This is a free call…
I don’t think I’ve had a rant on here yet – and actually this is probably less of a rant than a voicing of a slight irritation. About automated calls.
After all, I can hardly complain too much having been involved in the similarly reviled process of direct mailing people during its peek in the 80’s and 90’s. At the time, people were extremely vocal in their dislike of the ever growing pile of paper falling onto their doorsteps, the vast majority of which was unwanted. Folks bemoaned the fact that most of it was irrelevant and a complete waste of paper. But I can confirm for you that it was perfectly acceptable within the Direct Marketing organisations I worked in for anything up to 99% of it to be binned – the 1% plus of response was sufficient to make a campaign financially successful.
But I have to confess I find it extraordinary to think that even 1% of people would respond to these automated calls. I find them so incredibly irritating, that for the most part I can’t even be bothered to listen past the opening statement of “This is a free call, do not hang up.” For a start, that fact that they say “this is a free call” seems nonsensical – since when was an incoming call, NOT a free call? And the fact that they demand that I don’t hang up makes me want to… erm, hang up! Also for me, an added irritation is that they clog up my phone lines during the day when I have customers trying to get through.
I would be fascinated to know how many people actually respond to these calls – and which products or services are successful. The fact they continue suggests there is sufficient response to make them worthwhile as a marketing technique. If anyone out there has some industry or even anecdotal information about these calls, I would be grateful for some enlightenment!
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I had no idea there was such a thing until a few weeks ago when I started spending a lot of time at my grandfather's house. He gets them frequently, and they're always about ways to get out of debt. They drive me nuts. They're very intrusive – especially considering my grandfather is ill and we need the phone for keeping in touch with relatives, professional carers, the community nurse etc. I just hang up on these calls but I've been wondering if there's a way to block them somehow.
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I hate them, I hang up and as I have just changed my phone number I know they can't find me
What about BT's preference service – once you're registered, they're not supposed to call. For us it was about 90% effective. Much of the remaining 10% were overseas calls…
But if anyone could find me a way to fight back and make them pay for their calls on my time I'd certainly try it!
that's a good point Angela, it's even more problematic in those circumstances, Simon's suggestion on BT preference service may be an idea to look into.
thanks Simon, I shall look into BT preference service… and what a fab idea, a sort of inverse premium rate service for them to call in; now that would be a good deterrant
The Telephone Preference Service is ideal and free.
For about 10 minutes, Sarah. Don't hang up. Register with the TPS and get off their lists.
I'm totally with you on this one Elaine: You want my business but you can't be bothered to actually TALK to me human to human from the outset???
Just a point here: The Telephone Preference Service has been around for years – it's not a BT initiative – it was the next step on from the Mailing Preference Service.
And TPS can be used by companies as well as individuals – so you might like that one and just see how effective it is for you!
As Simon said, it doesn't cut any ice with calls made by overseas call centres, doesn't seem to have much in the way of 'teeth' but will cut out responsible callers from the UK who'll check against the TPS first: Yeah – they're probably the only ones you wouldn't actually mind receiving a call from!
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