From: oneil@cwis.unomaha.edu (Sharon O'Neil)
Newsgroups: misc.consumers
Subject: Re: Revenge on a telemarketer!
Date: 16 Oct 92 03:53:16 GMT
Article-I.D.: cwis.oneil.719207596
Organization: University of Nebraska at Omaha

harris@ROTC.orst.edu (Captain Harris) writes:

>Last night, I was called by a salesman from MCI (second most obnoxious 
>salespeople in the known universe, behind Time-Life Books).  I had 
>absolutely no interest in switching to MCI, but I let him ramble.  MCI is 
>famous for pitching their logic, and easily deflected my counter arguments.  
>During our conversation, I told him once or twice why I did not want to 
>switch, which led to a further line of discussion.

Hey!  What do you know?  I used to do outbound telemarketing in order to
pay my way through student teaching.  And I even called for Time-Life
books!  

>So I kept him on the phone for 5 or 10 minutes, and finally decided I had 
>had enough.  When he finally stopped his last argument, and asked me what 
>I thought, I told him very politely that I still was not interested, and 
>that he had wasted enough of my time.  There was just a slight undertone of 
>irritation in his voice as he replied "If you're not interested, you're 
>wasting my time".  To which I quickly responded, "Well, that's better, 
>because you are being paid for this and I am not".  Right after I said 
>that, he hung up on me!

Are you serious?  Well, first of all, I don't think it was right for you to
keep him on the line for five or ten minutes if you're really not interested.
You could always hang up.  But he should not have hung the phone up on you.
In fact, where I used to work, that is grounds for termination.  You /never/
hang up on a customer, even if they don't purchase.  That's just plain rude.

>After he hung up, I realized that another way to frustrate telemarketers is 
>to keep them on the line - they burn up money keeping the connection open, 
>and if one of them is talking to me, he is not making money talking to 
>someone else.  Then just before you hang up, tell them you are not 
>interested and thank them for the opportunity to waste their time. 

Yes, that's true.  You could keep them online, but why?  When I telemarketed
I was not out to cheat people.  More than once, if I realized the person I
was talking to really didn't understand the situation or if I thought they
were senile, I would find some way to get out of the call so that I did not
cheat the person.  If you're not interested, then just hang up, politely or
not.  Most of us are seasoned enough that we don't care if you hang up on us.

The fact of the matter is, yes, the company does burn up money keeping the
connection open.  But why punish the poor stiff on the other end who is
merely trying to pay his way through college?  Or trying to moonlight because
her regular job doesn't pay enough.  (I will point out about half of the folks
who worked at the company I worked for were employed schoolteachers trying to
make ends meet.  Two friends were trying to get into the police academy.)

If you're not interested, hang up.  I mean, yes, it's annoying to get a call,
but why be mean spirited to people who are just trying to survive?

>As an after-thought, should I now complain to MCI that their salesman was 
>rude to me?  :-)

Actually, YES!  I would definitely complain.  If they are automated, there
should be some way of tracing the individual who hung up on you.  And you
could probably ask MCI to remove you from their outbound telemarketing list
at the same time.

>----

Sharon O'Neil
oneil@cwis.unomaha.edu