Ever since I got caller ID on my phone at home, I’ve had a remarkably fun time ignoring unwanted phone calls. Ex girlfriends, sales people, Tara Reid’s ugly nipple, you name it. But there has been one phone number in the log that stands out among the rest. This single 1-800 number has called me at least 80 times over the last month and a half. I say “at least”, because it doesn’t record their number twice in a row. It waits until another call comes in before entering them into the log again.
So about two weeks ago, I sat playing GTA, and the phone rings. It’s the mystery 800 number of persistence. I run over a few pedestrians and decide that I cannot continue wondering who this ever vigilant phantom caller could be. So I pick up the phone.
Sharkey: “Hello?”
Caller: *long pause* “Hi sir. This is Todd with SBC Phone Service. I was calling you today to offer you a gr…”
Sharkey: *inturrupting* “You have got to be kidding me. You’re the bastards who have been calling me at 9 o’clock at night, 6 o’clock in the morning, hundreds of times over the course of a month?”
Caller: “Uh… I’m not sure sir, but I should tell you that we’re running a special on…”
Sharkey: “OK, OK look. I’ve got a special offer for you. Listening? Here’s the deal: you put me on whatever “do-not-call” list you folks have over there, and I’ll refrain from coming down there and stabbing random SBC employees in the eye with a spork. Sound good?”
Caller: “I’ll go ahead and put you down as ‘Not Interested’ sir.”
Sharkey: “Splendid. Have a nice day.”
*CLICK*
Now you would think “Not Interested” meant “Do Not Fucking Call 5 Times A Day Anymore”, but apparently SBC employees are illiterate, or uncaring bastards. I’m guessing a little mixture of columns A and B. Since that day, I have spoken with SBC reps no less than 8 times, which doesn’t even count the amount of times that I haven’t been at home to answer. And considering the fact that I’m never at home, I would imagine that amount to be rather large.
So after numerous calls where I asked reps to stuff paper in their asses, or calmy mimed the sales pitch along with them from memory, I finally thought that the last woman had heard my pleas. She stated that she would do whatever was in her power to get me off the call list, so that I could once again live a life of peace. She was nice. …for a lying fucking whore.
This morning’s call:
Sharkey: “Hi. This is SBC again, isn’t it?”
Caller: *long pause* “Hello…. um, yes it is. This is Sally and I’m calling to offer you…”
Sharkey: *inturrupting* “Man, am I glad you called. I hadn’t heard from you bastards in a day or two, I was starting to get worried.”
Caller: “… well sir, I should tell you that we’re offering…”
Sharkey: “You know what Sally, I’m on my way out the door right now, so I don’t have time to talk. But why don’t you lie and pretend that you’re going to put me on the ‘Not Interested’ list, and I’ll talk to one of you fuckers in about three hours, OK? Hope the kids are alright, have a nice day.”
*CLICK*
I’m thinking of keeping a log book next to my desk, and I’m going to try keeping demographic information about my new friends. You know, name, age, location, kids, social security numbers. Whatever they’ll tell me. I’m going to see how long it takes before I get a duplicate caller. And on that day I will rattle off the names of thier children and why the federal witness relocation program is such a boon to telemarketers in these exceptional times.
Hahaha !I hate these fuckers.Spork is the funniest word !
Some morehttp://bossiwritings.homestead.com/Convo_Tele01.htmlhttp://bossiwritings.homestead.com/Convo_Tele02.htmlhttp://bossiwritings.homestead.com/Convo_Tele03.html
Publicize your call logIf you decide to keep a log, why not post it on BAMF? Publicizing such information worked amazingly well when Dave Barry did it to the American Marketing Association.*Suggestions are for entertainment purposes only. Must be 18 years or older to harass the phone company.*
pwntDo it. Keep demographics. It’d be awesome to creep somebody out, because most of them are just waiting for it to auto-dial the next number, they don’t know who they’re calling aside from the name on the screen.That’d be asskickage.
Sue!Isn’t it illegal for them to call you once you tell them to put you on the do not call list? You can sue! Rape em!
sbcpost the 800 number. it costs the company 25 cents for every incoming call. if you post the number so everyone of these readers can call 20-30 times a day for a couple of days thats an impressive amount of money that they have to spend. you could put them out of business
Lawsuityou can indeed sue those fuckers. if they call again, write down the time and date, and tell them to throw you on that ‘do not call’ list. if they call again, you can sue them for like 2 grand the first call, then another 5 grand for each additional call after that. thats how it works in maine anyway.
Bahjohn skeen, you obviously don’t understand. The phone company is calling him. I sincerely doubt (considering I’ve worked for them and have seen the accounts) that they’re charging themselves for the calls.
Sue and tellWhat’s the 800 number? I’ll call my required 30-40 times a day just to screw with SBC. And yeah you can sue for harassment. Record all of the phone calls if you can and keep a log. Then sue the company for…1 MILLION DOLLARS!! Ahahahahahaha.
Anti-Telemarketer Scripthttp://www.xs4all.nl/~egbg/counterscript.htmlPrint this fucker out and give it a try, works like a charm
And your upset….Try buying a new Nextel phone 3 weeks ago, the I860 Camera deal and not changing my number mind you, then having the pleasure of recieving no less than 217 MMS messages regarding anything from reducing my mortgage to 2.93% or ENLARGING my Love Root 7 times its normal size in 4 weeks…..The Madness won’t stop…..
DNCThe Do Not Call Registry is only limited to businesses you have not had a previous relationship with. So if you have or had SBC service they are allowed by law to solicit you as often as they like. However it does not prohibit you from going down there and stabbing them in the eye with a spork. Happy sporking.
Sue ’emIf you keep a log you can easily sue these bastards and win $10,000 per incident. There was some dude in CA that got rich doing that. The law is pretty clear, sounds like they done fucked up.
sporkingProps on the spork reference 😉