Telemarketers ...please read

[Monika]

what ticks me off is that saying she had a choice... NO she didnt! when you cant find any other jobs you can do because you were hurt on your last job and disablity DOESNT give enough to pay BILLS there is no choice...... dont act like you know because you dont...

 

[Stardust]

Oh Monica, cry me a river!
Like you are the only ones that don't have problems. Poor you. Nobody understands. Nobody cares. Never any choices.
Hey, I have an idea, get a better outlook on what you DO have, there are choices, like it or not, you can wallow in your own misery OR you can do something about it.
Don't tell me I don't understand, I have tried to be nice to you, you have stomped on it. Stay in your little poor me mode and you will never get anywhere. There is always a choice!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Move to a different town, help support your mom, teach her how to put together computers. Come on, get your head out of the sand, I am tired of trying to be nice to you.

 

[kenster]

A night shifter perspective, I work nights (some may not call it a real job as I spend a lot of time surfing though) and have some very funny hours. I am here from 5:30PM until 6:30AM. So here I get home at 7, which means I hit very good sleep at around 9. Of course the phone starts ringing at 9:15. Look at caller ID “out of area”, so I roll over and just get back to sleep…RING….once again “out of area”. This goes on all day long. On an average we have at least 7 “out of area” calls per afternoon. It has now gotten to the point that I turn off all the ringers on every phone in the house. If someone of importance needs me, they call a pager or cell. I would love to have the telemarketers’ home number and give them a call about 2 am and see how happy they are about answering the phone while sleeping. Something else that I find a bit odd is that they call during the middle of the day. I would think this is when most “normal” people would be at work. So why do they call all afternoon long? It would seem like a better idea to call at 5PM until like 7PM when the “average” person is home. But hey, what do I know?

 

[Ken Harbart]

what ticks me off is that saying she had a choice... NO she didnt! when you cant find any other jobs you can do because you were hurt on your last job and disablity DOESNT give enough to pay BILLS there is no choice...... dont act like you know because you dont...

Monica, I hope that, in retrospect, you can see the multiple logical fallacies and pseudoreasoning in your argument.

1) She does have a choice. Is there a person holding a gun to her temple, forcing her to harass people?

There are many well-paying jobs, even in these trying times, available to persons with disabilities. The Federal government, for example, will give employment preference to disabled individuals. These are well-paying jobs on the GS payscale.

 

[Seamus Haley]

it doesnt pay for me to read the fourms because someones always got something smart to say

You would rather everyone had something stupid to say?

what ticks me off is that saying she had a choice... NO she didnt! when you cant find any other jobs you can do because you were hurt on your last job and disablity DOESNT give enough to pay BILLS there is no choice...... dont act like you know because you dont...

Actually, you will find a fairly good cross section of individuals have a friend or relative who is legally considered disabled in one way or another... And even a few on this board who are disabled themselves and have apparantly found work other than telemarketing or harassing people... Perhaps it is you who does not know.

Incidentally... all telemarketing involves is the ability to type, read and use a phone. I fail to see how someone with those abilities would be devoid of work, just flipping open to a random page within the classifieds section of today's small local newspaper, I see receptionists, call center operaters, accountants, DMV clerks, data entry types, proof readers, tech support types and about four hundred bajillion envelope stuffers are all needed... and this is on a single page of classifieds in a paper than only has two or three to start and with me frankly skimming the listed ads.

How can one possibly contend that there are no other alternatives than to become a telemarketer?

Telemarketers by the very nature of the job, must harass and annoy thousands of innocent people for every sale they potentially make... Know what people who harass innocents are called? Juvenile delinquents, Stalkers and your odd really determined homeless individual.

As an added bonus to the oppurtunities avaliable to the disabled, many companies with more than a certain number of employees and most civil service positions either have a legal requirement that they meet affirmative action quotas (Although that really is simply reverse discrimination and should be illegal) or tax breaks when they can report that they have hired certain disabled individuals. That means to many companies and for many of those potential positions, your disabled mother has a better chance of getting many of the jobs than someone who isn't.

As has been said many times, there is always a choice, the economy is not bad enough to force people to become telemarketers or starve.

These jack booted (metaphorically) telephone wielding thugs are a blight on the American way of life as it stands, interrupting the sanctity of our homes and subjecting the general population to annoyance and harassment over extended periods of time, ignoring the requests that they never contact you again, no matter how it's phrased.

Telling other people that they have no right to be rude to them or that there is something morally wrong with not wanting to be assaulted with sales pitches when asleep, eating dinner or just loafing around, then crying and sobbing like an ignorant child over the plight of the poor disabled indivudal who has no other choice (a fictional construct I might add) is taking this political correctness several stages too far. I've got no problem with anyone for anything they really have no control over... but telling me I have no right to have an opinion and voice it over someone else's conscious decision that affects me? That's crossing lines.

I'm going to stick in a quote by PJ O'Rourke here, from back when he was doing most his writing about social, economic and political subjects, I'd have to go look to get the specific date and right now, I'm too lazy... but it voices an opinion I agree with wholeheartedly which can have a slight application to this concept of not being mean to the poor telemarketers (Or anyone else for that matter, or any action). Those of you easily offended by slightly stronger terms that have entered into the vernacular might want to skip past the quoted section.

We have no ideology, no agenda, no catechism, no dialectic, no plan for humanity. We have no "Vision Thing" as Daddy Bush would say. All we have is the belief that people should do what people want to do, unless it causes harm to other people. And that had better be clear and provable harm. REAL HARM. No bull#### about secondhand smoke or hurtful, intensive language.

I don't know what's good for you. You don't know what's good for me. We don't know what's good for mankind. And it sometimes seems as if we're the only people who don't.
This is because we believe in freedom. Freedom-what this country was established upon, what the constitution was established on.

Freedom is not empowerment. Empowerment is what the Serbs had in Bosnia. Anybody can grab a gun and be empowered (or a multi-trillion dollar deffense system that has trouble killing some people living in rubble who may or may not be the enemy anyway). It's not entitlement. An entitlement is what people on welfare get and how free are they? It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights- the "right" to education, the "right" to health care, the "right" to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery- hay and a barn and herdsmen for human cattle.

There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only human duty, the duty to accept the consequences.

That last line is one I want you people whining about how it's so mean to express our dissatisfaction with being called at funny hours and having our lives interrupted or intruded upon. They chose to become telemarketers, they can accept the consequences.

The only really valid logical argument I have seen on here, although I disagree with it's practical application, was Richard's comments that the rest of us, by owning phones, should accept the consequence of being called by telemarketers. While it's logically sound in theory, it's not valid as anything other than an attempt to make a point in an argument, it can be said that a phone is, if not vital, still a very important tool in the modern world, it allows communication that the rest of society has become dependant on... Which shouldn't entitle it to be used to assault people in their homes with idiotic and aggressive sales pitches.

She does have a choice. Is there a person holding a gun to her temple, forcing her to harass people?

Well put and I'm going to take it one step further... Even if there was someone holding a gun to her temple, she still has the choice about complying with their demands or not complying with their demands. The outcome of failing to do so might be unpleasant, but it is still a choice.

It sounds bad to say it like this in light of popular sterotypes but... I am an American and I will be rude to whoever I want, whenever I want, where ever I want and for any reason (or no reason) I choose. If they want to get rude back, let 'em, we can go back and forth. If they choose to hang up, hey, more power to them then too. I can react to their intrusion in whatever manner I wish, they can respond to my reaction however they choose to. If they're going to go taking it personally because someone is angry that they just had to get out of the tub, get out of bed, stopp working, stop watching TV, stop eating dinner, stop doing ANYTHING... to go talk to someone who might as well just be a recorded message about something they don't want, even if it is just to pick up and drop the phone back down without even speaking... then they deserve whatever "bad feelings" that might result from their being thin skinned and over sensitive. Hey... it might even prompt them to do something USEFUL with themselves.

 

[Southerncat]

some not understanding

I first started this thread to get people to stop being rude TO EVERYONE! You know in these days and times, we as a nation need to be nice to each other!

Yes when i took this job believe it or not I HAD NO OTHER CHOICE other than disability. As far as the person saying maybe i could look into doing clerical work guess what, thats the first thing I did, I have no background in it so no one will hire me. And to the person who said I was whinning....You are dead wrong! That's not me. I have had to flip burgers. work in warehouses, drive a forklift, load trucks,ect so I am no stranger to hard work. I knew the down side of the job and guess what I found out that most of the people we call are nice. There is a few that are really rude. And believe me I KNOW how to hang that dialer up. The company i work for does not call during the morning hours , just goes to show some of you that all the companies with telemarketers are not the same.

We are all entitled to our opinions thats what the men and women are fighting for.

As far as what Monica has been saying, yes she is my daughter and it makes me so proud that she is voicing her opinion for her mom. She does not live with me she actually lives 2000 miles for me. And I know for a fact that she can be very vocal when she believes in something. If she sees someone being mean or rude to anyone or anything she lets that person know. So give her a break she is just standing up for mom. If there were more Teenagers like her in this world , THIS WORLD WOULD BE A BETTER PLACE! ............One last thing.......My real reason for posting in the first place...............Be nice to EVERYONE.....period

 

[Seamus Haley]

You know in these days and times, we as a nation need to be nice to each other!

Opinion... not fact.

Be nice to EVERYONE.....period

Or what? You'll cry at me some more? Call me nasty names like "Meany head"?

Boo goddamn hoo, people are rude to you when you call them at home... did you actually not expect people to be angry at the intrusion?

 

[meretseger]

As a third shift worker, I bit the bullet and bought a Telezapper. Now all I get are computers calling me (the computers will only leave messages and hang up if you actually answer) and rivals to my current phone company. So if you guys REALLY need sleep during the day, I'd recommend one. Now if I just could get rid of that pesky sun, I'd be on to something...

Erin B.

 

[Seamus Haley]

Now if I just could get rid of that pesky sun, I'd be on to something...

You can always do what I do...

Make your own blackout curtains out of high quality forty gallon black trash bags and duct tape.

It keeps out the sun and looks classy too.

 

[Uffern]

You could also use aluminum foil.

 

[Clay Davenport]

Aluminum foil is actually better. It not only keeps out the sunlight but also acts as an additional layer of defense against the mind control rays from the government satellites.

 

[Monika]

Kinda of hard to teach someone 2000 miles away isnt it OH and when you live in the middle of no where... and dont / can't drive its a bit hard to get to those jobs in the paper that are 30 mins - 1 hour away... not everyone lives in the city or has a car or can drive....... oh but now you are going to say but she drove a forklift right? well guess what she DID Thats right and she also got HURT AT that job.. you people are so clueless sometimes... geez. I HAD TO MOVE 2000 MILES AWAY TO EVEN BE ABLE TO LOOK FOR A JOB AND GO TO SCHOOL. She is lucky to have the job she has. and you all that want to start calling people names and cussing are acting a bit silly if you ask me.

 

[Monika]

oh and if you guys really dont like it.... like someone said... go buy a Telezapper that should solve the problem

 

[ms_terese]

Ah, the idealism of youth!

Monica, hon........calm down.

First of all, realize that no one here has had a bad interaction with your Mom. Your Mom started this post to make a point, and she's gotten reactions and opinions. I don't believe she's taken any of them personally. No one has bad mouthed her for taking the job. If that's what she had to do, that's what she had to do. The overwhelming sentiment is that rude people come with the territory when it comes to telemarketing work.

Now, we could all exchange stories about A) the rudeness of people that are called by telemarketers and B) the rudeness of telemarketers that have contacted us. It doesn't matter.

I'm one of those people that have a job that you seem to loathe so much. I'm in an office most days, except for the week or two a month that I have to travel and be away from my family, go make sales calls in distant states for 14 hours a day. Yep, it's a sweet deal, and anyone who can sit on their butt and shuffle papers is qualified to have it. Do you think that NONE of the people I deal with are ever rude to me? In person, no less. You know what? It happens. Comes with the territory. I just turn my attention to the next prospective customer and move on.

I don't think there's a person in the world who deals with the public that doesn't encounter rude people. That's just the way it is. However, your role in their day has a direct correlation with how you'll be treated. The Publisher's Clearinghouse Prize Patrol people who show up with balloons and flowers and oversized checks probably don't get snarled at nearly as much as the rest of us.

What about this scenario: a door to door salesman comes to your house to sell you siding. (Not as intriguing as the rat turd salesman that was referenced earlier, but try to stay with me.) You say no. The truth is, you might hate siding, or you maybe just can't afford it, or you're only renting the house. It doesn't matter why, you say no. The salesman returns in 2 days. He wants to tell you about the siding. I'm assuming that you're still being very polite and tell him "No, thank you" but this time you have to close the door while he's still trying to get his speech in. 3 days later he shows up again. Now, what you may not realize is that your address stays on his list until he moves to another neighborhood, or until you agree to let someone come out and give you an estimate. How many days are you going to be nice to him? What if it's a different one every time? Are they from the same company? How do you get off their dang list? You don't have the answers to those things, do you? What you end up doing is telling him loudly to leave you alone. How rude!

Many of us have had tough jobs to tolerate throughout our lives. Heck, I'd venture to say that anyone on this board over the age of 45 has had the privilege at least once in their life to have a job they swear they'd never go back to. My point is that it's not that anyone is unsympathetic to how unpleasant it must be for your Mom to put up with the rude people, just that there is compassion for the people who lose their patience with telemarketers. For the time being, though, telemarketers and their unappreciative targets will have to tolerate each other.

The good news for you, Southerncat, is that if you stay there long enough, you'll not only make some nice money, but you'll have enough anecdotes to write a book and make a fortune!!!

 

[Southerncat]

Seamus & Rozann

You know what guys, I have been on Fauna for a few years now and the only post s I have ever made on here was on the BOI about the dealings I have had with some. So where do you two get off saying the things you do. I have read many of the posts you two have posted and most if not all are negative.

Where in this thread do I(or Monica) whine? Sounds like to me either you two have misunderstood what we was trying to say or just really don?t care what we had to say. And guess what, the more I do this "low life job" the more I like it because of people like you. As MS_Teresa said I can make alot of money and I have already started to do so. But that wasn't the reason I started this thread to start with.

And yes you can be rude to whom ever, when ever but I think the where ever might not be. I do take offense to what you (seamus) said in one of your last posts. There was no call to use the language you used. ......................any way.....I just wanted to say that I do appreciate most of the comments on this thread(yes even the negative ones)
You all have a great day and just remember "when you hear that phone ring , it just might be me" lol

 

[Stardust]

C'mon Southerncat, I have not been on this forum for years, neither am I negative. On the contrary, I am usually slammed for going to the defense of the underdog, so to speak, and sometimes wrong when I do LOL.
I do not think my responses to your do's and dont's when a telemarketer calls was rude. It was only when your daughter came on with claws and total emotions out that I started with the like.
If you read most of my posts on here you would see that A) I know that job, very well and B) I take that job in stride.
I believe that is all I was telling you to do. If you cut out all your emotional feelings (as we women tend to do ) then you would read my posts for what they are.
I'll tell you what, if you are making your calls someday and see my name crop up don't start in your speil, just say who you are and I will talk LOL. Or know that I would just say "no thank you" anyway and just take me off the list.

 

[Rob Hill/Geckos Anonymous]

You know, something I've noticed in my life is that some of the people most annoyed by those telemarketing calls are...TELEMARKETERS!!!

I work for a company that does a fair amount of telemarketing(within a 50 mile radius) and all I hear from the telemarketers we have working for us is, "oh, last night when I was eating dinner these damn telemarketers kept calling," when they do the same thing all day and night! LOL

I have also done telemarketing for my company. I tried it initially under the idea that it might be an easy way to bring in some extra cash on my paycheck. I can say this, I HATED IT! I hated calling people and leaving messages on their machines, bothering people when they would much rather being doing ANYTHING than wasting time with a telemarketer, and I HATED the fact that I was doing the SAME THING I am annoyed by multiple times EVERYDAY. So you know what? I went to my management and told them I couldn't stand this job, and explained why. Now I'm back to doing the same thing I was originally doing, spending most of the day in front of a computer. And you know what? If they told me to get out and fired me for not doing it, I would have GLADLY walked out on the spot.

To me at least, an unsolicited phone call is a violation of my time. I do my best to be polite to every telemarketer I talk to. I answer the phone and say, "Look, before you waste your time and mine going into your spiel, I am not interested in whatever you're selling. Please make it known I do not wish to receive anymore calls. Have a nice day," and then I hang up. However, when I hear the same voice or someone from the same company calling back the same day or within a couple of days(or really hearing back from them EVER again), I get frustrated. I told them I wasn't interested and they chose to ignore what I had to say. In my opinion, if someone chooses to blatantly ignore my request to be left alone, all gloves are off. If a telemarketer/company repeatedly calls me to solicit my business against my wishes, they open themselves up to WHATEVER they receive, be it an immediate hang up, or a piece of what little mind I have.

If a salesperson comes to my door repeatedly after being asked not to and told that I wasn't interested, they leaves themselves open for whatever bucket of rat turds I choose to dump on them.

Persistance is one thing, persistance to the point of being annoying is harassment.

At my company, we EXPLICITLY make it clear that if someone says no, you leave them alone and you do NOT try to persuade them or call them back. As much as we want their business, we don't need to annoy them into giving it to us.

And as far as a lack of choices, that is in my opinion, utter BS and a cop-out. I'm not sorry if that offends anyone. You chose telemarketing over finding something else. You chose a profession that puts you in the position to annoy and bother people to make money. I agree that you shouldn't get treated like a lepper for your decision on a profession, but at the same time, you had better learn that it comes with the territory you have chosen to occupy. YOU ANNOY PEOPLE FOR A LIVING, DEAL WITH IT AND ALL OF THE REPURCUSSIONS, OR FIND ANOTHER JOB!

 

[WebSlave]

Lately, if I get a phone call from anyone whom even suspiciously sounds like a telemarketer, I simply ask them "Is this a sales pitch?" If they say 'yes' I just tell them "no thanks", and hang up. Anything else said AFTER the 'yes' will not be heard by me.

Of course, I have had some of them think they were clever by saying 'No', and then going into a sales pitch anyway. That's when the airhorn comes into play.

 

[Rob Hill/Geckos Anonymous]

So if I spend even 60 seconds on the phone with a telemarketer telling them that I'm not interested in their product whatsoever, will they refund my 60 seconds? Will they give me that wasted piece of my life back?

.....................................................

Thought so.

 

[Monika]

oh no.... not bran's freestyle .. haha if i hear that one more time i think i will scream!!!!