"No I do not want to renew the warranty on the car I sold five years ago." I know I'm sliding on thin ice letting it lapse for what one would consider a flimsy excuse such as that.
"No I do not need a supplemental medical plan that the caller insists I called in and asked for as unfortunately (for them) I am totally covered elsewhere." That one comes an average of three times a day.
"Oh yes, social security says you have been a naughty senior and please give me your SS number to make it right or the po po will be at your door to arrest you."
"No, I don't think you're my grandson needing bail for a traffic accident." Although I think he is an amazing eight year old, I still say he is a little height challenged to use the gas pedal and see over the steering wheel at the same time.
So amazing the phone calls I apparently make in my sleep seeking assistance at three in the morning (cue Jake from State Farm). We all get bored in quarantine land, and making bogus calls could possibly be in my repertoire. However I believe I would limit it to ordering an unsolicited pizza for the neighbor or asking a homeowner if their refrigerator was running (go catch it, duh) when I was bored and TWELVE!
I picture these phone sales folks working from home which I am guessing they would be doing anyway. No novelty there. Captive and bored audience waiting for any aberration of their daily routine even if it's just conversing with some poor sap about insurance they're never going to buy. No, strike that. No one is that bored. But the most insulting of all, is the robo call. Not even special enough to call you directly, they let the automated faker take the first shot; no doubt saving their ears on slammed phones or their sanity on no answers/hang ups/curses.
We're all familiar by now with the long pause on the message indicating a robot holding its metallic breath so to speak to pounce if any human-like sound is heard. Press 1 to talk to a "live" person; 2 to be put on the no-call list (wouldn't my reluctance to even answer the phone give you a clue); or the infamous call this 10 digit number that is - surprise - in Aruba or Latvia and will cost you $10 a minute. They sound amazingly lifelike until you start ranting at them as they plow through the pre-recorded script. One really needs the satisfying equivalent of a slammed phone sound when listening on a mobile.
Also small rant about the folks who answer the automated or live person customer service lines. Your first clue is they are much more polite than is warranted and no casual humor is involved. Although they claim their names are Bill or Annette, that is a lie.
When I was first married I worked for a small subscription service that also published a newsletter from an politico in Washington D.C. which I edited while coordinating advertising and mass mailings to sell. Although the owners were pure Indians from India they let the office staff call them by "Americanized" names which I thought was very impersonal. I made everyone practice the Indian names until we could say them. I felt it dehumanizing to not hear your own name, but in retrospect we probably butchered them past recognition to their ears. Also being of the Brahmin caste of Hindus they probably found such familiarity insulting.
Digress: Notable achievement of that newsletter job. I was able to organize the entire mail room staff to vote for McGovern. That was the first presidential election for which I was qualified to vote. In July of 1972 Nixon had signed the 26th amendment giving 18 year old's the ability to vote even though at that age they were drafted and paid taxes; issues that they should have had a stake in one would think. I would have been one day shy of 21 on election day if that change had not been ratified. However my non-chosen candidate managed to derail himself during Watergate. Good times when actions mattered for a President.
Recently I had the pleasure of trying to resolve a technical issue with my phone bill and was talking to "Cristine". Nice try but I'm thinking she was "assigned" Christine verbally, not in the written form so she did the best she could. Two phrases she used made me want to say "English isn't your first language I'm guessing" but that would be rude.
"Sorry you have to be in this experience". Wha huh? I looked around to be sure I wasn't in any experience besides tangling with the bureaucracy of a large company. As we were wrangling with different questions that I had to keep rephrasing to get the point across, her second statement that struck me was "your patience does not go unnoticed". Really? I should have at least got a participation award for that one. Patience was definitely needed as she ended up having no idea what I was referencing although I was looking at the information on their website at the time. Consequently, my patience was not rewarded as I hung up on the whole thing.
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