Telemarketers That Call In the Afternoon Looking for my Parents

[machinaddict]

My girlfriend got a call from the jehova's this semester because they can't get permission to go door to door in residences (obviously).
Talk about a new low for a religion I already can't stand. I'm already convinced that religion is just another product people try to sell you.

[yellowsubmarine]

Originally posted by Nimrod's Son
You work for a company with shitty marketing practices, you have to take the heat. Sorry.

[ChristHimself!]

Originally posted by bornentertainer
See, if they just took NO for a fucking answer, I wouldn't have a problem, but they don't.

I've worked in a very similar job, and my job now is only a little different. It goes like this;
When you start, for about 3-4 months they just want you to get into calls, handling customers and not screwing up.
But they tape every single one of your calls, they check 5 random ones every month and mark you on them, they give you your overall bonus total, how many people you get interested per hour, what percentage of people you get interested out of all your calls etc, and if you aren't constantly pestering people then they basically threaten to fire you. I've been called up over calls like this:

*phone rings... *person picks up*

Me: Good evening, is Mr 'David Hughes' there?

David: Yes, this is me, look, I know you're from Lloyd's TSB, they've already been phoning me, I'm just not interested in any of your services now, my account is fine, I'm totally happy with it and I just want to leave it as it is.

Me: Okay, that's fine, I'll mark that down and we'll call you back in a few months time (It's for a bank 'customer service' review)

I've then been pulled up for that and asked "aww paul why didn't you say 'But when was the last time you had a review" or "we really do recommend everyone comes in twice a year for a review" etc etc etc etc etc etc etc AHHHHH

Anyway I hate this job and you just have to realise that these people only do it for the money.. if you give them a totally succint answer and basically tell them to fuck off, and if you want to, state clearly that you are the householder and they are not to call the house anymore and WAIT FOR THEM TO RESPOND AND TAKE YOU OFF, or get the person they want to speak to and get them to say that, they do legally have to take you off if you demand it. But don't shoot the messenger because when I'm saying these things to people I'm cringing to shit when I know you sound tired and just home from work and you're eating your dinner but I can get fired if i don't moan at you.

I'll reiterate this too, DO NOT HANG UP because they will just call you back again, even a lot of the time if you shout at them and say don't call back, if you hang up without explaining who you are they'll just tick a little box that says they haven't spoken to the householder and you'll get rung back some other time.

And don't be a dick, because if you're some young guy who tries to have a go at me for phoning in the middle of the night (at like 8pm) saying "don't i have anything better to do" (I don't WANT to be making these calls! It's not what I do in my spare time) and you tell me to fuck off and hang up, if you don't tell me your name I'll set it to call you back at 9am on Saturday when you are nice and hungover.

Originally posted by Toby

I didn't think telemarketers could call cellular phones

They aren't supposed to, but if you've given a company your mobile number as a contact number they might phone you at some point on it, because it's computer dialling which doesn't check number types, but if you point out it's your mobile they'll mark it as a wrong number.


I hate call centre work.

[ChristHimself!]

oh and just since I'm bitching about it - if they keep phoning at a certain time every day for your dad don't just say 'he's not in just now... bye!' say 'he's not in, he'll be in at (8) tonight' etc

[Nimrod's Son]

Originally posted by Toby
I didn't think telemarketers could call cellular phones.

I worked for a company that developed predictive dialers for telemarketing. Originally it was for incoming call queueing, but of course there's also money to be made on outgoing calls.

Anyway, it just pulls from a database of numbers. It doesn't matter if it's cellular or not.

[Candy]

some have figured out the whole 'text messaging advertising' as well.