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From: bcsaic!carroll@beaver.cs.washington.edu (Jeff Carroll)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Dealing with Telemarketers
Message-ID: <68913@bu.edu.bu.edu>
Date: 17 Nov 90 01:00:39 GMT
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 828, Message 7 of 7


In article <14383@accuvax.nwu.edu> nickless@flash.ras.anl.gov (Bill
Nickless) writes:

>Sleaze:   "Is Mr. Nickless available?"  (Or better yet, I live with my 
>           recently widowed aunt, and the Sleaze asks for "Mr. or Mrs.
>           White....")

>(20 minutes later, Sleaze hangs up in disgust, realizing that it has
>lost that time to harass someone else.)  :-)

>[Moderator's Note: Based on only one sentence from the person calling,
>how do you know it was a telemarketer and not a police officer,
>hospital clerk or someone Mr. and Mrs. White *do* need and want to
>speak with?  PAT]

	For about three years after we got married, our phone was listed
under my wife's maiden name, though I usually answered the phone. 

	It was not very difficult to figure out what was afoot on
calls like these:

	Me: Hello?

	Other person: "Mr. Burns?"

	Actually, here in Bellevue, the police department (or, rather,
the Police Officers' Guild) *does* engage in telemarketing. I was
interrupted during the second game of the World Series by a police
officer seeking a rather large donation ($25/head) to pay for "tickets
for disadvantaged youth" to a circus that was coming to town.

	Being wrapped up in the ball game, I didn't bother to
investigate further, but it did sound a little fishy -- not to mention
the uncomfortable feeling that accompanies receiving phone calls from
local cops asking for money.


Jeff Carroll
carroll@atc.boeing.com