The angry ranting of a telemarketer

Hokay, here's the deal. You hate 'em, I hate 'em. Wanna know a secret?

I'm one of them.

Yep. I'm a telemarketer. Feel free to throw tomatoes, shoes, dogs, whatever. Wait, I'm getting a message here...What's that?...Oh, you CALL the person a dog...Well that's not nearly as fun.

Either way, folks, we've got some issues to discuss when you're done throwing things. I'll wait patiently. Are we ready to move on now? No? Yes? Good. Now, kindly wipe the tomato juice off your computer screen and we'll begin.

Rule number one. What's the first thing a telemarketer says?

"Hello, is Mr./Mrs. _name_ there?"

If you say no and hang up, regardless of whether we believe you (and we do know pretty easily if you're lying--it's in the way you add to many specifics or simply hang up WAY too quickly after the word "no"), it's our job to assume that he isn't there and try to get ahold of him/her at a later time. If you want us to stop calling, you're doing yourself quite a disservice by saying the person we're calling for isn't there. All that means is we'll call back. And saying "No, and don't call back" won't work either, because you're not the person we're calling for, and thus, we kind of have to call back. See a pattern here?

Rule number two. Dicking around on the phone like you're five? Not as amusing as you think it is. Pushing buttons in our ear? Usually, again, we call back. Saying you're Batman once we get on the phone? We'll laugh, roll our eyes, and call back. Another pattern - screwing around doesn't really get you anywhere. Now, this one doesn't apply to ALL telemarketers because some places actually require you to stay on the phone while others encourage you to make calls quick and to the point and just reschedule if it's clear there's someone with the mentality of a 3-year-old on the other line. The ones that you make stay on the line while you go play xBox? You're not hurting us. That just means we get to sit there with the phone on mute while we BS with our coworkers, and get paid for it. So if you do that to annoy us, you're not very successful at it.

Rule number three. I'll try to make this more to the point because you're probably getting bored and I'd hate for vegetable juice to destroy your keyboards or monitors should you resort to throwing things.

Don't repeatedly tell us you don't have time to talk to us, and spend several minutes doing so. Because half the time, in all honesty, in the three and a half minutes it took you to explain seventeen thousand times that you can't POSSIBLY stay on the line for ONE more second because your car is running and your oven's on and your dog just peed on your leg and your three-year-old is playing in traffic (then why did you answer the phone to begin with you buttmunch?), half the time the call could be over already.

The most hated phrase--for me at least--is "I don't want to be rude and hang up on you..." Honestly? If you don't want to hear what we have to say, the best thing you can do IS hang up. Because you're being a lot more rude interrupting us seventeen times in three sentences to say how you don't want to hang up, than you would be by hanging up. Moral of the story? Don't try to sympathize with us. We don't want that. Either listen, or hang up. We don't want to talk to you any more than you want to talk to us.

On the note of sympathy, we do generally care (usually) what you're going through, on some level. When we're trying to sell you something or convince you to make a donation, and you're telling us how your sister's out of work and most of your money is going to help her make rent, we sympathize. We do. But, I personally, and many others too, have a three-strikes rule. You interrupt us three times to repeat the same sob story, we'll start to not care so much and we'll talk over you so we can just get the call over with. Sympathy only goes so far when you're on the other end of the line ready to blow your brains out because you hate your job and you're stuck there listening to a bunch of angry fuckbuckets cussing you out for, gee, I don't know, trying to put food on the table like everyone else. Call me crazy, but I'm kind of a fan of eating, and that's the only reason why I do this. (Thus concludes rule four.)

Which leads nicely into rule number five. "Get a real job!" Excuse me, sir or ma'am or ma'amsir. Beggin' your pardon kindly. I sure golly would hate to upset you, but DO YOU SEE ME STANDING ON A STREET CORNER BEGGING FOR BOOZE MONEY OR SELLING MY BODY? This IS a real job. And it's actually significantly higher stress levels than you'd get at a lot of others, which is why they do pay a little higher. But I implore you to go job-hunting. I'd HAVE a better job if I could find it, but I'm busting my ass to pay my own way through college because my parents can't afford it and I'm trying to work toward a political science degree so I can make a difference in the world. Suck on that while you're bitching about the "welfare state" while you're drinking up your social security checks that you get from the government. That I'M paying for, thank you very much. (This probably doesn't apply to most here, but about 80% of the people I call at work are on social security.)

Rule six (I know you're getting restless and about to sic the hounds on me, I promise, I'm almost done). If you don't want to be called again, don't simply hang up on us; don't refuse to ever answer your phone; and don't just say "stop calling" before you know who's even on the line and immediately hang up.

All you have to say are these five magic words: "Take me off the list. If you don't actually mention a calling list, we're not obligated legally to remove you from the calling list.

Now, this doesn't guarantee we won't call you ever, ever, EVER again for as long as we both shall live. It's not as serious as marriage and all that, and if it is, well, would you treat your wife how you treat us? You should be ashamed. But we will take you off the list that we're currently dialing for. Should you end up on a list in the future, that's not our fault.

A little side note that's pertinent to my job: Political fundraising groups are legally exempt from the national Do Not Call registry. So if the Republican/Democratic National Committee calls you, that's why. Also, it shows up as a blocked number usually because it's on an automatic dialer and there physically is not a number you could call back. So stop bitching about that, too.

On a final note, I just ask you to remember that there are human beings on the other end of the line. Human beings who probably hate their job and are doing what they have to to make a living, to make rent, to make tuition, to put food on the table. Human beings who may have a family to provide for, and who are probably facing some of the same economic troubles your family is. So before you throw yourself a little pity party about how rough your life is and how you don't deserve with all your hardships to have to put up with telemarketers on top of it all, understand that those very same difficulties are probably exactly why we're on the other end of the line.

SO PUT THAT IN YOUR JUICEBOX AND SUCK IT.

This was longer than I'd intended. Thank you for reading this. I'd give you a cookie (fresh baked by my roommate!), but try as I might to throw them at the screen like all of your tomatoes, shoes, and that one poor chihuahua (you may wanna take that fella to the vet, Jim), it doesn't seem to go through. But I hope you can appreciate the thought.