5 barks and woofs on “Random Thought”

1. What would you suggest we do about the continuing (two plus years now) calls we get for “Wilma”? We’re getting personal calls and now going into the everlasting election season we get solicitations and requests for answering a “few” questions. We’ve politely requested the caller remove the number from his/her call list since there’s no Wilma here or ever has been. Then we simply hung up. Now we’re trying rudeness. I suspect our number has been recycled so who do we ask for relief?

   • You have caller ID. If it’s always from the same number, don’t answer. If you don’t recognize the name or it says “Unknown” or doesn’t have a name at all, ignore it. Do not press 3 or whatever they say to “take you off our list.” That only tells them they have a live one.

     Yes, the phone company recycles numbers. When AJP and I moved to Albuquerque, we got calls for Amy Yasbeck, who had had the number before us and was apparently a deadbeat. The same happened when I moved to Miami; another deadbeat. Then I got calls based on the address; the previous tenant had gone on the lam to Brazil. The only solution is to not have a phone.

     • It’s always a different number on caller ID, sometimes a local one, sometimes one I fear could be an old friend’s whose # I’ve forgotten. I believe the callers aren’t trolling but are using a number from an old list. Our problem is that the retirement community has the 247 prefix and does indeed recycle them as the residents come and go. But no one who should know remembers a Wilma. I suppose we must suffer along until all Wilma’s acquaintances get the word. At least we’re not being dunned. Or threatened. . . .

2. If it is a robo call I let it run through the entire pitch without making any kind of response. I don’t hang up. I wait for them to hang up on me. It seems to get us less calls.

   As for people asking for money I tell they we don’t respond to phone soliciting. That throws them for a moment.

3. The “do not call” list is only for sales calls. Anything else is allowed — including the self-styled “prophet” who was calling me between 10 and 11 pm every night to demand that I pray.

   And of course, if you’re not actually asking for money in exchange for a product, it’s not a sales call, right?

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