Painted Diva

I have started to become overwhelmed by telemarketers! Is this happening to you? This has even become an issue on my cell phone now. I have listed myself on the do not call list and I block most of these numbers that come in. It is so frustrating! If you take any business calls on your cell and do not have them programmed in your phone it is so easy to overlook the call because you don’t recognize the number. These days I don’t want to answer my phone if I don’t know the number. On Wednesday I received a call on my home number from this number – 216-712-1591. The first time a voicemail was left on my answering machine. It was a company stating that it was my second warning (or something like that) to lower the percentage on my credit card. I have received a call like this before and knew it was not my credit card company. I received the next call from this number on Friday. I decided this time I would play along and I pressed one and stayed on the line. I asked the lady who picked up the line if they were my actual credit card company. She started yelling out this cards that they participate with (Chase, MasterCard, Visa, etc) and just continued to raise her voice with each card name. I said “so you are not with my credit card company”? Of course the answer to that was “No” and then she stared to scream to me that they participate with … and naming all these cards off again. I then asked her if she realized that we are on a do not call list. She said “bitch we don’t care if your on a do not call list” and disconnected the call. I did not realize she disconnected the call because as you can imagine my surprise with her comment to me and had some choice words of my own. I think the first thing I said was “Are you serious, did you just say that to me”? I was livid. I had no opportunity to say things back. I at least wanted the opportunity to ask for a supervisor and express my aggravation even if nothing was done about it. I was so angry that day so I decided I shouldnt call back until another time. I tried but if you call the number it says that the person you are trying to reach is not accepting calls at this time. Ahhhh! Are you kidding me! So for days i thought about this. How can I make this stop? How are they allowed to do these things? There really is not much that I can do except change my number. I’m not willing to do that plus I already pay for an unlisted number. Why do I pay for an unlisted number? Could you imagine how many more calls I would get if I didn’t? So I did the only thing I could logically do. I’m not sure if this will help either but it is worth a try. I wanted to know what happens to my complaint. Here is what I found on the website.

• What happens to my complaint?

  Do not call complaints will be entered into the FTC’s Consumer Sentinel system, a secure online database available to more than 1,000 civil and criminal law enforcement agencies. While the FTC does not resolve individual consumer problems, your complaint will help us investigate the company and could lead to law enforcement action.

Just knowing that this complaint would be made available to civil and criminal law enforcement agencies somehow made me feel better. I’m not sure if it result in anything for that person/company/scammer (I can only hope) but like I said it did make me feel just a little better. LOL!

If you receive tons of calls from telemarketers (you will want to refer to the list of what classifies as a telemarketer) you can can register up to 3 numbers. You receive and email confirmation and you must click on the link in order for it to actually activate. If you have been on the do not call list for over 31 days you can register a complaint against a company as well. Here is the link to the National Do Not Call Registry  https://www.donotcall.gov

This will not stop all calls but I know there are people who would love to cut these calls down. I did notice a cutback in calls when I registered my numbers. I hope that you will to.

Painted Diva