Post Your Telephone Sales Wind Ups Here!

krayzechick

When I was about 14 I got a call for my parents. My parents were at work, and it was the school holidays.

They asked to speak to my Dad but I just replied with "actually ...*shakey voice*... no, he passed away last week" the called replied with "oh i'm so sorry dear. Is your mother there?"

I replied with, in full fake tears, "no she died too!!!". The lady on the phone was so sorry and offered me lots of support... A few days later a massive box of freebies and flowers arrived from the company with a sympathy card!! I then had to explain to my rent what had happened!! hehehe!

Jacks_xxx

I'm really boring - I screen my calls.

We have a 0845 number though - so if I do get stuck on an unsolicited sales call I just say "please hold", hit mute and leave them there.

Eventually they realise I am never coming back.

Love Jacks xxx

Ladygrim

msmicawber wrote: »

These are all wonderful - thank you! Have a listen to this, as I think this guy has the best way of dealing with cold callers ever:

http://www.boreme.com/boreme/funny-2006/telemarketer-prank-p1.php

Just found this thread - this link is fantastic - wish I had the nerve to do this :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

sunshine_shell

My dad is best with those who knock on the door... He puts on a really broad Welsh accent and starts talking to them... then he'll switch it to a Gordie accent and the Rep doesn't quite know what to do and me and my sister are usually !!!!ing ourselves in the kitchen!! Funniest on ever is when he just kept saying oui to them

I love my dad :j

GreenNinja

I have NEVER laughed so much, thanks everybody for making my friday afternoon at work so pleasurable.

I am sooo glad I can't afford to have a landline, but hey look what fun I am missing out on. LOL

:j :j :j :j

squirrel_pigeon

I was killing myself laughing reading this at work today. And now I've come back for more. BUMP.

RAS

Moved into the first house and got a phone installed. very run down and freezing cold, so getting up at 7.45 thinking it was OH's work did nothing for our humour, particularly since the timing was often unfortunate.

It turned out the number had previously been allocated to the local (internationally famous) golf course. People were using old contacts or old phone books. In the end we started booking rounds at the suggested time etc... if they insisted it was the right number.

My favourite was the early morning call during the Open, asking what time our national hero was teeing off? J solemnly advised the caller that the championship was off, "because we have moles on the 18th".

dors01

What I just love to do to them if I have time when they call, if they are calling to offer me a new mobile phone, they normally offer to beat my current contract or ugrade me to the latest superduper handset.
If they offer to beat my current price I normally tell them I get free line rental or that my mobile company pays me, that gets em off the phone pretty quick.
If they offer me the latest handset I try to take them through a series of insane questions like the following;
1, How many buttons does it have?
2, What are the dimensions of the phone? (L/W/D)
3. Is there a number 11 on the phone?
4, What are the ringing tones like?
5, How heavy is the phone?
Add to this all the other questions you can think of like what language does the manual come in etc

I had one operators supervisor get angry with me once over asking questions like this.

cookie_monster

Used to get loads of Indian call centres ringing up trying to sell mobile phones but it has stopped since I went with TPS.

Some of the good ones were.

1-Me and a workmate got together as we were both called by the same company and made a pact that who ever was called 1st would go along with what they were selling and just before giving card details would say can you ring Mr X (me) and get an order number from him as he was using a company credit card, we were put on a conference call discussing the merits of the mobile for atleast 1/2 an hour after which the salesguy hung up and left us to talk for a further 1hour.

2.Pretend to be really old and get them to explain everything really slowly and loudly in a clear voice.

3.Give out bogus address details-have given out something like 1937434 high street, swansea,brighton, plymouth b65 4rt.

So much fun I had. Wife didn't agree with it though.

Larumbelle

It's not quite cold-calling, but I do have some creative ways to deal with debt-collection calls. I posted some of them once before... no idea where that thread went. I am never rude, more cheeky, unless the same person calls repeatedly after I have asked them not to, then the gloves come off.
(EDITED TO ASK - just found it for a completely different thread so here it is: http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=586050)

All of these have made me laugh so much and I will definitely be adopting some of these strategies!!! Anyone know how I can report my calls and whack them on youtube?!

One thing that strikes me about this thread is the jibes about indian call centres. I have a few friends who work in (inbound) call centres in this country, and they are forever getting abuse for 'calling from India' or 'using a fake British name'. I really hope that people posting here aren't assuming that anybody with an asian accent or asian-sounding name has to be calling from India. COuld just as easily be Coventry, you know.