Archives: Phone Follies
3/29/00
My three telemarketer stories in this chat session were originally told on
RinkWorks in the Site Journal entry for December 23, 1998.
The discussion spawned some more interesting conversation.
* extirpator calls Mia on the phone.
* Mia answers her phone. "Hello?" No one is there....Strange....
extirpator: Hello may I please speak with Sptefffi....tesssinfi...stpehhenii---stephanie? [background sound = "blahblahblahblah"]
extirpator: [telemarketing call]
* Issachar has scarfed down so many salted sunflower seeds yesterday and today, he's pretty much cured his own tongue.
Ticia: I love sunflower seeds, except when you get a bad one, cause then you have to eat a dozen good ones to get the taste out of your mouth
Issachar: Yes!
* Mia hangs up the phone on the telemarketer.
Issachar: And for that matter, there are only a few *really* good ones in any given bag, that have that great roasted flavor.
Issachar: Telemarketers, I mean.
Sam: Telemarketers RULE! There are so many ways to play with their heads.
Mia: Hey, I've never thought about that before!
extirpator: Hello may I please speak with Samuel Sdodtt....Stottot...StoddUND...rrd...errr.Ard?
Sam: I haven't told you my telemarketer stories yet?
Mia: Not to me, you haven't, Sam.
Issachar: You can always tell which telemarketers have attempted to call Sam, because they have that great roasted flavor.
* Issachar loves to mix 'n match chat threads.
Sam: Once...
Sam: ...someone called to try to get me to switch to MCI. I said, "No, but I work for AT&T...want me to switch your phone service?"
Ticia: On the local radio station, the morning DJ's got a list of telemarketers in the area and would call them at 6:00 in the morning, trying to sell stupid things like "Cheese of the Month"...
Mia: Hey, what's wrong with "Cheese of the Month"?
Ticia: ...and the telemarketers would be like "that's so not funny, guys, I work nights."
Sam: Another time...
Sam: ...a guy called asking what my long distance bill averaged each month. Obviously I didn't want to tell him that, and I mumbled some sidestepping remark. He said, "How would you like to save up to 50% on long distance calls?" I said, "I prefer paying full price." The guy didn't have a canned answer for that. He said, "Uh...uh...er...uh...ok, then!" And that was the end of the conversation.
Mia: That's pretty good...I'll have to try that....
Ticia: I'll have to use that one sometime.
Sam: Another time...
Sam: A guy with a foreign accent called. Not sure where we was from. Anyway, he asked me, "Where do you call the most?" I said, "Guatemala. Hey, can you get me five dollars a minute to Guatemala?" He said, "FIVE DOLLARS! Oh no...that's way too much." I said, "Oh, sorry then." And hung up.
Nyperold: "Thanks for calling while I'm having dinner; I can't tell you how much I appreciate that!"
Issachar: Telemarketing is one of the most high-stress, thankless jobs I can think of. I can't imagine that people do it voluntarily; their spouses and children must be held hostage over a pit of rabid wolves or something.
RandyK: I love messing with telemarketers.
extirpator: Hello. My name is Hank and I'm calling from the Visa mastercard express Gold(TM) Platinum(TM) Arsenic(TM) 5000 credit card. What is your current fixed annual rate?
Nyperold: -10%.
extirpator: With the Visa mastercard express Gold(TM) Platinum(TM) Arsenic(TM) 5000 credit card, there is no fixed annual rate. Instead, we guarantee a fixed rate, compounded MONTHLY; only 33% interest. Are you interested?
Issachar: No, no, NO!!!! You NEVER just ask the person, "Are you interested?" You always just go ahead and process them, and ask them to validate the process by supplying their current address and so forth.
extirpator: NO DOWN PAYMENT!
extirpator: NO SET LIMIT !
RandyK: Ever?
Nyperold: No, I take that back --
Nyperold: 10i%
extirpator: 10i% ? Please explain. I'm sure our company can offer you a much less complex percentage rate.
extirpator: Since you seem to show interest, I will go ahead and process your registration now. It will only take 5 seconds, and you can cancel any time by entering the first 15 decimal places of pi into your touch-tone phone now.
extirpator: Thank you for choosing the Visa mastercard express Gold(TM) Platinum(TM) Arsenic(TM) 5000 credit card with a low fixed monthly interest rate and NO DOWN PAYMENT EVER ! NO SET LIMIT ! EVER ! You will receive your card within the next 5 business days. Please feel free to spend as much as you want with the Visa mastercard express Gold(TM) Platinum(TM) Arsenic(TM) 5000 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!11111~~~
Sam: One time someone called asking for Mrs. Stoddard. This would be long before I got married. I said, "There's a Mrs. Stoddard? I wish you had told me sooner."
Ticia: I got a piece of mail the other day that said "To Mr and Mrs Baker" I turned to my roommate and said "Which one do you want to be?"
RandyK: I get calls for Mr. and Mrs. Randy and Danny(my brother) Kirkpatrick.
Sam: Misspellings in my name as it appears on junk mail are great sometimes. Stotdard is a memorable one.
Sam: Stebbard is even better.
Mia: Apparently my brother Tim has a twin brother, Jim. The army sends Jim letters a lot.
RandyK: I get Kirkplatrick or Killpatrick
Nyperold: We get mail for Fossett and Sawcett.
Sam: No Faucet? I'm shocked.
Nyperold: Not yet.
c0bra: We get mail for Han and Ham and Hahn all the time
Sam: Hardly anybody ever spells "Darleen" right. It's "Darlene," even when we spell it out for them. "What's your name?" / "Darleen Stoddard. D-A-R-L-E-E-N." / (types "Darlene") Happens EVERYwhere, with every conceivable type of clerk, receptionist, bank teller, whatever.
Ticia: you should hear telemarketers try to pronounce my name...I've had Tisia, Trisha, Ticka, and just about every other pronunciation you could think of
c0bra: Ticka?
Mia: Ticia: And then there are the people who are CONVINCED that you spell your name wrong....
c0bra: I had a friend in high school who's last name was Bahmie, I don't think a single teacher pronounced it right.
c0bra: Its Hebrew I believe
Sam: I'm scared to guess how to pronounce it right.
c0bra: I think its "Bah-hmay" the h's make a throat clearing sound.
Sam: I like "Bommy" better.
extirpator: I like it when they claim to be "local" people, have a highly southern accent, and can't pronounce "Michigan" correctly.
extirpator: Misschriggan?
extirpator: Once, a guy claiming that our area had bad water drainage and high basement flooding occurences called...
RandyK: ext: do you even have a basement?
extirpator: He wanted us to pay big bucks to get the problem solved, expensively. I told him we had 2 feet of water in our basement but don't DARE do anything to it as we have neither well nor city water.
Sam: LOL
extirpator: We also live in a high area, where the soil is 100% sand with high permeability, nobody I know has ever had basement problems.
Ticia: The best telemarketer call I got was from MCI. "You have recently been disconnected from MCI, we'd like to have you back." I said, "Actually, it wasn't an accident." *click*
c0bra: Welcome to AOL vending machine! If you know the name of the beverage you would like to purchase please press "1".
RandyK: I used to get phone calls when i was ditching school from administrators. I would tell them Randy is sick. And they bought it.
Ticia: I got a call for a wrong number once, and ended up talking to the girl for about 5 minutes, she kept asking if I'd gotten the pictures yet, and if I was going to send her some
c0bra: Oh hey, I have a good one. Our help desk here is a 1-888 number, and people keep dialing it without the "1-888". This poor woman has been getting hundreds of phone calls asking for computer help.
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