TELEMARKETING FIX?

Can't believe I hadn't thought of this already. Since I really have to use a land line, and am subject to repeated calls from Telemarketers and scammers, I had a bit of a brainstorm. Being the pack-rat that I am, had me digging through a box of old electrical and electronic devices to get one of my old answering machines out. Since I won't be using the phone that caddies in said answer machine, I'll be able to park my regular phone in it upside down and face down. This brings the mic in my phone pretty close to the answer machine speaker.

I went online and found a message to record into my "Fake Answer Machine". Granted, only about 1/2 of the calls I get show up with a title like, "ATT" (not the real company either) or "Breast Cancer", (not a real charity) etc, etc. Then there's the "toll free" numbers that show up. I have checked dozens of these kinds of numbers in reverse number look-up much like the White Pages uses, or you can google it to get a list. 99% of them have scam ratings out the wazoo.

Generally, I won't answer my phone if I don't recognize the name or number, and let my standard voice mail handle it till they identify themselves. Cool part is, didn't cost me a dime to set it up, so now when those a**holes call me up, maybe they'll take me off their list. I know for a fact that ATT call has gone on for over 3+ years and never a message from them. If the real AT&T (note the ampersand) should ever call, they might actually leave a message.

For the easy recording access, see the video.

[video=youtube;2BVbyCZXc5s]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BVbyCZXc5s[/video]

You can tell them to take you off their calling list. They are required by law to do so.
Doesn't help with robocalls..

Seems pointless and waste of time to play recorded message to robocall.

Rocketjunkie said:

You can tell them to take you off their calling list. They are required by law to do so.
Doesn't help with robocalls..

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Tried that on ATT and a few others. Had an Operator do it too. Worked about 2-3 months, and they're back again.

timbucktoo said:

Seems pointless and waste of time to play recorded message to robocall.

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Truer words couldn't be spoken. Some of them are robo's, but most of the calls, I can hear them hang up the phone. Especially the toll free numbers. My plan is to listen and jot down the robo numbers so I can just ignore them. But the other ones that have live ppl on them might get a clue and take me off the calling list. I'm only doing this because I can and doesn't cost anything.

My phone/cable provider has a deal with nomorobo.com. I think you can get it free for VoIP landlines if you provider doesn't sponsor. It works GREAT. At worst we get 1 ring and then nomorobo disconnects the call.

sl98 said:

My phone/cable provider has a deal with nomorobo.com. I think you can get it free for VoIP landlines if you provider doesn't sponsor. It works GREAT. At worst we get 1 ring and then nomorobo disconnects the call.

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I'll look into that, thanks.

Had this on my answering machine for months. Made no difference.

I work nights, and sleeping in the day is hard enough without getting @#%% sales calls in the day. Last summer I kept getting calls from "Disney Resorts" saying since I had stayed there once before (I hadn't), I could get a great deal on a room. The tricky part was the first time I answered it, I could have sworn I was talking to some young lady. It was very good. I tried blocking the number, but they changed them every couple weeks. I finally had it after getting woken up once again, so this time I played along. After a few minutes, the recorded voice ask if this was something I was interested in, and said YES. It then said let me hand you off to a reservation agent and when he got on the line (a real live person), I politely ask if he had my name and phone number pulled up on his screen (he did). I then said good, now will you please put a note by it to NEVER call me again. Never heard from them again.

CallerID spoofing. Why in the world does the technology even allow this? I can understand the need to be able to block callerID, but there should never be a case were anyone should be allowed to *lie* about it.

Call blocking is a part of my service package. Unfortunately, the first time I had to use it, there was only a 5 mile radius where it works. WTF!

Telemarketers, robo-callers etc. have John Q Public completely outgunned by technology. You are not in control of your phone unless you have taken control.

There is only one way to eliminate unwanted calls.

Get rid of your landline or Cable phone bundle, Have a mobile phone that works well in your home, and use a WHITELIST.

The only people who can reach you are the people you have granted permission via the list you control.

scsager said:

Telemarketers, robo-callers etc. have John Q Public completely outgunned by technology. You are not in control of your phone unless you have taken control.

There is only one way to eliminate unwanted calls.
Get rid of your landline or Cable phone bundle, Have a mobile phone that works well in your home, and use a WHITELIST.

The only people who can reach you are the people you have granted permission via the list you control.

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I see what you're saying. That would be a nice way to own a phone, but I need the landline for my fax machine. I have many clients that rely on me having it. They send changes to the revisions I do for them. I suppose if all of them could belly up to the Tech bar, scan and email them, I might not need a fax. But such are my clients that are older than me and really frozen in time. I work at home, just so you know.

scsager said:

Telemarketers, robo-callers etc. have John Q Public completely outgunned by technology. You are not in control of your phone unless you have taken control.

There is only one way to eliminate unwanted calls.

Get rid of your landline or Cable phone bundle, Have a mobile phone that works well in your home, and use a WHITELIST.

The only people who can reach you are the people you have granted permission via the list you control.

Click to expand...

Try nomorobo...you might be surprised what technology can do. We tried call blocking but that didn't work as spoof numbers would pop up. We went from calls every night to no calls on our landline with nomorobo. If a new spoof number is created you might get 1 ring but we haven't had even 1 ring for many months.

Gary Byrum said:

I see what you're saying. That would be a nice way to own a phone, but I need the landline for my fax machine. I have many clients that rely on me having it. They send changes to the revisions I do for them. I suppose if all of them could belly up to the Tech bar, scan and email them, I might not need a fax. But such are my clients that are older than me and really frozen in time. I work at home, just so you know.

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One thing you could do is to leave the fax machine on the land line. Get a VOIP app for voice calls - something like google voice (free). Give the VOIP number out to people that need to talk to you. I've got a tablet I run mine on, via wi-fi. Seems to work fine, even places with typically slow speeds like free wi-fi (McD, etc).

sooner.boomer said:

One thing you could do is to leave the fax machine on the land line. Get a VOIP app for voice calls - something like google voice (free). Give the VOIP number out to people that need to talk to you. I've got a tablet I run mine on, via wi-fi. Seems to work fine, even places with typically slow speeds like free wi-fi (McD, etc).

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If this is something that is used on mobile phones, that's out. I'm not paying Bell South or anybody for another phone service. I already don't want a smart phone/cell whatever and plan on keeping my one land line. I do buy a burner phone for traveling purposes in case of an emergency. But I let it expire from Fall thru to Spring because I don't travel then. Cheaper for me to go this route than keeping a yearly service going. 99% of my travel is generally during what I refer to as "my rocketry season". This starts in either March or April and runs through to October, weather permitting.

I think for now, I'm going to try my little setup and see how it goes before I consider other options.

Google voice (actually Hangouts) runs over your internet. I think all the VOIP (voice over internet protocol) applications (like Skype) do. I use either a tablet (Android) or a laptop (Windows) to make calls. I use an inexpensive headset for each. The only problem is that the device needs to be on and have internet connection to receive calls (OK, to make outgoing call, too, but it will ring through your computer on an incoming call).

Gary Byrum said:

I see what you're saying. That would be a nice way to own a phone, but I need the landline for my fax machine. I have many clients that rely on me having it. They send changes to the revisions I do for them. I suppose if all of them could belly up to the Tech bar, scan and email them, I might not need a fax. But such are my clients that are older than me and really frozen in time. I work at home, just so you know.

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The Internet based 800 service I was using for a few years could accept faxes, from a regular fax machine. Could send to a fax also, it was handy on a few occasions. The service was Freedom Voice, and was quite reasonable too.

Pull the battery pack out and unplug unit from wall. They can call and it won't ring for them or you. Ol' pilot trick for yah. That feeling of no sleep and the FULL responsibility of other people's lives, a career, and an aircraft at your fingertips is worst feeling ever dude. Sleep deprivation kills in certain career paths.

When they call, I usually just tell them to "hold on" and put the phone down. after about 5 minutes of them waiting, they hang up. (And that's 5 minutes they aren't calling someone else!)

it is either working, or they've removed my number.

Here's an update for all those still curious. I saved the "No Longer In Service" sound bit I got off YouTube to my desktop. The audio was much better than that old answer machine was. So I started using it when I got an unwanted call. This has been about a month now and the unwanted calls are down 85-90%. So please don't tell me it doesn't work. I am quite pleased in just how well it does. I just have to make sure all is quiet in the house, tap the talk button and hold the phone next to the speaker on my comp while I click the shortcut. Easy Peasy.

Rocketjunkie said:

You can tell them to take you off their calling list. They are required by law to do so.
Doesn't help with robocalls..

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davel said:

Had this on my answering machine for months. Made no difference.

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Here's what does work. Whether it's a call from ATT, BREAST CANCER, BLUE WHALE or some other bogus firm, robocalls and 800/toll free numbers, you have to actually answer the call. All I do is press the "talk" button on my phone and click on the desktop link to play the recorded message. With ATT, I had to make a sort of vocal expression like, "duh" to get someone on the phone. When I heard a real voice, I played the recording. ATT no longer calls and I received 1 (one) toll free call in the past 3 weeks. It's narrowing down to nothing as we speak. Bottom line, if you make sure a human is listening, you can make them go away. And robo calls don't respond to recorded voice messages. You have to get someone's attention first. I'm 99% pest free, so it seems.