Telemarketers Sue Over "Do Not Call" List 1004
Joey Patterson writes "CNN reports that 'Telemarketers expanded their legal challenge to the government's do-not-call list, suing a second federal agency over the call-blocking service for consumers that the industry says will devastate business and cost as many as two million jobs.'"
Hypocrites... (Score:5, Interesting)
Better Now... (Score:4, Interesting)
FYI - if you work in email spam, better start looking for a job now while you have a chance...
Re:In other words... (Score:1, Interesting)
I was moved to tears of joy.
Those b@stards! (Score:3, Interesting)
I have heard that, in the day of door-to-door salesmen, many such folk were actually thrilled to see "No Solicitors" signs, because they felt that such signs were indicators that the people there knew they couldn't stand up to a sales pitch. I'll bet the same logic might be applied here, so those of us who prefer not to be called might in fact have inadvertently invited twice as many.
What I don't understand is why the list officially does not apply to cell phones? I get sales calls on my cell phone, and it pisses me off. I pay for those minutes on incoming calls!
For once (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:In other words... (Score:5, Interesting)
I would like to see some legal basis behind this challenge. What rights does it infringe? Where does it protect these rights in the constitution? Remember that stuff? That's what court cases used to be about.
2 Million Jobs my A** (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't have a clue how many people the Tele-hacks employ, but I sure know that they never get any business from me. By using this list, I am saving them time - increasing their profits!
2 Million Jobs! You have to be kidding me!
Why can't the media see thru lies like this one, and the RIAA, and simply report that companies are lying in order to survive.
Two million jobs (Score:5, Interesting)
Embrace the change (Score:5, Interesting)
This isn't about the government killing off an industry. It's about protecting the people who are "bothered" enough to request not to be bothered. If I called you every night at dinner time, and if you did not welcome my call, you would ask me to stop. If I did not stop, then by definition, I would be harassing you, and you would have some right to protection by the law.
The DNC list does not prohibit phone solicitations; it merely requires that solicitors prune their lists based on people's requests not to be contacted that way.
Most people in that line of work are paid by commission anyway, so I feel that I'm doing them a favor by having them not call me because I *NEVER* buy anything sold by an anonymous phone (or door) solicitor. Rather than sue, these folks should embrace the change for the better of all mankind!
Re:Exemptions? (Score:3, Interesting)
And then put the phone down...not hang up, just put it down. Hang up a few minutes later, when it starts making an annoying sound.
It's quite effective. Even against robot callers.
Oops, sued in the wrong venue... (Score:3, Interesting)
Hey, I'm sure the judges have had positive experience with Colorado's No Call list [coloradonocall.com]. It's amazing, I went from an average of 3 phones calls plus 6 hangups a day to ZERO! It was a night and day difference.
Perhaps they should have filed somewhere else?
Overkill? OVERKILL?!? (Score:3, Interesting)
This from a group that represents an industry that once called me at home no less than 60 times in a five day period!
Re:repeat after me (Score:5, Interesting)
Telemarkets don't show up as "ATTENTION, TELEMARKETER" or "TELEMARKETING INC." or some other dead give away.
Frequently they show up as UNAVAILABLE just like 90% of valid businesses. My mother works for a small Funeral Home. They don't show up as "JOE'S FUNERAL HOME" they show up "UNAVAILABLE".
Should I ignore valid business to block telemarketers? No.
If anything, force Telemarketers to show their ID to the box and pay for me having to use it to block them.
Insert another quarter and try again (Score:4, Interesting)
"This [telemarketing] truly is a case of pushy sales overkill" said mobileskimo, Annoyed phone owner.
The telemarketing industry estimates the do-not-call list could cut its business in half, costing it up to $50 billion in sales each year.
Go make money providing society with something usefull.
Implementing the list could also eliminate up to two million jobs, the ATA said.
Stop getting paid for being a schmuck and go do something usefull.
Quality Service Management
Don't get me started on this one.
And we wonder why our economy sucks when people wake up and smell the garbage they've been tossing around. Well, duh, if we're not producing anything and just making shit up to sell to each other, how do you expect anything of real value to be added to our world?
Re:In other words... (Score:3, Interesting)
I work in email-marketing, and we get and maintain our clients on the basis of what percentage of click-throughs we get. If someone doesn't want to receive the email and we send it anyway, that just hurts our click-through ratio. We usually get about 10-30% click-throughs on our emails. We try to get the list as clean as possible so that we can show them how successful it was, rather than unsuccessful.
I'm surprised, then, that the telemarketing association would go against the do-not-call list. It reduces their target area to people who don't mind being called! This should increase, not decrease, their success.
So, I'm against the law as a law, but I think the telemarketing agencies are stupid for not at least holding their own.
Re:2 Million Jobs my A** (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Embrace the change (Score:3, Interesting)
First, the Federal Government isn't putting the industry out of business, because (in addition to other reasons stated in other posts) there are exceptions, i.e., groups and organizations who can still call you even though you're on the DNC list.
Second, when you ask a company to take your off of their list, they usually give you the 6-8 weeks bullshit. And yes, my friend, it is bullshit. Those 6-8 weeks give them time to sell the list to some other telemarketing company, with your name still on it, in addition to giving them time to harass you more. All of their lists are computerized. With a single click of a button, you could be removed from that list. And yet, it still takes them 6-8 weeks to click that button? Why? Because they're bending the law, getting around it.
Just like they'll continue to get around it. Note the exclusions to the DNC list - churches, airlines, etc., Craftly lawyers and businessmen (or should I just say assholes - these people are no better than the SPAM kings who sit at home, smug smiles on their faces, telling us 'it doesn't take very long to delete unwanted email, so just deal with it') will find a way around the law, and we'll end up getting nearly as many calls as we did before the DNC list ever existed.
Mark my words.
Phone SPAM (Score:4, Interesting)
This is laughable. Like travel/insurance/real estate agents and media distribution, this industry sprang up because of a particular circumstance of the business environment. Now that its changing, all these business are crying foul. Not so. They are slowly being replaced with online/digital mediums for searcing and sorting, micropayments and validation services.
IMO, I hope these services die a painful death and the people involved with them go looking for work elsewhere. Economic disaster, true, but I think it'll be good for our population to be forced into newer concepts rather than propping up the old ones. A certain percentage may even train to be part of the digital industry's workforce. Sadly, some may become spammers (if not already).
We're content overloaded and most of it is junk food. There simply isn't enough quality out there to warrant getting it stuffed in our faces every way possible. Let's have a phone/Voip be for private conversations, not substance-free radio blather.
mug
Re:The very same reason we get spammed? (Score:5, Interesting)
You know what? I've *never* purchased anything from a telemarketer. Ever. I've never even been slightly interested in doing so. If I want a product, I'm going to go and get it, not wait for it to come to me. In spite of the fact that I've never once purchased something from a telemarketer, I'm certain I've spent hours telling them to go away. That's hours of my time spent doing something that serves me no purpose and waste's someone else's time as well. How am I "screwing" them by telling them not to call me? Is it ok for them to inconvenience me to attempt to sell me crap I don't want so they can feed their family?
Re:repeat after me (Score:4, Interesting)
Hmm...I wonder if this puts the phone companies in a position where they are essentially blackmailing domestic abuse survivors by charging a fee to keep them unlisted (and somewhat hidden) from their assailants.
2 million jobs? Sh'yeah, right. (Score:2, Interesting)
Those numbers mean each telemarketer's contribution to the economy is $25,000, as opposed to the approximately $40K to $50K to the GNP by each working citizen. Now, let us consider the telepests must be selling a product on top of getting paid - minimum wage is about $10K yearly, so with overhead we're talking closer to $15K, which means the products sold must be worth no more than $10K assuming full-time phone droids. This is supposedly a profitable industry, so one assumes the price would at least cover the overhead (in this case phone spammers) and cost of product. In this case we see the overhead is massive which means the end-user does not get value for money even if the phoners are getting minimum wage. Anecdotal evidence elsewhere in the thread indicates pay rates are better than that.
For the customers to be getting a good deal, the yearly rate must decrease considerably - the only way this can be done legally is to hire people part-time or offshore the phone banks. The aforementioned wage rates, coupled with the overhead of annoying hundreds, if not thousands, of people to make a single sale, mean the jobs must be far less than even half-time. In other words, the "2 million" jobs number is actually equivalent to a fraction thereof.
All the above calculations presuppose, of course, that the DMA and ATA are not merely lying sacks of shit. For the $50 billion and 2 million jobs they claim telemarketers "contribute" to the economy, I sure haven't seen any trace of that presence on the Fortune 500 list. For that matter, the demand for goods and services will not disappear just because Joe LoBrow isn't hawking them over the phone when you're eating dinner. The demand will still exist, and conceivably increase once the cost structure decreases when the inefficiencies of scattergun telephone marketing go away.
Francois.
Re:repeat after me (Score:3, Interesting)
-dk
Voice Spam (Score:3, Interesting)
When my audio Caller ID announces a call coming from "Out of Area" (aka no incoming caller id information), then I let the machine get it.
Then, if the business really wants to get a hold of me, they'll leave a message and, if I'm home, I can pick up.
This has worked pretty well until recently, when some of the more obnoxious telemarketers have played a pre-recorded spam message into my machine.
I could have sworn it was not legal for them to do this; certain state statutes prevent it.
Possibly my outgoing message must explicitly refuse such calls, or the loophole interpretation is that I am implicitly agreeing to opt-in, to receive such spam.
<philosophical>One of the more tragic developments in modern society is that more and more of our "public attention commons" is getting exploited because the cost of doing so is largely external to the people doing the exploiting. For millenia, we've paid attention to people wanting our attention. With few people, such interruptions are infrequent and of little cost to our emotional well-being.
Not anymore.
Unless laws are put in place to provide guarantees of private space, then it will be exploited.
But that won't happen. Instead, we'll all just turn into stressed out consumers that develop our ability to actively ignore our environment, other people and any attempt to grab our attention.
The newest sign of affluence is less intrusion into your personal attention.
</philosophical>Re:repeat after me (Score:3, Interesting)
> an unlisted number.
You do? I don't.
I've got an _unpublished_ number, and the rates are the same as
for a regular number. Of course, I told them flat out I wasn't
connecting a voice phone to the line, just a modem. (This is
true. I've connected a voice phone a couple of times to test
new jacks for dialtone, but that's it.) I don't know whether
that has any impact on the rate, but I don't see why it would.
Almost as bad... (Score:5, Interesting)
Did I mention Drexel's mascot is "the Shaft?"
One night I did cold calling of Alumni. I called 100 names on the list, I had 1 donation. Most of the alumni I called were downright hostile. Many were unemployed. A good chunk were bitter that they hadn't even paid off their loans and they were already hit up for donations. (Ten years later, but who's counting?)
I felt so dirty that I swore I'd never do it again.
That said, I did help out our local PBS station during a call drive. At least there, people were calling US, with credit card in hand, after having already recieved the "product" so to speak.
The first rule of marketing is to have a product that will sell itself. Ideally you are only introducing the buyer to the seller.
Re:Caller ID doesn't work for ME. (Score:2, Interesting)
> show no data on the caller ID.
To filter out telemarketers, you also have to get the additional
feature known as Anonymous Call Block, wherein if the caller is
blocking caller ID he gets a message saying you don't receive
anon calls, and your phone doesn't ring. A legit caller who blocks
caller ID normally (for other reasons than you, presumably) can still
call you by using star-something to enable caller ID just for the
one call.
These comments are hilarious! (Score:2, Interesting)
2 million jobs WHERE? and other points (Score:3, Interesting)
It's too bad we had to come to this point. They brought it on themselves by not targetting customers more carefully when it became a widespread complaint. E.g. if I bought tires from Sears 2-3 years ago, I probably wouldn't mind if they called to ask if I'm interested in a big tire sale they're having.
Re:devaste jobs WHERE? (Score:3, Interesting)
Step 1: Set up server in india at call center.
Step 2: Set up servers in major american cities you want to market to.
Step 3: Profit!
Many calls you get have been illegal for 10 yrs (Score:5, Interesting)
Two things completely outlawed:
1) Junk faxes - unsolicited commercial faxes may NOT be sent without WRITTEN authorization of the fax machine/line owner. Period. There is NO EBR (established business relationship) that would exempt that. If you are sent an advertisement and did not specifically give your (express) permission, then it is illegal. Period. Do not allow yourself to be taken in by the BS of 'removal' numbers that are on the faxes. It is merely an attempt to legitimize the industry as much as spammers try to suggest remove address make them ethical.
2) Prerecorded commercial solicitations to your home may NOt be initiated without the EXPRESS permission of the owner. An exemption (unlike junk faxes) would be an EBR. Calls made for survey, political speech, or non commercial are exempt.
If you receive either of the above offenses, then you are immediately owed $500 per VIOLATION by the person initiating the call and on who's behalf the call is made.
That law provides a private right of action. Meaning you are specifically given the authority to sue them in court. While you cannot sue someone that litters on the highway, Congress provided this right. this pretty much makes you a private attorney general of your domain in regards to telemarketing.
Live calls are regulated. They must identify themselves by the caller's name, entity placing the call, and an address or phone number by which they may be contacted. This MUST be provided without your even asking. The company MUST have a DNC (do not call) policy in place before making such calls. They MUST provide you with a written copy of that DNC policy upon request. NEVER, ever allow the telemarketer say they will take your name off 'the list'. Specifically DEMAND that they ADD your name to their company's Do-Not-Call list (emphasis added).
The telemarketing is claiming the loss of millions of jobs. Yet they have not specified in what country. Do many of you not realize how many outbound call centers are in countries like India? The law by not affect that out-of-country company directly in terms of jurisdiction, but it does put liability on companies on who's behalf the call is placed. The only way a company can get by completely is if they are based and operate outside the country and have no business presence in any area under the jurisdiction of the US.
I have gone to court several times against telemarketers. If people knew their rights and enforced them by bringing suit in court as Congress intended, then a national list would not be necessary. the companies would simply not be able to operate.
Who buys that much stuff??? (Score:3, Interesting)
So they're making $100 billion a year in sales? That means that on _average_ each phone number is paying between $300 and $600 a _year_ to telemarketers, depending on how many of the cellphone numbers we want to include. (Techncially it's illegal for telemarketers to call cell phones, but does that stop them?)
So who's buying this stuff, what are they buying, and how much are they paying for it? Clearly there have to be some people spending totally atrocious amounts of money given how many people there are who have never bought anything from a telemarketer in their life.
Do the idle rich sit around waiting for telemarketers to call so they can spend thousands of dollars a year on them or what? Or are a lot of low and middle income people blowing their savings on this crap?
Not just spam, but crap wages for their own people (Score:5, Interesting)
But "2 million jobs"?? Are they counting not only the boilerroom flunkies and their managers, but also everyone in every industry that ever used telemarketing? Even it that's so, I suspect this number was pulled out of their ass.
And most of said flunkies aren't making a living wage anyway. Back about 1985, I attended a "job fair" that proved to be a boilerroom recruiter. Now, they claimed that it was possible to make serious bucks. Well, I happened to be sitting where I could see onto the manager's desk, and the previous week's wage sheet just happened to be laying open where I could read it. ONE person had made the promised several hundred bucks. ONE other person had made about $100. But everyone else had made only $40 -- for the entire week.
Now, do we really WANT to preserve an industry that pays that poorly, even compared to India??
Come to think of it, if cheap internet-based long distance becomes an everyday reality, the next step is to outsource boilerroom telemarketing to India. And then how do you go about enforcing a Do Not Call list??
Re:repeat after me (Score:3, Interesting)
Telemarketers: subsidize my phone bill (Score:1, Interesting)
Telemarketers seems to think they have a fundamental right to use my telephone to sell stuff... You want to sell stuff using my phone, you help pay for it.
Same goes with email massmarketing.
Re:Caller ID doesn't work for ME. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Almost as bad... (Score:3, Interesting)
I thought Starbucks was a perfect career path for caffiene addicted engineers...
Likely outcome of all this: (Score:3, Interesting)
Instead of getting calls like "I'm calling today to offer you a spectacular deal on vinyl siding!", you'll get calls like "I'd like to ask your opinion on vinyl siding and what you think it could do to the asthetics of your home." May I ask you a few quesions?" I can think of nary a pitch that couldn't be converted in to some sort of "poll quesion".
I'm not at all familiar with what the FTC or FCC require of a "pollster" firm as opposed to a "direct marketing" firm, but my rough guess is little to nothing.
Re:why should they want to call... (Score:3, Interesting)
You suuuuuuure?
This may work for the uninformed or the unprepared, but it doesn't work on me.
lmao...dude, it works on _everyone_...it just depends on how good the salesperson is. In fact, you're the kind of guy reps love...a lot of ego invested in the fact that you can't be swayed...unwilling to back down...you're an easy sell, only have to turn that ego around so it's invested in the product and bang, you're buying
I'm not afraid to walk away from a salesman either
I didn't realize that it took courage to walk away from a salesperson? It's not your obligation to listen blah blah blah Dude, you're so missing the point...a good salesperson(and I'm not talking about your crappy run of the mill "good morning mr x, do you know you may have won already" reps)...I'm talking about a good sales person, skilled in the art of psychological manipulation and selling, will make you _want_ to listen, and do so without you realising it. So many times I've sat talking to sales guys, I mean really really good ones, that earn most of there cash travelling around training teams etc...they love this stuff, they sit down at the end of the day and laugh about how someone said blatently to their face something like you're comment above (it doesn't work on me)...to which they've countered with understanding and re-assurance...thrown in a 'feel-felt-found'...built a sense of ownership and invested your ego in their product...casually 7 point closed you...then bamn...you're buying...and you think you've got one over on them while you're doing it...dude, they sit round and kill themselves laughing over people like you..."You should have seen him, he thought he tore strips off me, thought he put me in my place...*laugh*, he was really just setting himself up for and ego based close"....everyone will be talked into buying something they don't want by someone who is just better than them at pop-psych...if you haven't yet, lucky you...that just means that you haven't met a good sales person yet...but don't worry, they're out there...you will. Lmao...maybe you have been already...as I said above, the _really_ good sales people make you think it was your idea all along.