I wondered if that “scam” was actually a myth, but from that, it seems like the actual scam involves getting them saying “yes,” sending someone an invoice and then playing the doctored “agreement” back to them if they call to complain. Which is pretty convoluted and only works if people think, “Oh no, they have a recording of me saying ‘yes,’ I guess I have to pay the fraudulent bill now!” That doesn’t work if you’re aware of the scam in the first place.
Still, it’s probably not the best idea to agree to things randomly over the phone…
All the phone solicitations I get now are fraudulent to one degree or another - either misrepresenting who they are (and wantonly violating the “do-not-call” list), or straight-up criminal scams.
My mother gets a lot of calls from contractors trying to drum up work (or rather thuggish middlemen making money by calling people on their behalf) and “vent cleaning” services (which are inherently a scam, even if a real business). Despite all the calls violating the do-not-call list, and often making fraudulent claims (pretending that she had called them, or that they had previously done work for her), she’s always polite in her refusals and in pointing out that they’re not telling the truth. It doesn’t stop them from being rude and even verbally abusive, swearing at her, even telling her she has dementia for not going along with their gas-lighting. And these are the “legitimate” telemarketing calls she gets, not the outright scams. In short, they’re all outright criminal scum and fuck them. This is definitionally true when there are no legitimate telemarketing jobs anymore in this context.
They should find more legitimate work, like robbing Walmarts or mugging businessmen.
Or, just a thought, we should have an economy that doesn’t make poor people have shitty choices to do basic things like feed their families and pay their bills. The people responsible for the shittiness that is telemarketing are not the working class folks who take those jobs, it’s the corporations who think it’s a great way to get business and our government which does absolutely nothing to reign them in.
I don’t feel this about dumping on the poor. it’s about having freedom deal with an intrusion into your personal time as you see fit. yes you are right some these people are in shitty position. I have been a shitty position and taken a similar job and really could not stomach it. at the end of day I feel if someone wants want to ignore a telemarketer or string them along is a personal decision. personally i’m unemployed this winter and I like to hone my skills as a prankster and I’m not the one that intruded so if they don’t they don’t like it they can hang up as they usually do . that being said I said I do my best to keep banter positive and in good humour. my personal choice is to support people that are actually less fortunate than me in other ways and being as kind as possible to the world around me . but at they end of the day I feel i’m honing a positive ability when I attempt find amusing ways to engage someone who’s job it is to take advantage of someone else’s lack of knowledge in whatever area they are trying to exploit. any kind of fraud has its effects on a victim sometimes as much so as mugging or home invasion or other form of violation . I know I have suffered it. but the spirit of the clown in me tries to take what I know about that pain and transform it into laughter.
Was just coming to weigh in with this. “Working to make ends meet” != “turning to crime.” Unless they are calling in very specific circumstances (e.g. previous business relationship, political campaign), the phone call itself is most likely illegal in the first place (and I don’t think anyone here has specifically complained about those exceptions.). Calling someone on the “do not call” list adds another layer of criminality, IIRC. That’s aside from whatever fraud/con they’re perpetrating via said phone call (i.e. whatever they’re trying to do has potential, and intended, victims).
“Times are hard” is one thing, but here’s an interview with the former operator (previously on BB) of a revenge porn website, in which he uses that as an excuse:
BOB GARFIELD: Does your mother know what you do for a living?
CRAIG BRITTAIN : They know, and my parents don’t really care. They understand that we’re in one of the toughest economic periods in the history of this country right now. A lot of people’s backs are against the wall.
[ . . . ] BOB GARFIELD: Do something else. You can’t rationalize it.
CRAIG BRITTAIN : I can’t rationalize starving either.
BOB GARFIELD: You know what? Starve.
[BRITTAIN LAUGHS]
Starve.
CRAIG BRITTAIN : No.
BOB GARFIELD: Stand on the median strip of the highway and beg. There’s more dignity in that –
[BRITTAIN LAUGHING]
- than in what you’re doing now.
CRAIG BRITTAIN : I tried that. I wasn’t good at that either.
Or, as Seth Tobocman once put it:
(couldn’t find the image, but the follow-up to that one was “Or Yourself”)
I worked many years in retail, having to promote things customers don’t want, so I can empathize with somebody who’s just trying to do a job. A polite but firm no is my answer to them. If that person ignores me and responds with high-pressure sales tactics… I’m less polite. If it’s a scammer (especially if it’s a Medicare scheme targeting my deceased parents), well, game on, motherpuppy. I may or may not play with them a little before I verbally blast them-- I owe no respect to crooks trying to swindle me or mine. Otherwise, I aim for a proportionate response, both for their benefit and mine. I don’t want to be someone who’s nastier than I have to be. But that’s me.
Sadly, even seemingly legitimate companies feel they can ignore the Do Not Call list. Until there’s clear and consistent penalties for that, I don’t see unsolicited calls going away anytime soon.
“You don’t have to fuck someone over to survive.” Well I hope so, I really do hope that that is true but I just don’t know what these people’s circumstance is. I am all for prosecuting the owners of the business that peruse any illegal / immoral stuff like that. I just do not feel like I can harass the actual people who are calling me. Maybe they are criminal predators, maybe they are just poor saps who don’t know how bad the company they are with is yet, maybe even they are perfectly legitimate volunteer for a real charity; I am not sticking around long enough to find out.
And a revenge porn site operator is not a valid comparison to a telemarketer.
I usually just ask those guys “do you mind if I record this call?”
Their answer always seems to be “no.”
Then they end the call.
[ETA: to be clear, “no” means “no we don’t want you to record this call”, not “no we don’t mind.” I started doing this when they mentioned that they record the call for “quality control purposes.” Apparently they can record the call, but we can’t.]
Instead of making their life worse, I’d argue ignoring is the better option, because it doesn’t make people who don’t have good choices feel worse, and it sends the message that you’re not participating at all with incoming telemarketing calls. And if you have to answer a call, is it really so much skin off people’s noses to just firmly and politely say no, and hang up?
And i think that’s more than fair enough. Especially since it is true that some people do have other options and pick this anyway AND there are scammers out there, too.
But this whole “the person on the phone deserves to get dumped on” isn’t really thinking through the whole of the problem and who is primarily responsible for this current state of affairs…
They do, because they know that corporations have nearly free reign, especially now.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but personally theft and street prostitution is more dignified than defrauding senile old folks of their social security checks. It’s not like these phone scams are targeted at billionaires or ceos. They go after the most vulnerable population.
Yes, and that’s scamming, which is illegal, and is not all of telemarketing calls. They might make up the majority now, I don’t know (as I don’t answer my landline or unknown calls on my cell), but there are some that are for more legit businesses and not scammers, even if the businesses are a bit dodgy.
There seems to be a whole set of categories that make up “telemarketing” that everyone is assuming are all fraud-based scams, when that’s not really the case. Some of the few telemarketing calls I do get that leave messages are from legit businesses like insurance cos trying to get me to change. Is that annoying? Yes. Is house or car insurance a legit biz? Yes (well, you know what I mean by difference between scammers trying to get your SSN and a fully legal business trying to get your business). These are horses of different colors.
My phone reports its own voicemail number I use as “Dangerous Spam”. So it hard to completely trust the filtering services.
Occasionally I get a call from a different extension at the doctor’s office, for example.
If the goal is to waster their time, than a good method is to use your best senior citizen voice and be super slow about everything. I don’t have the patience to tell Abe Simpson stories, but I don’t mind saying, “Hang on, let me get that information for you you.” and then put the phone in a drawer and make dinner.
“Oh this is the wrong wallet.” and then put on an episode of Matlock for an hour.
Etc.
Also, don’t try this if you have a “minutes” plan.
I already record my calls. Comes in handy when dealing with Comcast or an apartment’s maintenance staff. Or even when Mom says to be there at 7, then yells when I didn’t show up at 6.
I acknowledge that some legitimate business telemarketing exists.
I can’t remember the last time I ever encountered it.
The last several thousand “telemarketing” calls I’ve got are from “cardholder services” trying to get me to hand over my credit card info so they can steal my identity. “Microsoft support” trying to get me to let them VPN into my PC to steal my identity. “The IRS” for stealing my identity.
Occasionally I’ll get political campaigning robocalls. Paid with PAC/SuperPAC money I don’t agree is legitimate anyway.
I don’t begrudge actual telemarketers. They barely exist. They’re not the problem I’m talking about, I doubt anyone here thinks of some down on his luck guy selling vacuum cleaners when they hear “telemarketer”. They’re remembering the guy who got their grandma to buy fake life insurance.
Yes, think of the poor people who make me ignore every single phone call from unknown numbers.
I’m editing this because I shouldn’t come down on you personally, but I also got rid of my landline (which was the only type of phone that worked after 9/11 or major weather events before and after) because it became unusable because of these wastes of humanity.
