Don't know if this is old but I was sent this via email and thought it would be interesting enough to share.


"HANDLING TELEMARKETERS AND JUNK MAIL

I suppose some degree of commerce would grind to a
halt if telephone solicitors weren't able to call people
at home during dinner hour. But that doesn't
make it any more pleasant.

Now Steve Rubenstein, a writer for the San Francisco Chronicle,
has proposed "Three Little Words" based on his brief experience
in a telemarketing operation that would
stop the nuisance for all time. The three little words are "Hold On,
Please."

Saying this while putting down your phone and walking off
instead of hanging up immediately would make each telemarketing
call so time-consuming that boiler rooms would grind to a halt.

When you eventually hear the phone company's beep-beep-beep tone,
you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset,
which has efficiently completed its task.
This might be one of those articles you'll want to e-mail to your friends.
Three little words that eliminate telephone soliciting.

----------------------------------------------------------------
Good Ideas

When you get ads in your phone or utility bill, include
them with the payment let the companies throw them away.

When you get those pre approved letters in the mail for everything
from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and junk
like that, most of them come with postage paid return envelopes, right?
Well, why not get rid of some of your
other junk mail and put it in these cool little envelopes.

Send an ad for your local chimney cleaner to American Express.
Send the pizza coupon to Citibank.

If you didn't get anything else that day then just send
them their application back!

If you want to remain anonymous,
just make sure your name isn't on anything you send them.

You can send it back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing!

Eventually, the banks and credit card companies will begin getting
their junk back in the mail. Let's let them know
what it's like to get junk mail, and the best of it is that they're paying
for it. Twice.

Let's help keep our postal service busy since they say
e-mail is cutting into their business, and that's why they
need to increase postage again.

Send this to a friend or two or three...or fifty"

 

Great stuff!

 

Been doing the phone one for years, but thanks for the junk mail tips!

 

The greatest thing they did in Texas is that you can sign up on a list not to have telemarketers call. It cost about $4 for two years. Since I signed up I have gotten no more than 2 calls per week. Prior they were doing 3 or 4 a night. The only down side is that I have noticed that my stack of junk mail has increased exponentially.

 

Indiana also has a no-call list. Something like 25% of all households are on it now. No cost to the consumer, the service is paid by the fines collected when companies call someone on the no-call list. One of the few things this state has done right.

Nice tips, regardless.

 

That's awesome. Anyone know if California has the same type of list? If we don't and we do enough of what the email suggests in California, maybe they'll put up some type of no-call list service too. Probably wishful thinking though, they'll just raise another tax to pay for it.