Another Rant from That Joe Guy

Todays rant is aimed in a number of different directions…

The other day my cell phone rang to let me know I had a call.. The caller id showed the number calling as 000-000-0000 Now the first thing that comes to mind is that they don’t want me to know who was calling.. When I answered the phone it turned out to be some type of survey..

My answer to the first couple of questions was to push #3 which told them I was not a home owner.. I am now a 60 year old cliché that lives with his mother.. After the first time I replied that I was not a home owner I assumed they would say something like “thank you for taking the survey, but you do not qualify for our gift” . No.. It seems that the results of the survey have no relationship to getting the free gift.. When they asked me to push a number so that I could be connected to an agent I hung up..

Later I got a call from 954-237-8081 where the agent called me back.. He went on to explain that I could get a boarding pass for 2 on a cruise line. He was insistent and I finally just hung up on him. He even tried to validate himself by telling me that, if I could go to a certain website that I would understand that he was legit.. He may have been calling in relationship to Royal Bahamas Cruise Lines.. Or not.

There is also the Scam where some guy who give you and American sounding name, though he sounds more like New Delhi, says he is from the Technical Division of Windows. He is nice enough to to call and let you know that your computer has sent them a message letting them know that you have a virus, or some other fault, on your computer.. I get these calls every once in a while.. The guy always says “your computer”… I figure that if this message had enough information to ID me, like my phone number, it would have the name of the effected computer, so I asked him “which computer?”. They hang up at this point. I love the fact that most of them will tell me they work for Windows and NOT Microsoft..

Even if it is not some whack job Scammer : I put our numbers on the “Do Not Call” list because I don’t want to hear from them.. Sometimes I explain to them that we are on both the Federal and State list. The callers will sometimes explain to me that they are not covered by the law, so they don’t feel bad about calling me.. I explain to them that even if they are legit I am no the list and that should give them a clue that I don’t want to talk to them. I have explained to a number of them that my being on the list was like my putting out a “No Trespass” sign on my yard and that any salesman who knocks on my door would have little chance of selling anything here.. Rarely do they understand what I am saying..

What this brings me to is the question of.. Why do the politicians think we could trust them to do important things when they can’t even design a do not call list that works.. All of our phone numbers are on both the Federal and State “Do Not Call” lists, and we still get calls. I understand that certain groups, such as almost anyone, will contribute to political campaigns but aren’t these people supposed to be working in OUR interest.

Some calls, such as safety alerts, can be useful.. Otherwise if I want to hear from anyone, other than people I know, I will call them.

While I was looking up the number at whocalled.us I found, after looking at a number of web sites, a reference to a free service at nomorobo.com.. It is supposed to be a free service, it even works through Comcast, which works in conjunction with your phone to head off these annoying calls..

If you are as tired of these type of calls and are not going to wait until the politicians decide to serve you rather then their special interest then you might want to look at nomorobo.com..

Thanks,

That Joe Guy.