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From: friedl@mtndew.tustin.ca.us (Stephen J. Friedl)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Dealing with Telemarketers
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Date: 21 Nov 90 06:04:54 GMT
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X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 840, Message 8 of 12


There have been various discussions about how to deal with
telemarketers, and John Higdon mentions that the game is quite
different for businesses than it is for people at home.  We get these
calls from people wanting to hit us up for the police athletic league
or disabled veterans or whatever all the time, but rather than be
combative or irritated that they have taken time out of our day, we
decided to make a game out of it for *our* fun.

Since we had gotten pretty good at recognizing these charities by the
way they asked for the callee, we made up a person who was in charge
of what they wanted: he was Mr. Szudsen.  The problem is, this person
was never in the office (darn!).  We were always prepared to take a
message, but of course they would always rather just call back later
(probably because they weren't summarily blown off and because they
had a real *name*).

So, whenever we got a call for Mr. Szudsen we got progressively more
interesting in the detailed explanation about why he was not in.
First he is just out of town for a day or two, then yachting to
Mexico, and so on, until he was on safari in Africa or assisting the
Contras in Nicaragua.  If you have somebody who has been really
persistent but seems ready to give up, say that he is accepting an
award from the President for outstanding volunteerism -- that should
keep them going for a while.

If you are not very good at determining these calls from the first
voice but you still want to have some fun, try this: fill out a
reader-service card from a magazine asking for some insurance
information or make a small donation to a police charity but be sure
to use Mr. Szudsen's name.  Now you have primed the pump and it is
just a matter of time.

This is more fun in a smaller office where everybody kicks in to
answer the phone, so you can all get turns on occasion.  You gotta
make sure that everybody knows about this person, and you gotta keep
from laughing.


Stephen J. Friedl, KA8CMY  /  3B2-kind-of-guy  /  Tustin, CA / 3B2-kind-of-guy
+1 714 544 6561  / friedl@mtndew.Tustin.CA.US  / {uunet,attmail}!mtndew!friedl