This post was originally published on Oct. 27, 2010.
Just a wild guess, but I doubt this phone call was recorded for quality assurance.
RING-RING
I answer the phone, “Hello.”
A woman answers me and explains that she is doing a fire safety survey. “This is not a sales call.”
Ok. Whatever.
“Do you have a fire alarm or smoke detector in your home?”
“Yes”
“Do you have a fire extinguisher in your home?”
“No” Hmm… Maybe we should buy one of those!
“Do you own your home?”
“Yes”
“In case of an emergency, which of the following is the biggest concern for you: fire in the home, break-in, medical emergency, all of the above or none of the above?”
My general philosophy with telemarketer calls is to tell them that I have no fears of bad things happening in my home. It works really well with people trying to sell me home security systems. You simply can’t sell an alarm system to someone who isn’t afraid of a break in. It doesn’t work. So I answer, “None of the above.”
She seemed confused and repeated the question.
“None of the above.” I’m getting irritated now because I received this exact phone call last week. It was at this point in the call last week that things went really down hill. Grace had woken up from her nap and was crying. I told the gentlemen this and said I needed to go, but he wouldn’t let me off the phone. I ended up hanging up on him. I was trying to be more patient this time around, but things weren’t looking good.
“And to confirm your name, am I speaking with Rebekah [Maiden Name].”
Sigh. “No.”
“This is not Rebekah [Maiden Name]?”
“No.”
“You’re name is Anne?”
“What?” Did I mention the thick accent she has?
“A-N-N-E? Anne?”
*rolling my eyes* “No, my name is Rebekah.”
“Oh ok. You have a very nice name. Thank you.”
“What company are you calling from?” I don’t even remember what she answered. However, she did rush through telling me that by answering her survey I was being entered in some kind of drawing. So much for this being a simple safety survey! This must be how they get you on some list to try to sell you something in the future or to send you junk mail.
“Wait. I don’t want to be entered into any drawing.”
Moment of silence
“And please remove my name & number from your calling list.”
More silence. In fact there is so much silence that I wonder what has happened to my telemarketing buddy. Just as I was about to say, “Hello?” I hear this…
“Shut up.”
Was she talking to me?!?! Maybe she was talking to someone in the room with her…
“Excuse me?”
“You don’t EVER say ‘take my name off of list’!”
*jaw drop* “Excuse me??”
“I will call again! I will call you EVERY DAY!!” *CLICK*
Did that really just happen??? What do I say if she calls again? Oh, life can be so strange sometimes…
UPDATE: She never did call again, but her call certainly rattled me. I was a bit nervous to answer the phone for a few days after this incident.
Telemarketer calls can certainly be annoying, but have you ever experienced anything crazy like being threatened by a telemarketer?
This is what I did one time: “Oh, I am so glad you called – I, too, am doing a survery – do you live in a ranch or 2-story home – is it brick or siding – do you rent or own (she answered she lived with her parents and started to giggle). I then said “thanks for calling – goodbye”. Ask your mom what she did once.
wow. wow. wow. that would creep me out!!! thats crazy!!! :/
Um… I’m not even sure what to say to this. Strange world, indeed.
I can’t imagine someone saying that to me or what I would have said in response. I get flustered easily when I’m insulted…
If you choose to answer next time they call, you should definitely find out who she’s with and report them to the BBB.
Sue her for harassment. What a weirdo.
That kind of harassment is actually illegal. Put your number on the Do Not Call registry. It then makes it illegal for telemarketers to call you. Period. Go to http://www.donotcall.gov.
We are already on the “Do Not Call” list, but something tells me that this company doesn’t really care. 🙂
I actually used to work for a Market Research company (worse job ever) and the Do not call registry doesn’t actually apply to market research companies because its surveys and not sales (super dumb I know) you have to specifically ask to be put on their do not call list. And a real easy out with a lot of survey calls is saying yes to the being related to someone who works in a certain field such as market research question in the beginning, it will automatically screen you out and end the call right then.
Thanks for the tips, Melissa!
I don’t recall them asking this but I haven’t answered all of their questions but once and that was I know over a year ago. This “survey” is driving me crazy. Is there any way to actually issue some sort of complaint? Yesterday the heavy accented lady got really angry after I said, “Look, it’s really none of your business how many I have!”, after the fourth call in five days. She screamed, “Yes, it is!!”. But, after reading this blog I am beginning to think that they intend on keeping you on the phone in order to enter your info or something. I asked her if she was serious and she gave me a long silence as well as the man who called literally 15 minutes ago when I asked if he would please take me off of their list.
Time to cancel that phone line. Tell your phone company why your canceling and file a police report to your local pd and the ftc. Then talk to an attorney and take all parties responsible to small claims.
We are on that list and can’t register twice. I keep getting these calls. Twice a day once. They get angry every time I say take us off of your list. Always smoke detectors.
oh my goodness gracious! That is so totally weird. We don’t have caller I.D., but our answering maching serves as ours. LOL We get a lot of hang-ups but those who know us by now know to just start talking and we’ll pick up…maybe! (giggle)
I would get the number if you have caller ID, and find out what company it was. Then report them to the BBB. If you have an iTouch you can do a number look up in the White Pages app, and it will tell you what company or person owns the number. What a creep! Hope she calls back so you can get more ammo. 😉
OH, great idea: I have teenage boys who love to freak people out– especially telemarketers. If you have any of those around, you could enlist them to make it so the lady NEVER wants to call you back! hehe
Oh boy! Send your boys my way. This sounds too interesting to pass up!
I’d call the phone company and find out if there is a way to block harrassing calls free of charge (of course!). If it is a cell phone, I believe there is a way to block calls…at least ours we can and I think it is free. But, either way, you’ll need to get the company’s phone number. If I remember correctly, if they call you more than three times after you tell them to put you on their do not call list, you can sue. Not saying you should, but if she knows you know the law….
She is just creepy. Maybe next time ask if you can pray for her! 🙂
Believe it or not, but it wouldn’t be the first time that I’ve prayed with a telemarketer!
That is so crazy! I don’t answer numbers I don’t know. I’m on the Do Not Call list but it doesn’t seem to matter anymore.
I would for sure find a way to report that somewhere, DNC list for sure.
Also, I can’t read and just realized this happened 5 years ago. LOL.
I just received this in an email so don’t worry that you are the only one who doesn’t notice initial date of publication.
In Canada I can look up numbers free with Canada411. I believe there is a similar service in the USA. If I look up a business number that is not listed, I am asked if I want to report it. I have not reported any number as yet but I do recognize when it calls me again and do not answer.
Julie, it was an insane conversation and I was too shocked to really know how to respond! Don’t worry about this being an older post. I “recycle” my content from time to time.
We’ve had some pretty crazy ones :'( One guy told us if we didn’t give him a SS# of whoever does the taxes in our house, he’d call the FBI to report us for fraud and about 15 minutes later (same number, same guy) we got a call saying there were police in our front yard, give him our bank info and charges will not be pressed. That’s what happens when you call tech-support… It happened to about 60+ people in our town that week!
*jaw drop*
WHAT???
Oh. My. Word.
This is actually nice compared to a call I dealt with. After I asked to be taken off the call list, he informed me he knew where i lived and would come and went into detail to describe what he was going to do to me when he arrived. I hung up, and he called back and continued threatening me. He even went so far as to keep my number and call a week later to continue to harass. We tried the phone company but they could only provide the number that called, which went to a companies main switchboard, so I couldn’t find someone to file a complaint with. We actually ended up canceling our home phone line over this.
I am sorry, but WHAT?!?!?!? What an INSANE story! I am so sorry you had to deal with that.
Not quite the same issue but we used to have collections people call all the time for someone who didn’t even live in our house and harass us constantly. One company called us like 2 years after we hadn’t received anything for quite some time (they always sold the file or whatever to someone else when they could never get anything for the collections) and the guy who called was the biggest jerk I’ve ever spoken to in my life. He called me a stupid bitch after I asked him if he was dumb or just hard of hearing because I had explained THREE times already that the person didn’t live with us nor had they ever lived with us and that people had been calling our number for years and I thought it had already been dealt with. I said they needed to remove our number from their file because it was obviously the wrong number said I wanted his manager to tell him the same thing. He told me to kiss his ass and hung up on me. They called every day and hung up when I answered just to be annoying. I finally did the *69 thing or whatever it was to get a number and called them, got a manager and they finally removed our number from their file after he asked me “is your address _____?” and I said NO and gave him our address. He apologized but had no idea who the other caller was that treated me like that so it was never dealt with either but at least they don’t call anymore
Oh my goodness! You just have to think that people like that must be dealing with a lot of negativity in their lives. Why else would they purposely harass someone like that? Such a shame. I’m glad it has been resolved for you.
The past 2 years have been very hard in our houes hold. My mothers health has declined and I was forced to resign from my job to care for her. During one of her visits to the hospital we kept getting phone calls from one # in particular. I finally answered and long story short the caller informed me that my mother had made a pledge to their organization and they had not received it. I explained that my mothers health wasn’t good and she was suffering from dementia so anything she had promised in the past few months couldn’t be taken seriously because she wasn’t aware of what she was agreeing too. He responded, “so you’re family isn’t going to honor the pledge.” I said, “no I’m sorry without doing more research into your organization I cannot at this time.” He said, “nice f#@king family.” Than hung up. First I just stood there shocked. Than I cried, than I got angry. I googled the organization and found tons of reports that they weren’t legit. They were claiming to be helping veterans yet less than 20% of their profits went to the veterans. So be careful who you give your money too. Don’t ever allow them to harass you either.
Oh Meghan, that is just awful! I am sorry you had that experience during such a stressful time.
Unfortunately, this is why I do not have a home phone service because of situations like this. Even with cells they can still somehow get their claws on your number and call as well.
Thankfully, nothing like this has happened to me since then. You might think I’m nuts, but we still have a landline!
So I was looking at quotes for health insurance and I am a contractor, There was a site I just looked at the quotes, and bam I started getting calls. I am actually alittle scared. One keeps calling me and if I hang up he just calls back silent on the phone, refused to let me speak with the manager. I called back and asked to speak to one, they said they didn’t know who it was. Is there a number you can report abuse to?
Oh man. I’m sorry. Can you call your phone company to ask about blocking a number?