Telemarketers : The alternate alarm clocks
Has anyone experienced an increase in the number of telemarketer calls lately? I am noticing this trend, with my phone ringing around 9 in the morning [when they are allowed to start "soliciting" for business] until 9 PM [after which they aren't allowed to contact humans]. These people want to sell me newspapers, houses and cars.
Almost all of them start by referring to me with a different name, “Hello X”, where my name isn’t X. When I say they have the wrong number, they say “Oh, I have the right number, just the wrong name, how are you doing today?”. Wrong name and the right number? That person deserves to be honored at a flea market. Two options from there: either you tell them not to call you again, or if it’s a sunny day, just hang up. I usually hang up [since it gets sunny in California a lot]. I am getting probably more calls from these people than my friends, enemies and even strangers who really do dial the wrong number.
Try asking any of these people their phone number to call them back, or in case the phone gets disconnected (for any reason), and see the number of excuses they come up with to make sure you don’t get that number. Let’s see if signing up with the National Do Not Call Registry, which I have been hoping [but forgetting] to do for a long time, works soon.
REGISTRATION COMPLETE
You have registered the following telephone number in the National Do Not Call Registry:(xxx) xxx-xxxx
This registration will be effective until 4/16/2010.
Please print a copy of this page for your records.
Now I would now need to setup an actual alarm for some days though, since the telemarketers always woke me at the right time in the early mornings on certain days. 
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( April 15th, 2005 at 10:58 am )
I signed up for the registry a long time ago, and I did notice a significant decrease in calls, but there were still some calls coming in. Especially when we sat down for dinner. What really killed all the calls was a phone we got, made by VTech, called the Telezapper. When you answer the phone, the phone emits a beeping sound like the one that would start the "sorry, the phone number you are calling is no long in service" message. Now the telemarketer think they have a bum number and hang up before we even say hello. What also happens is they note it in their database that our number is bad, so we rarely receive any calls at all.
( April 15th, 2005 at 1:41 pm )
Not all telemarketers have to follow the guidlines of the registry, weird and true indeed. Your solution sounds interesting [http://www.telezapper.com , for those of you wondering about it].
However, I wonder how annoying it would be for "normal" callers [friends or family] to hear that tone/beep everytime they call someone with the telezapper.
( April 17th, 2005 at 6:34 am )
something I like to try with them is to tell them just a minute and I’ll get her when they ask for me. Then I put down the phone and go do something else. Sometimes I even leave the house and run errands. I don’t know how long they stay on there waiting for someone to talk to, but I really don’t care! Its their nickel and some of them are not permitted to end the call first…heh heh.