junk mail and annoying phone calls

[mikeysaling]

havn't tried the # thing but sounds reasonable - not so sure about waiting for the beep beep beep (may miss a genuine call) anyway thought this was interesting.

REVENGE ON THE TELEMARKETER

Three Little Words That Actually Work!!

(1) The three little words: 'Hold On, Please...'
Saying this, while putting down your phone and walking off (instead of hanging-up immediately) would make each telemarketing call so much more time-consuming that sales would grind to a halt.

Then when you eventually hear BT's 'beep-beep-beep' tone, you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset....you have efficiently completed your task.
These three little words could help eliminate telephone soliciting.

(2) Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end?
This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and records the time of day when a person answers the phone.

This technique is then used to determine the best time of day for a 'real' salesperson to call back and get someone at home.
What you can do after answering: If you notice there is no-one there, immediately start hitting your # button on the phone, 6 or 7 times, as quickly as possible. This confuses the machine that dialed the call and it kicks your number out of their system. Gosh, what a shame not to have your name in their system any longer!!!

(3) When you get those 'pre-approved' letters in the mail for everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and similar type junk, do not throw away the return envelope.

Most of these come with postage-prepaid return envelopes, right?
It costs them more than the regular postage 'IF' and when they are returned. It costs them nothing if you throw them away! In that case, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in these cool little, postage-prepaid return envelopes.

Send an advert for your local chimney-sweep to American Express... they might need one!
Send a pizza coupon to HSBC... in case their canteen packs up. You get the idea.
If you didn't get anything else that day, then just send them back their blank application form... after all, it is their form!

If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn't on anything you return.

You can even send the envelope back empty if you want to keep them guessing! It still costs them, and it is their envelope after all… you are just returning it!!!!

The banks and credit card companies are currently getting a lot of their own junk back in the post, but folks....we need to OVERWHELM them, in order to stop them.

Let's let them know what it's like to get lots of junk mail, and best of all they're paying for it...Twice!

Let's help keep Royal Mail busy. Since the Royal Mail is saying that e-mail is cutting into their business profits, let's help them so they will not need to increase postage costs again. You get the idea!

If enough people follow these tips, it will work ----

maybe you'll get very little junk mail in future.

[FrameArt]

When I get these phone calls I say hold the line please and put the phone near the radio playing Classic FM so they can listen to some nice music while they wait...

[mikeysaling]

if the wife is home i say - its for you dear - frightens me!! seems the only ones that don't get the message are anglian water trying to sell plumbing services

[Bill Henry]

My understanding that you guys have something similar to our “Do-Not-Call” registry.

Despite our being on it, there are still some telemarketers who ignore or are exempt from it. Particularly annoying to me are the “computer” voice calls, who begin their sales pitch as soon as the phone is answered. (I cannot imagine anyone in their right mind listening to the whole spiel.)

I heard a suggestion that if you repeatedly press the “Operator” button, you will be forwarded to a supervisor. I have been doing that for some time now. Once you reach this real person, simply ask that you be removed from the list. Sometimes it works.

Recently, when I hit the Operator button, I have been taken directly to another automated voice message saying that I have been removed from their DNC list.

It depends, I’m sure, how their systems are set up, but it may work for you. Give it a try; you’ve got nothing to lose.

[mikeysaling]

i can rent out tapes of the wife being very aggressive - i got loads on the answerphone

[prospero]

I had a good one yesterday. A tempting offer to get 'superfast' broadband at speeds of up to 3.5meg/sec for £30 a month. I told them I get 7.6 mbs for £5 month. That shut 'em up pronto. What's more it was true.

Sometimes I patiently explain to telecom company callers that I don't make all that many calls and any miniscule reduction in call charges has been totally wiped out by the value of the time lost in taking this call. They don't seem to get the point though.......

One thing I haven't got round to doing is to ask for the billing address of the company and say that I charge £150+vat for consultations and if they ring again I shall assume they know this and send an invoice. And this call is being recorded for training purposes.

[mikeysaling]

another thing you can do is immediately go into computer mode after a few beeps and odd noises (a few odd number presses will do it)

please press 1 for new business - 2 for sales - 3 for customer service - 4 for a personal appointment - and so on

they soon get fed up.

or just say your call is important to us - your call is important to us - we are sorry our musak is down and my wife is not available.

[Roboframer]

A lot of the stuff, if not all of it in the OP was on BBC 2's Jeremy Vine show today.

We don't have a problem with telemarketting calls, we registered with TPS years ago, that won't stop certain types of call, but those certain types must have got bored with us or something. We went through a phase of messing them around but in the end we just stopped them mid-spiel and said "You're trying to sell me something aren't you"? Some BS would follow and then we'd just hang up - but we even got bored with talking to them at all, so now, in the rare event of receiving this type of call, we just hang up - life's too short.

We don't get a lot of junk mail either - maybe because we're registered with the relevant people in that dept too.

So - when are they going to provide an equivalent for the interweb?