Pete Deals With Cold Callers

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Guest post by W.

W. says her boss Pete doesn’t take to cold callers wasting his time.

For example:-

A call from someone claiming to be in computer support: I want to talk with you about your computer.

Pete: No. I don’t want to talk to you about my computer. Goodbye.

A minute later, another caller from the same company: My colleague just phoned to talk with you about your computer

Pete: Your colleague obviously doesn’t understand English –I said NO! What part of NO doesn’t he get? and slammed the phone down.

Pete’s philosophy is don’t waste time on these callers.

Another time he told a caller to stop wasting his time and she told him to be more polite.

Pete said’ Alright I’ll be polite – please bleep off”

Another time, Pete wanted to have more fun and started a sales pitch on selling the caller life insurance. That really confused the caller.

Don’t waste your time on theses callers unless you want to have fun confusing them.

May 26, 2016

Don’t Buy a Worthless Degree

The email title is “Make it impossible for them to say no – get that degree”.

It goes on about losing out on jobs because you don’t have the right paperwork.

Then comes the pitch

“Get any degree in 5 weeks with our program. Best diplomas in every field of knowledge are now available for your order”.

And they do mean any – Bachelors, Masters or Doctorate degrees in any subject.

Then it says “Anyone with professional experience can get these degrees and there are no exams, no study required and no classes to attend”

Is such a degree going to be worth anything – No! Of course not.

It is sad that people feel they can cheat the system like this –that is the people offering these worthless degrees and no doubt some people will take up the offer with maybe good intentions or maybe just laziness.

Interestingly, there is no website to view – you have to phone their answer phone and leave details and apparently they will get back to you.

This is all a con. Worthwhile degrees take a lot of time and hard work to attain. Something so easily attained has no value.

May 25, 2016

Lead Generation Companies

One big source of spam emails is lead generation companies.

These people are paid to create leads for a business to follow-up.

For example, suppose you have a new product – “pre paid funeral plans” was one that we received a lot of emails about recently. You can try to find sales leads yourself or outsource to a specialist business that guarantees to find as many leads as you want. And it only charges per lead found.

Sounds a good deal.

Probably this works well sometimes, but often its more about the lead generation companies sending out vast amounts of emails or making huge numbers of cold calls. They don’t have a reputation with the public to bother about – so it doesn’t concern them if they annoy people or waste a lot of people’s time. If they can provide leads then they make money.

This is why high pressure sales tactics are used.

If you’re in business and you’re going to use lead generation companies – do find out who they will contact and how. Also how they incentivise their staff and what rules they have to stop contacts being pressurised into things they don’t really want.

Use lead generations companies with care !

May 23, 2016

The Magazine Subscription Scam

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You receive an invoice for renewing a magazine subscription – by email or in the post. If you already receive the publication, you may think nothing of it and pay up. If you’re suspicious and read more closely, you may find it’s actually inviting you to subscribe.

It doesn’t come from the publisher but a third party subscription service who may or may not be legit. Sometimes, there’s an offer to supply a free copy but you still must give your credit card details for a full subscription “which you can cancel at any time.”

Your card, of course, will be charged and you might get the magazine, but you’ll pay way more than you need to and find it difficult to cancel — the scammers don’t give you a phone number.

Don’t be fooled. Read the invoice. Don’t pay if you’re not a subscriber or if it’s not a genuine renewal notice from the publisher. If you want to try a magazine, visit its website or get a subscription card from inside a current issue.

May 21, 2016

Update on Those Time-Wasters

So, what rubbish emails and calls have there been to Brooklands Radio station in the last few days?

A company named Toople trying to sell us business broadband. – never heard of them.

A company offering merchant cash advances against sales – we’re a volunteer radio station – we don’t sell stuff.

A Captain Tim of the US Army 82^nd Airborne division serving in Afghanistan. He wants help with securing two trunks and will pay handsomely for that help. He wants to know my name, address, telephone number, occupation and a copy of my drivers licence , which of course contains birth date and a photo. – This couldn’t possibly be an attempt at identity theft. NO. Never.

An email from a company telling us about a private jet service in Hong Kong – no use to us – we only ever use helicopters.

An email from an SEO company says “Over 80% of people in your industry search for and buy your products online” – Generic rubbish.

A set of emails titled “Contractor Working”, “Payroll Solutions”, “Contractor Call” etc.. advertising systems for contract workers. – This is just lead generation. The marketing company sending this stuff will earn money for every reply they pass onto their client.

These people just waste our time and clog up the Internet with rubbish.

May 20, 2016

Valerie Deals with Cold Callers

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A guest post by Valerie.

Valerie says she got fed up with cold callers years ago and signed up for the Telephone Preference Service. This led to a big reduction in the number of calls but she still does receive them.

They seem to call her mostly around 6 pm – they wait till they think you’re home from work and some even call her around 8 am when she’s having breakfast. She had three callers in one afternoon.

Valerie pays the extra money each month for caller Id on her phone so she can see who’s calling.

For cold callers, she keeps a very loud whistle by the phone and if it’s a cold caller they get a good blast of that.

If the whistle isn’t to hand, then she simply says ‘I’ll just get Mrs J.. for you’ and leaves the phone off the hook so it continues to cost the caller.

Cold callers can be a real nuisance, but I bet Valerie doesn’t get the same caller twice.