The Pandemic Soul

Take on Telemarketers with this Counter-Script

Not sure I like this, for a number of reasons.

First: who has time to find this thing, especially when you’re on your cellphone? Unless you tape it to your battery or something…

Second: I’m not fan of telemarketers, but surely we all realize that taking a telemarketing job is one of those “I’ll only do this for as long as I have to until I find a new job” type of things. I wouldn’t call it a mark of desperation, but it’s certainly not the type of job anyone aspires to.

I work in a call-center job, as a “Customer Service Specialist.” Really, I’m a collector. I work 30-89 days past due (”dpd”) accounts for captive, luxury auto finance company (meaning, we only buy deals for one car company). I’m on the phone all day long, and make an average of 130 outgoing calls a day. 80% of the time I leave a message and go on to the next account, but I do talk to a lot of people every day. Now, of course, I’m dealing with a completely different set of circumstances than telemarketers, but in general the type of attitude that this little sheet is promoting is negative and a little mean-spirited. I won’t even mention some of the suggestions what some of the commenters on that article’s page said, because they’re worse than the article itself, but the total idea here is that you should waste the telemarketer’s time.

I find this reprehensible, especially considering how easily one can come to the conclusion that it’s not the people who are on the phone that’s the problem. They are doing a job, just like every other average Joe. They want to make a buck, just like you or me. Yeah, they probably work on comission, but to get anything done in that type of business, you have to — otherwise the telemarketer doesn’t do their job at all. If you want to be angry at someone, be angry at the company behind them. (And yes, believe me, if there is anyone who knows that the person on the phone is the “representative” for the company, it’s me.) The fact is, we have a high standard of living because we live in a capitalist economy. You have a computer because you make enough money to buy it. That makes you privileged. But with that privilege comes a lot of annoyances. There are thousands of “tagalong” annoyances that come with capitalism, and telemarketing (and spam) are part of that. Capitalism promotes predatory money-making schemes.

By fostering situations where the person on the phone with you becomes annoyed or misled, you are simply promoting negativity. You may not give a shit that you ruin someone’s day, but what goes around comes around, right? If you want a better life, a better outlook, a more positive day, don’t try and ruin someone else’s. All that aside, have some damn empathy. If your job was to call people who didn’t want to hear from you all day, wouldn’t you get tired of people thinking their oh-so-damn smart and cheeky with all those glib little responses people come up with? It reminds me of all the people who respond to the fact that I have same last name as the main character from rather infamous set of movies from the 80s. Every time someone says something about my name, I think: “Gee, aren’t you original?” And while I usually don’t respond in kind, I end up thinking they’re an absolute moron. Same thing with telemarketers. Yeah, they took a job that isn’t exactly rocket-science, but believe me, when you’re on the phone giving them what you believe is this totally clever song and dance, don’t you think they’re calling you an idiot and telling everyone in the cubicles around them about how stupid you are?

The meandering finale to all this is that, instead of going through all this type of mess to make someone else’s life more difficult, let me give you a few, simple, non-cheatsheet-necessary suggestions:

1. Say: “No thank you, please take me off your list.” Remain on the line until the telemarketer acknowledges your request. If they don’t, repeat your request until they do.

2. Say “yes” to nothing. If they ask you, “Do you want me to take you off of our list?” Respond: “Please remove me from your list and do not call again.”

3. If you really want to be confrontational with someone, ask the representative on the phone for the name of the company they are calling from, and their mailing address. Then, be pro-active and write the company a complaint letter, asking them to consider the social ramifications of not checking any one of the dozens of online databases to see which numbers are cell phones, and which numbers are landlines. Include in your letter a note about the fact that you feel that telemarketing is degrading to the employees of their company.

Then, feel better about the fact that you did something that didn’t make the representative’s life more difficult that day.