Robocalls

Ill often explain that the person they are asking for is taking a shit, and that he/she should be done soon. Ill ask the caller to wait, checking back every couple minuets to reassure them that the process is nearly complete.  Some callers have waited a surprisingly long time. 

Gotta have fun with it.

I like this methodology.  Keeping them a little tied up helps other people to not receive these calls, I'd wager.

Pretty good for junk calls on the cell, but 4-6 a day on the land line, which we keep really only because we're on the periphery of some high crime areas and it's nice to not be routed to the CHP when calling 911.

I keep getting calls from "PG & E" looking to save me money by selling me solar panels.

They have called me 3x in two weeks, each time asking "do you spend more than $100 on your PG&E"

My elec bill is like, half that, with $10 coming from the analog meter "privilege". So annoying.

I'd let it go to VM, but like others said, it could be a client.

Even more anoying are the people who chase me down inside of Home Depot from Solar City.  They see me EVERY DAY and yet still insist on asking me EVERY DAY.  I've given them every excuse from "no, I rent" to "no, I already have solar" to "no, I don't have a roof" ... that one left them scratching their heads last time and a good laugh for me.  What ever happened to distraction free shopping?  First they were outside the stores .. now they are inside!  I've learned to avoid their area and not make eye contact till the day they were roaming the inside of the store.

Hahahaha oh I am such a dick about that. The solar city guys were trying to sell me something and I just turn a deaf ear. Once they made the mistake of physically standing on my way as I was walking. Bro, I am like a bull, I'm a nice and courteous guy but if you try to physically stop me it won't end well for you. I just maintained eye contact with him while he was making a pitch, but I didn't even slow down my pace. He ended up trampling over their desk getting out of the way.

I have no tolerance for that crap. I realize they have a job to do but trying to use pressure selling tactics just means your product sucks if it can't sell based on merits.

Ill often explain that the person they are asking for is taking a shit, and that he/she should be done soon. Ill ask the caller to wait, checking back every couple minuets to reassure them that the process is nearly complete.  Some callers have waited a surprisingly long time. 

Gotta have fun with it.

HA!!

 

    Have to share this,  Back in 2004(Ish) I was at a desk in our cube, there was 6 or 7 of us FSE at the time, all our tools were up and running so no PM's or Cleans to do. Phone rings in on the desk,  no display so can't see who's calling, (Might be our customer? ) I answer the phone, Hitachi, this is Troy  Guy on the other end starts into his sales pitch.  As soon as I realized I needed nothing to do with the guy I attempted to interrupt his pitch, (He wasn't happy and NEEDED to get through his pitch) but I was determined to get his attention, and let him know that he dialed a company work line and if he didn't have any of our tool, that were having any issues I would need to go.  He continued his pitch, I hung up!  Phone rings again, I'm thinking this guy is dense.  I answered it again.  Same guy! He starts by saying "I think we were disconnected"  I asked him if it sounded like this, ckick!  Hung up again!  didn't get a call back, shockingly.

I have tried telling them the person they are trying to reach is recently deceased.  They usually get really flustered and don't know what to say but the calls keep coming.  I don't think there's a solution other than only answering when the  caller ID is recognized. 

I keep my land line as an emergency option in case I can't locate my cell phone, which normally is in my pocket. 99.999 percent of the calls on the land line are solicitations. So I don't get off my butt to answer unless I recognize the person calling. Approx once every 15 solicitation calls still results in the lamebrain making his/her sales pitch, despite the voice mail that say solicitations will be automatically deleted. 

Ill often explain that the person they are asking for is taking a shit, and that he/she should be done soon. Ill ask the caller to wait, checking back every couple minuets to reassure them that the process is nearly complete.  Some callers have waited a surprisingly long time. 

Gotta have fun with it.

 

Nice.

Reminds me of a Danny Devito classic from Ruthless People (1986): 

Sam Stone: [answering the phone] Hello? Debbie? Yeah, Debbie's here, who's this? Well, Ralph, uh, Debbie can't talk right now, my d___'s in her mouth. How about if I have her call you back later when I'm done?
[hangs up and laughs]

beggars and pushy salesmen

something good about standing 6'1" and weighing 250 and having a shaved head.  I give them a strong dog command NO along with the I will rip your head off psycho grin and they leave me alone

Then there's always this one:

If you've got the time,  play into it. Pretend that you are very interested,  ask as many questions as you can think of. Waste as much of their time as you can and then finally tell them that you weren't interested in the first place.

Anyway to get rid of annoying robocalls?  We never answer the phone anymore and let it go to message.  We sometimes get up to 4 robocalls a day and now they are calling at night, sometimes after 9 or 10 pm which never used to happen.  I added our phone # to the National Do Not Call Registry several months ago which seems to not have done a damn thing.  I wish there was some way to fry their circuits through the phone on the asshats that are behind the robocall crap.

I bought a thing from Radio shack years ago. It was called a Zapper, when you answer your phone it would put out a short tone. That tone told the robocall device that it reached a computer.soon the calls quit. As that number was listed as a computer. When the zapper broke it took several years for them to find us again. I keep forgetting to buy a new one. 

Hah, these suggestions remind me of another one I heard and used before    When they call, let them give their whole spiel to the very end and then say, "I'm sorry, could you please go over that once more?"  Then, when they are done, say it again and again until they give up. 

Then there was the guy that mistakenly called our work phone once, thinking that we were Bank Of America.  I answered twice and said, sorry, this is not the right number to call.  Then when he called back a THIRD time, I answered "Bank of America, how may I help you?"  And they guy was looking for status on his home loan or something like that.  I told him my secretary lost his paperwork and he would need to send it in again.  I could have asked him for any information and i'm sure he would have given it to me. 

 
  That's messed up Al!  The stresses that guy was going through about refinancing? OMG! Hahahahaha    Serves him right if he couldn't dial the right number!