot recite all the phoney caller IDs because there are so many, including my own name or phone number. My point is the phones have never been my favorite devices, but now they are despised because I have run across the garage floor too many times only to get a telemarketer or robo call. Feel free to call but don’t block your caller ID or have something that shows up on caller ID as bogus.
If I have hung up on you, I am sorry for that.
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20 Replies
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We have done away with our land line three years ago for the same reason. The people who had the line before us must have been involved in politics because most calls seemed to be from there.
My cell phone from AT&T has more crankers than I like but not terrible. I’ve also found the people are getting more sophisticated by using local area codes and phone numbers.
My position is simple. If the caller is not in my contacts file I don’t answer. If they leave a voice mail and I’m interested I’ll call them back. If not I block them from future contact.
So if you want to talk, call me and I’ll love to chat. Yes even with you Jon, just know you’ll have to leave a message the first time you call. After that you’ll be on me contacts list!
Harry
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We have not had a land-line for the past five years. Haven’t missed a thing.
I will say, we do get calls on our cell phones which we don’t recognize. We won’t answer them when that happens and, if they don’t leave an appropriate voicemail, we block the number permanently from our cell phones.
But Jon, if you get lonely because of no calls, feel free to give me a call 🙂
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Jake,
I rarely make phone calls unless I have to. Probably because I assume most people dislike the phone as much as I do.
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There’s Apps for that…
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Free app. “True Caller” helps identify spam calls and allows blocking of all future calls.
I love it
Jim brown
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Unfortunately, I have to answer my phone calls for my Battery/Pressure Pro business and have both Norobo, True Caller and the Verizon piece of crap that’s suppose to screen out non identity calls and none of it works much. They always find a new way, now with phony names and phone numbers that you would swear is a real call.
I hope they end up in phone hell.
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I can barely remember even having a land line in the house growing up. We don’t have a land line at the shop, only cell phones direct to us.
Kyle Bennett 386-848-4466
Scott Bennett 386-785-4562
Brian Miller 386-624-2833
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Kyle, you are just a kid.
I’m sure you heard stories about how us old farts had to walk to school and it was uphill both ways. As a kid we had a party line phone and there was only one in the whole two story house and it was downstairs in the entry hall.
But as much of a pain as it was answering a phone call it is far better in the respect there was no such thing as a telemarketer or robo call.
It is a serious problem and out of control and our elected officials will do nothing to stop it.
We cancelled our subscription to USA Today about 6 months ago. From the day we did that we started getting calls from USA Today marketers trying to get us to resubscribe. We asked nicely for them to stop calling. Then we got nasty and insisted they stop and the calls continued. So I wrote a certified letter to the chairman asking his company to stop with the phone calls. I got a call back from one of his minions saying they would stop. They did not.
So I sent a second certified letter explaining my policy regarding unwanted phone calls and that from that day forward I would charge $100 for every one I got. No response, but within days USA Today was calling again. So I sent an invoice to the chairman (certified letter of course) with the caller’s name, time and date and content of the solicitation. A minion explained they would not pay the invoice in a letter.
I responded that if they do not pay the invoice I would go to court to demand payment along with all my proof they had ample notice. The calls stopped.
I did that previously with Olan Mills the photography company and actually did go to small claims court. By the time it was over, after they moved it to a higher court I agreed to drop the case if they changed their corporate telephone solicitation policy so anyone that even says to not call will never get another. It cost them plenty because they used three law firms as the case went up through the courts and it cost me the filing fee.
But we have no defense is we cannot identify the company.
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Don’t worry, I won’t take offense. I’ve been hung up on by better people than you!!
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Good for you Jon!
Part of the problem is lost civility in the world!
It’s people like you as well as my father-in-law, who takes the time to sit down and write a letter to the editor when he notes examples of things that are just plain wrong. His daughter, my wife does the same thing. When she receives an example of shoddy workmanship or poor service she gets after the culprits and more often than not they own up and make it right!
It’s those of us that “continue to just take it” who are contributing to the problem!
For an “old fart” Jon, you rock
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Some years ago Carole and I moved from Winston-Salem to Raleigh. We got our land line since there were no such things as cell phones. Problem was the number we were given was previously a pizza business in Garner, NC. We started getting calls and all hours day and night. My Grandfather was in hospital in Baltimore, MD during this time. So when the phone rang at 0200 hours I jumped out of bed to answer since I thought it to be the dreaded call that Granddad was passing. Needless to say I was furious and called the phone company, Southern Bell, and complained about being given a previous number from a business. They were very polite and gave me a new umber. Problem continued since they referenced the new number against the old number. In other words, when dialing the old number there was an automated message the number dialed had been changed to the new number. I don’t think I had ever been more angry when I called Southern Bell at 0200 hours and pitched a fit about the non fix to their problem. I actually recall telling the person if I get another call tonight I will rip the phone off the wall and come cram it in a place that never sees the sunshine. I hung up. A few minutes layter I received a call from the first person’s supervisor demanding I apologize for what I had said. My response was the damn phone has two parts so just keep this up and I’ll share half of it with you. I then hung up. Problem solved as I never got another pizza order call for the year we lived in Raleigh.
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We see from some demonstrations that if enough of us are mad at a certain situation we can bring about change. I am certain robo calls and telemarketers are more than annoying to most of us, but we will not take the time to come together with phone calls to legislators or demands to the phone service provider to make them stop.
If enough upset people let their legislators know their opponents will get votes the next election unless laws are passed the problem will go away. But we may get pissed but we also accept the phone calls as a fact of life. They are not. If all calls have to be made by a real person a big part of the problem goes away. If all calls have to be correctly identified on caller ID we have a tool to make then stop. If callers are obligated to stop calling if requested it will not be long before the number of calls is greatly reduced.
If the do not call list actually worked we would not have this thread. But for anything to happen we have to collectively raise hell.
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I am very lonely so I enjoy the calls from people I do not know and have never met. The trouble is they often lose signal on their end about half way through of me singing, “You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy, when skies are gray…….“
Davy
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Davy,
I’d love to hear you sing “You are my Sunshine” at our next Rally!
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Very Funny! The dues are so low here, I am not sure PC could afford me.
Davy
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