Snotty people are a pet peeve.
I have a cold. Maybe pig flu; who knows? Slept in for once, haven’t had a damn shower or even finished my coffee. Head is foggy and if not for the magic of nyquil things would be even worse. Though I hate the stuff, it works for sleeping through misery.
So in this condition I answer the phone when it rings, to a self righteous bitch who wants me to donate to the wounded troops. I don’t even know what program she’s with, but she goes on and on about how they need our help and how no one program alone can do it all… and I’m trying to interject where possible, but it’s not easy.
She had pretended to be nice at the start of the call, but as I endeavored to explain that I supported a wide range of wounded troop related charities and that they had to be enough right now, the floodgates opened and she became very snotty. Finally she snarled that all she wanted to know is: would I donate something?
No.
Nobody should ever say ‘You have a blessed day, madam’ with such venom. Ever.
I know why I didn’t hang up: she hit my weak spot, wounded troops. I could hang up on a siding salesman.
Bitch. She’s sitting there in a call center, a large room full of people, all dialing the phone. Her employer will get most of the money from any charitable donations they manage to collect. I do not give money to strange people, only charities that I know.
Like Soldier’s Angels and all their offshoot missions. Same for the Haley House Fund.
Next time, I’ll just hit the button and end the call….
…and yes, I know that I’m over-reacting because I don’t feel good.
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:00 am
This is why I have caller id and don’t answer the phone if I don’t recognize the number. I figure if it’s a real person, they will leave a message and I can call right back or pic up while they are talking to the answering machine. LOL. They can shove their guilt trips where the sun don’t shine.
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:26 am
Yup. I don’t have caller ID and am about to give up my landline altogether, so it won’t -or shouldn’t- be an issue anymore.
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:31 am
Same as Teresa, I don’t answer unless I know the number and even them sometimes I don’t answer either.
That is also the reason that I donate directly to the charities I do, I never go through another organization (ie United Way) because they take their cut then give what’s left to the charity.
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:37 am
Right there with you, QW!
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:35 am
Don’t have caller ID (I know, we are the last ones in the whole freaking world) but we do have a tricky last name. If you can’t pronounce it I don’t know you – click
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:39 am
Heh… that tickled me. You’d be surprised how many people can’t pronounce my last name!
And of course, I don’t have caller ID, either. If someone doesn’t leave a message I have no way of knowing who called…
December 3rd, 2009 at 12:06 pm
I probably would have been caught by the call for wounded veterans and hesitated the same way… But I do have a boilerplate response: “I DO NOT donate to any charity based on a cold call. If you would like to send information to me about your charity, I would be happy to look it over. Please include your 501(c) letter so that I may confirm your status with the IRS prior to my donation. Need my address, you say? You should already have it – you called me.” *click*
My personal peeve: “Fraternal Order of Police” and “Support your Troopers” callers. Oh, and let’s not forget the RNC.
December 3rd, 2009 at 12:11 pm
Well, shit. Why didn’t I say that?
I’ve gotten creative with the RNC lately… and the FOP calls just piss me off…
December 3rd, 2009 at 12:12 pm
OH, while in Houston we joined the 100 Club. Excellent charity for the families of law enforcement families! But they don’t call you for money, either…
December 3rd, 2009 at 12:30 pm
I don’t have Caller ID, we do not ever answer the phone, the answering machine picks up. We then decide whether or not to pick up, that’s hardly ever.
December 3rd, 2009 at 12:33 pm
…I never realized how many people did that.
I thought it was safe to simply pick up the phone because we’re on the do not call list, but that doesn’t really help any more…
December 3rd, 2009 at 3:15 pm
Charities and anyone with whom you have done “business” with in something like the last year are excluded from Do Not Call regulations. Don’t you just love it. That is why the freaking cable company calls 6 times a week to ask if we want their bleeping phone service and the mortgage company call 6 times a freaking day to ask if we want their stinking mortgage insurance. arggg
December 3rd, 2009 at 3:26 pm
I didn’t know that, Patti! UGH!
December 3rd, 2009 at 1:21 pm
Random thoughts:
1) I am not the only person in the dark ages with no caller ID!!!! We can form a support group!!!
2) Soft spot is the same – I might have felt compelled to listen since the soldiers, particularly wounded patriots, hold a special priority to me.
3) I too have an odd last name… I find they try asking for me by first name figuring they can sneak in… So I now always ask who is calling…
4) the pregnant pause (while the machine connect you to a person) is a pet peeve – I always hang up.
December 3rd, 2009 at 1:47 pm
Wow, there are more of us than I thought!!
…and that pause while you *know* you’re waiting to speak to either a machine or a salesperson? Loathe it! I’ve started just hanging up at that point. Too bad this woman didn’t have a pause!!
December 3rd, 2009 at 3:13 pm
Ugh, I HATE, LOATHE and DESPISE the computer calls. If you can’t put a human being to work (to be hung up on), then why bother? I just listen to dead air and put the phone on mute when it connects through hearing the person on the other end try to figure out why no one is there. Duh! Your computer and my computer can’t talk to each other!
As for the pig flu – been there, done that. (Well thought it was just the “regular” flu, but when I got bronchitis, thats when the doctor said I’d had swine flu. Damned pig, he told me he’d call me again. Rat bastard.) Sending you hugs and bowls of chicken soup. Lots of sleep and Tamiflu, made mine go away in 3 days. (Oh and generic Claritan D – dries you out for 24 hours, great stuff!)
December 3rd, 2009 at 3:26 pm
Thanks, Lee Ann! I actually feel a little better this afternoon… either my body [with the help of meds] is fighting off a cold or I was the victim of such a severe allergy attack that benadryl couldn’t even touch it…
December 3rd, 2009 at 4:55 pm
Yeah, no. I wouldn’t have been happy with a call like that either. I’d have hung up.
You get to feeling better soon, Pam!
December 4th, 2009 at 8:13 am
I’m better, Joanie!
December 3rd, 2009 at 9:18 pm
Regarding computer calls: Just hang on while it does its spiel. Play on the computer while you wait, email, whatever. And when the real person finally comes on, tell them you had no interest in buying/donating. When they ask why you bothered to listen, just say that while they were connected to you, they wouldn’t be harassing anyone else! It works…I can’t remember the last telemarketing call we got. *knocks on wood really fast*
And I go by my middle name. If anyone calls asking for me by my first name…or worse, by the shortened nickname of my first name, I tell them I don’t appreciate their familiarity and hang up.
December 4th, 2009 at 8:14 am
I never thought about that… but I’m going to do it, thanks! I bet they’re flabbergasted when you tell them WHY you listened to the computer!
December 3rd, 2009 at 9:22 pm
Which is why I never answer the phone if I don’t recognize the number.
December 4th, 2009 at 8:14 am
…you’re smarter than I am.
December 3rd, 2009 at 10:00 pm
I love a good cause like St Jude’s but it was St Jude’s that pissed me off shortly before Thanksgiving with a call for me to give more $… and not only that… but to solicit funds from friends and relatives for THEM. Fruck that noise! The lady wouldn’t take no for an answer and I finally told her not to call again….sheesh! They treated me like those jerks at the Republican Party, who gave me a crap choice like McCain, and then acting like what’s wrong with me when I said “OH HELL NO, I WON’T GIVE YOU ANY MORE MONEY (or dinero in John McCain talk) !!!” Screw’em all in their necks and Merry Christmas…ya jerk-wads!!! Don’t feel bad about it. Not for a single second.
December 4th, 2009 at 7:31 am
St Jude’s is one of ours – for the obvious reason – but I got aggravated with them a few years back and called THEM to chew some butt. You see, St Jude’s fund raising arm is quite the machine and if you are on their donor list, in any given year you might receive a nice calendar, a video tape (or CD now), a book for the love of Pete, twice monthly mailings, sample greeting cards… not just one or two of these, ALL of them! I finally called and told them I give all I can, every year. That is not going to change. I’m going to send the same amount no matter how often you send me things. So stop spending more in value per year than I can donate! Send me one mailing in Dec so that I have a return envelope with which to send our donations late Dec just as we have done for the last 10 years. The woman was stunned, but it worked.
I also cannot stand when I get a children’s cancer fund raising pitch that starts with “you have no idea what families go through”… Especially if that pitch comes from the very Ronald McDonald house were we have stayed many days… Please people, flag your former tenants before calling for donations…
Wait, this isn’t a donation post and not my blog. Ooops Pam, I did it again
December 4th, 2009 at 8:19 am
The DAV used to do that, but not to that extreme! It drove me nuts… the calendars are useful, but sending all sorts of other stuff just started to wear on me. Kept wondering how much money they were wasting on it!
St. Jude’s is great; don’t know why they slipped off my list. Oh, that’s right – the troops and their families replaced the kids. Can’t give to everyone, as much as we’d like to, eh?
December 4th, 2009 at 8:40 am
exactly
December 4th, 2009 at 10:14 am
If you wait until just after the 3rd ring of your phone to answer, you won’t have to talk to telemarketers.
The telemarketer machine will start to disconnect your call at the 3rd ring, so if you answer and get dead air you know it’s a telemarketer and you can hang up without talking to people.
Works about 98% of the time.
Me, I am just bitchy enough that if I answer and it’s a telemarketer I just hang up.
December 4th, 2009 at 10:21 am
I’ve never been able to just hang up; don’t know why. I hear my mama’s voice in my head and the echo of the sting of the paddle on my butt and engage the manners that were beat into me at an early age.
God bless my mama!
December 4th, 2009 at 5:51 pm
You do know you can tell them you want to be taken off their call list and not called again. Even charities have to do that. If they give you a song and dance about calling someone else to get that done – tell them if they call again, you’ll report them to the FCC for violating a request to be removed from the list. THEY are the ones who need to do the work to take you off – not you!
You can do the same with businesses.
The only time I get persistent calls is when a collection agency thinks they have the number for some person they are trying to collect money from. I can always tell when that happens, they call about 10 times a day. Some leave messages some don’t. But when the same number calls me at 8am and again at 9pm and several times in between, I know it’s time to answer and tell them “no there is no person by that name at this number – don’t know how you got our number, but that’s not my problem, stop calling!” Sheesh.
December 4th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Wish I could have done that to the Capital One rep who just called… gak!