'Cold-call' phone calls that pi$$ you off?

[ray]

Hi/
Just a quick rant. Is any body else getting the phone calls from hell, they seem to come from a call center in India or somewhere, you get the call pick up the receiver and it is silent then goes dead, or a foreign sounding voice says it this Mr .... first of all you are polite and say sorry we do not buy over the phone and can you please take us off your call list, then end up after 10 calls a day for 2 years screaming if you do not stop calling me I will shove the F$$$ing phone as far as I can up your arse, or I will some how find you and kill you and your children, only to get another call an hour later.
I called BT to try and get it stopped, but the girl on the other end just sounded despondent, every call she gets must be people like me complaining, all she could say is they can not stop it, as the calls are international, I can not change my number as I have to have it for my business, any way I have a call block for any anonymous callers who can not get through, pity this will not work on international calls.

If everybody in the country refused to pay their bills until this nuisance calls stopped something would be done, does any of you lot get these calls, and how do you feel!!!

[aclivity]

I have now taken to hanging up if there is more than about half a second of silence or that tell tale 'click' whilst the autodialler puts you through to a caller.

I wanted to buy a whistle but SWMBO reckons it might wake the kids up if I whistled down the phone at night!

[Janos]

TRY THIS

I registered with them a couple of months ago and it's brilliant. Occasionally you do get teh odd call coming through. But I interrupt and say (very politely) that I'm with the TPS and they tell me they'll take me off their lists.

Absolutely brilliant.

I still get the odd recorded message, but the number of these has dropped dramatically (now one a fortnight rather than one a day).

Laters,
Janos

[Ian@1904]

Register with TPS

Leave a whistle by the phone and use it with relish

(I used to work in the call centre industry)

As I work for a finance company, if I get any calls like these I start speeling off our interest rates, and ask them if they would like one of our reps to call them whilst they are eating their evening meal. They usually are so gob smacked that they hang up.

Have now registered with TPS, as this is probably the better option.

[Simon A]

I am registered with the TPS but I still get the odd call like this, since the only people who dont phone me on my mobile are a couple of my mates, and these calls, I just answer the phone "Bob's discount Golf", my mates know about it, and telemarketers seem to be targeting private individuals and hang up the second they think it's a business line.

Simon A

[Salvo]

I usually say I am very busy and could the give me their home phone number and I will call back. They then tell me it is against company policy to give out home phone numbers. I ask if the company is afraid employees would get annoying phone calls at home and hang up. I do like the wistle idea though, I will have to try that.

[DanE]

Telemarketer: Hello, could I speak to Mr E?
dan: Speaking.
Telemarketer: Would you be interested in product x?
dan: What are you wearing?
Telemarketer: Excuse me, sir?
dan: What are you wearing? You're not wearing any knickers are you?
Telemarketer: [click]

I actually have to work quite hard at being evil

[DaveB]

Doesn't get rid of the problem, but I've been told that the "autodialers" dial a large number of calls for each that gets an answer. If someone else in your batch picks up first, then you get a dead line. I find this a bit quicker to deal with than a real person, so I now let the phone ring for a bit before picking it up.

My appologies if you were in my batch and had faster reactions!

I registered with TPS some time ago, but might just do it again as it seems to have worn off.

[PW1664]

Like others, I started getting an increaasing amount of calls in the evening. It got to so many the disruption was really getting out of hand. I did the usual, be polite and ask them not to call back, get rude, offensive, make smart comments...I may have vented my frustration but it stop the calls.

Finally i registered with TPS. By far the best solution, shortly after registering the calls reduced, those I did get I politely explained that I had registered with the TPS. Now I NEVER get any telemarketing calls.

If you don't want those calls, register with the TPS...