Answering The Phone
So Dave Stancliff reports the feds shut down at least some of the guys calling people on the phone selling extended warranties. Goodie for them, but I still don't understand why people feel they absolutely have to answer the phone every time it rings.
It's kind of like that one guy the paper quoted back when the cell phone driving ban was being discussed. He said, When the phone rings, you just have to answer it....
No, you don't. That's what answering machines and voice mail are for. Sure, telemarketers might be a slightly different subject, but seems to me the answer is the same: Use your answering machine.
I nearly always screen my calls by having the answering machine pick up the call first. As soon as I hear who it is, if it's someone I want to talk to, I'll pick up the phone and turn off the answering machine. Works quite well and I'm always a little peeved at myself when I decide to just answer the phone and it ends up being some guy soliciting for some police and fireman's fund.
Use your answering machine if you don't like dealing with telemarketers. It works for me. It should work for the wife, too, but she's a lot like the rest of you that feels she just has to pick up the phone every time it rings. Then she's all pissed off when it turns out to be a telemarketer.
I keep telling her: Let the answering machine answer the call first. It works.
posted by Fred Mangels @ 10:02 AM
6 comments
6 Comments:
Answering machines are for taking messages when I'm out-of-the-house. They were not designed to filter telemarketing calls.
Don't be an apologist for telemarketers. Stop blaming the victim.
I'm not blaming the victim. I might be pointing fingers at people that think they're so important they have to answer every phone call, but not blaming them for telemarketers.
Speaking of not answering the phone, case in point:
Just minutes after I wrote the last response Connie, who can't just let the phone ring, answers the phone. I'm out in the garage. She brings me the phone with a strange look on her face like I'm not going to be happy.
She's right. It's someone I did not want to talk to today. If I would of been in the house alone I would of let the phone take a message and deal with it on Monday but, nope, now that I had to talk with the guy my first day off in a while has been pretty much screwed up.
Love those people that just have to answer the phone.
Fred, you would make a good prosecutor.
Fred, our phone talks to us and tells us who is calling. Also our televisions have information on the screen to tell us who is calling. We just don't answer restricted, 800 or other unknowns.
Life is great! - ERE
PS: I grew up with hand crank party line telephones, our ring was two longs and a short. You also had to tell folks to get off the line so you could hear because the eavesdroppers weakened the signal. Wonder what it would have been like to have telemarketers then?
Stancliff's article is "as sweet as honey from the bee." I recommend that article to anyone who cares about this issue. It shows that the power of greed can sometimes be contrained.
The people who profited from these robo-calls have harrassed hundreds of thousands of Americans and refused to stop the calls even after repeated requests for relief from that harrassment. What an unfair invasion of privacy!
It was in some ways like having the abrasive voice of Billy Mays screaming out at us during nearly every commercial break on TV. In self-defense, untold numbers of Americans held their remote-controls tightly with their fingers on the mute button to protect themselves and their families from that voice - that horrid voice!
Now, thanks to our Higher Powers (both secular and divine) life for ordinary Americans may again attain some of the peace and quiet for which we all strive.
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