Actual conversation

Thursday 12 October 2006 — This is more than 18 years old. Be careful.

The following is an actual conversation that occurred tonight between me and a stranger on the telephone.

(phone rings)

Me: Hello?

Him: (longish pause, giving away the commercial nature of the call)

Him: Good evening sir, would you be willing to help me with a short survey about electricity use? It will only take two minutes.

Me: (reluctantly) OK.

Him: Thank you, now, um, just a minute, .. Uh, my computer seems to have frozen.

Me: (chuckling on the inside)

Him: Um, I’m having a little difficulty right now. Can I call you back?

Me: (rolling my eyes, knowing I won’t pick up the phone next time) Sure.

Him: Great. What’s your telephone number?

Me: (in disbelief, hangs up the phone) [Click]

Comments

[gravatar]
Jeremy Jones 8:13 AM on 13 Oct 2006
I'm a little disappointed. You should have at least asked if the pesky telemarketer was running windows :-)
[gravatar]
gemidjy 10:40 AM on 13 Oct 2006
It's the phone spammers, trust me!
>: Plus, it is Friday 13th!!
[gravatar]
susan senator 4:16 PM on 13 Oct 2006
Darling, that was me. Why did you hang up?
[gravatar]
Calvin Spealman 11:26 PM on 14 Oct 2006
I can usually agree with you. But, after my wife's job as a phone survey operator, I've come to hear their side of it (over and over and over) and, hey, they're just paying the bills like the rest of us.

Besides, they literally don't know the numbers being called. They are hooked to random numbers from an outside dialing service, often.
[gravatar]
Ben Finney 9:03 PM on 15 Oct 2006
Calvin: Yes, telemarketers are just paying the bills. The difference is, they're doing so *at our expense*. There are plenty of jobs out there that *don't* involve pestering people in their homes. While they attempt to pester me in my home, they get none of my respect.

Add a comment:

Ignore this:
Leave this empty:
Name is required. Either email or web are required. Email won't be displayed and I won't spam you. Your web site won't be indexed by search engines.
Don't put anything here:
Leave this empty:
Comment text is Markdown.