Comments on: Telemarketing trick

by: Evenstar

Tue, 20 Dec 2005 04:31:27 +0000

If this happens in India, I can imagine the choice words the marketing caller is going to hear. Telemarketing on landlines is an increasing nuisance in Mumbai though.

by: Sachin Nair

Tue, 06 Dec 2005 06:02:30 +0000

Curse of capitalism!

If you activate the voice mail its totally possible that you might have to filter all kinds of spam messages on a later date.

If this could be dubbed as an intrusion into our private lives then possibly we could actually sue them. Which means we need to have a clear cut policy on such issues.

Sadly this is not the case in India and no service provider here is really worried about being sued by a lone individual.

by: Ck

Wed, 30 Nov 2005 17:40:07 +0000

My mobile phone is also my only line as I no longer have a land line. Tele-marketers in the US (as far as I know) are not allowed to call your cell phone (as you have to pay for the call).

I often get ‘Private Call’ or ‘Unknown Caller) IDs on my phone as the local networks don’t usually recognize international calls and I usually get ‘unknown caller’ when my parents call from India. Also voicemails don’t show up instantly - very often it can take a coupe of hours for your phone to inform you that you have a new vm.

by: arZan

Wed, 30 Nov 2005 17:14:44 +0000

Since i dont own a landline anymore since the last two years, my cellphone is the only link to the world in that medium of communication.

Personally as a rule, I never pick up the cell if i dont know who the caller is. There is always the voicemail, and i generally check voicemail from my office landline. This was i dont incur costs during peak times.

Only once has this policy of not answering strange calls put me in trouble. Funnily the calls were from a friend who was visiting from India, and wasnt used to the concept of voicemail, and hence wouldnt leave a voicemail.

And yes since a year or so there is a do not call list and hence telemarketing calls are on the down. Also, since cellphone numbers do not list on a public directory enquiry service, there are no marketing calls on a cell. Unless of course u write that number down on every free offer you get.

marketing calls on indian cellphones are insane. My brother was here in the US on business and had to keep his cell on at all times. We were in Chicago on a weekend and some charlie from HSBC called at 3 am, offering him a credit card !!

by: Nitin

Wed, 30 Nov 2005 15:11:35 +0000

Britain is waking up to this only now. This gimmick was pioneered in Japan (where it was called wan-wan-giri) a few years ago. In 2003 it even jammed and brought down the entire telephone system in a couple of cities. Japan is a saturation advertising zone, and leads the world in coming up with irritating innovations. I’m surprised they didn’t invent those pop-up ads.

Btw, sending it to voicemail still costs you money (in countries where you are billed for both making and receiving calls). My own solution is not to pick up the phone when there is an unexpected unfamiliar number on the caller ID. And then, there is the option of delivering a cold threat to the poor telemarketer which is quite thrilling too.