A call from my granddaughter

[LannyPC]

People actually answer random, incoming phone calls? Why?

One reason could be to stop the phone from ringing. That's probably why we still see so many people talking on their phones while driving.

It's probably faster to answer, find out what the person wants, then, after realizing it's not an important call, hang up. Another could be that it is possible that it is an important call but just coming from an unrecognizable number. Me, personally, I don't have a problem answering an unrecognized call. If it's not a conversation that I wish to continue, it's very easy to hang up and it takes less time than letting the phone ring until the maximum number of rings and then retrieve the call from voice mail if the caller left one.

 

[rapmarks]

One reason could be to stop the phone from ringing. That's probably why we still see so many people talking on their phones while driving.

It's probably faster to answer, find out what the person wants, then, after realizing it's not an important call, hang up. Another could be that it is possible that it is an important call but just coming from an unrecognizable number. Me, personally, I don't have a problem answering an unrecognized call. If it's not a conversation that I wish to continue, it's very easy to hang up and it takes less time than letting the phone ring until the maximum number of rings and then retrieve the call from voice mail if the caller left one.

Right, also I don’t care to pay extra for caller Id.
last fall I ended in emergency room. When I got home I wanted to rest for awhile. For two and a half hours the phone rang from the same scammer. It did not matter if I answered and hung up, let it go to voice mail, or pushed blocking numbers. It was a nightmare. I am having land line removed when we go north.

 

[Luanne]

Right, also I don’t care to pay extra for caller Id.
last fall I ended in emergency room. When I got home I wanted to rest for awhile. For two and a half hours the phone rang from the same scammer. It did not matter if I answered and hung up, let it go to voice mail, or pushed blocking numbers. It was a nightmare. I am having land line removed when we go north.

We don't pay extra for caller id. It's on the phone.

Also, removing the land line and only having a cell won't necessarily help. Dh and I both get junk calls on our cell phones.

 

[rapmarks]

We don't pay extra for caller id. It's on the phone.

Also, removing the land line and only having a cell won't necessarily help. Dh and I both get junk calls on our cell phones.

We have phones with caller id but unless included in your plan the number doesn’t show up. I am well are you still get scammers on cell phones, but nowhere like the amount on land lines

 

[clifffaith]

Wait. People actually answer random, incoming phone calls? Why?
All of my calls go to voice mail unless I recognize the caller's name on my phone.

We may answer random numbers and count to four and hang up if no one says anything, or just let them ring. I however have become somewhat of a curmudgeonette, so I on purpose answered the phone from bed at 8:15 this morning just so I could put the woman calling from A Place for Mom on notice that neither we nor anyone else appreciates a phone call at that hour on Sunday. CLICK.

 

[susieq]

Wait. People actually answer random, incoming phone calls? Why?
All of my calls go to voice mail unless I recognize the caller's name on my phone.

Me too!!!!!! If people can't leave a message, wasn't too important, and I'm not wasting my time!!

 

[Luanne]

We have phones with caller id but unless included in your plan the number doesn’t show up. I am well are you still get scammers on cell phones, but nowhere like the amount on land lines

Well I guess caller id is included in our plan at no extra cost. I think many phone companies started including that option quite awhile ago.

 

[Brett]

Wait. People actually answer random, incoming phone calls? Why?
All of my calls go to voice mail unless I recognize the caller's name on my phone.

same here - but I suppose it could be interesting if picked up on some of those random unidentified calls

 

[Icc5]

My brother's mother n law whom taught school for 40 years always seemed very bright and had a great sense of humor. On around her 85th birthday she had a scammer call and said they were one of her grandsons and stuck in Mexico in jail and needed $500 to get bailed out. It had to come in the form of gift cards. She argued with her caregiver to go the store right now and buy them. When her caregiver stepped outside she called the oldest son and told him about the scam. It took the oldest son telling her that the grandson was at work and someone was trying to pull a scam on her before she believed it. The son also told her he was going to call the caregiver and tell her to come back home. Two minutes later the caregiver came in and the grandmother seemed to have already forgot the entire thing.
Now when we talk to the nephew we always first ask him how he liked the Mexican jail?

 

[Luanne]

same here - but I suppose it could be interesting if picked up on some of those random unidentified calls

Most of the time when I have accidentally picked up a random unidentified call it's been a robo call, no human on the other end.

 

[Patri]

We don't pay extra for caller id. It's on the phone.

Same here. In the old days with traditional long distance service I refused to pay the extra fee for caller ID. But now with Comcast's digital phone service, it is free. Thank goodness way back when there were not many scam calls, or I would have gone nuts. I keep the landline now on purpose. It is what I use for businesses and casual acquaintances. I don't want everyone calling my cell, especially if they are not in my contact list. And with companies, every agent may have a different number, so you can't save them all. At least on the landline the legit callers have an ID, and the rest can leave a message. They don't, of course.

 

[Talent312]

The robo calls I get nowadays is once a day from RCI telling me I have a match for.my on-going search (which I don't want). But I'm too lazy to deal with it.

 

[SmithOp]

One reason could be to stop the phone from ringing. That's probably why we still see so many people talking on their phones while driving.

It's probably faster to answer, find out what the person wants, then, after realizing it's not an important call, hang up. Another could be that it is possible that it is an important call but just coming from an unrecognizable number. Me, personally, I don't have a problem answering an unrecognized call. If it's not a conversation that I wish to continue, it's very easy to hang up and it takes less time than letting the phone ring until the maximum number of rings and then retrieve the call from voice mail if the caller left one.

I put my cell on silent when driving.

When it does ring I have a green button to answer and a red one to ignore.

It's not why you see people talking while driving, that a whole other problem.

Sent from my SM-G970U using Tapatalk

 

[melissy123]

Do you remember when we all used to rely on the “Do not call list”

 

[rapmarks]

I got a hearing aid last week and the cell phone rings in my ear. My cell phone identifies the caller, but my hearing aid does not. I was very surprised to get a poll and I was happy to share that I didn’t like anyone, to my surprise it was from Bloomberg .

 

[davidvel]

Volume down or red button (next to green answer button) both silence the ringer with a single press.

 

[moonstone]

My 89yo dad not only answers unknown calls but then talks to the people! I guess that's what happens when you live alone and don't have too many people to talk to! If the caller says there is a problem with his Windows dad tells him no they are only a few years old and he just had them all washed. If he gets a call for duct cleaning he tells him he doesn't have any ducks now that he doesn't live on the farm. Many years ago he did get a call from a guy claiming he was a grandson in trouble in Europe and needed money. But both of his grandsons who were old enough to travel on their own were sitting with us in Dad's living room at the time! Dad strung the caller along for a while then tapped the phone receiver with a pen and said 'yes operator this is the call to trace'. He has never had one of those type calls again. Last fall he was getting many calls a week saying his credit card was used in some foreign place and he needed to get some gift cards to send them to cover the refund procedure. He asked the caller if it was his Mastercard and the guy said yes. Dad said that's funny since I don't own a Mastercard and hung up. After repeating that on every call the folks finally gave up calling him. At least Dad is still mentally with it and I don't have to worry about him falling for one of those scammers.

The funniest call I've had was a guy saying he was with the IRS and I was in trouble for many years of back taxes. I asked the IRS as in the Internal Revenue Service of the USA? The guy said yes. Then I said well that's really funny since you called a Canadian in Canada and the IRS has absolutely nothing to do with us! He hung up pretty quick.


~Diane

 

[DaveNV]

Do you remember when we all used to rely on the “Do not call list”

That was when most phones were landlines, and before robocalling became so pervasive. When telemarketers started breaking the “do not call” laws, it changed the playing field. Now, if you’re not on my Contacts list in my cell phone, you’re routed to voicemail without my phone even ringing. If you don’t leave a message, I won’t be calling you back.

Dave

 

[mcsteve]

I got a call last week wanting to sell me “ADT” monitoring and emergency response. This scam has been in the news for a few years as the Toronto ADT office publicly warns people about this scam and that the call originates from overseas. Having a few minutes on my hands that day I played along. I focused on their emergency response saying I really needed extra medical insurance and kept pressing for more details about how they cover the ER costs. Listening to them try to explain that it wasn’t medical insurance, and then saying it was to get me to pay for it was pretty amusing. The call went for about 15 minutes before they must have figured out I wasn’t a good catch and hung up. It was fun.

 

[jehb2]

Wait. People actually answer random, incoming phone calls? Why?
All of my calls go to voice mail unless I recognize the caller's name on my phone.

There are times when I’m getting a big delivery or expecting a service man to come by. People keep their cell phone numbers when they move from another state. So there will be a couple of days where I might get important phone calls from unknown numbers. Like next week we’re getting new hardwood floors and carpeting. I’m getting calls from the sales person, the person who sets up the installation, and eventually the guys who do the actual installing.

 

[stmartinfan]

My brother's mother n law whom taught school for 40 years always seemed very bright and had a great sense of humor. On around her 85th birthday she had a scammer call and said they were one of her grandsons and stuck in Mexico in jail and needed $500 to get bailed out.

I had a relative in her 70s fall for this one, too, several years ago. She and her husband, who both were very capable, actually sent the scammer money. In this case it was supposedly a granddaughter and she didn't want her parents to know. They did report it to the police in the Phoenix area and learned that they were far from the first to have gotten suckered! She was very embarrassed to tell us about it but wanted to share her story to alert others.

 

[clifffaith]

I had a relative in her 70s fall for this one, too, several years ago. She and her husband, who both were very capable, actually sent the scammer money. In this case it was supposedly a granddaughter and she didn't want her parents to know. They did report it to the police in the Phoenix area and learned that they were far from the first to have gotten suckered! She was very embarrassed to tell us about it but wanted to share her story to alert others.

My uncle, late 70s/early 80s when this happened a few years ago, went to 711 to buy the darn iTune cards or whatever the scammer claiming to be his grandson wanted. This man is professor emeritus of an IT department at some university in Ohio, still drives from Ohio to Florida every year and back, but still got suckered into the "grandpa I'm in jail and don't tell my dad" scam. My freaking parents haven't answered the phone for years for fear of scammers. Irritates me no end when the hospice nurse is due or they are expecting a call from the pharmacy. Nope, won't answer until the person starts talking -- which means half the time they miss the call because my mother is too slow, even with the phone in her hand, to answer.

 

[isisdave]

I tell them I charge $50 to listen to their pitch, so please give me YOUR credit card number. They are usually stunned by this request. No one has actually coughed up a number, but we do have a Square account still, so I could actually run it if they did.

 

[DrQ]

My 89yo dad not only answers unknown calls but then talks to the people! I guess that's what happens when you live alone and don't have too many people to talk to! If the caller says there is a problem with his Windows dad tells him no they are only a few years old and he just had them all washed. If he gets a call for duct cleaning he tells him he doesn't have any ducks now that he doesn't live on the farm. Many years ago he did get a call from a guy claiming he was a grandson in trouble in Europe and needed money. But both of his grandsons who were old enough to travel on their own were sitting with us in Dad's living room at the time! Dad strung the caller along for a while then tapped the phone receiver with a pen and said 'yes operator this is the call to trace'. He has never had one of those type calls again. Last fall he was getting many calls a week saying his credit card was used in some foreign place and he needed to get some gift cards to send them to cover the refund procedure. He asked the caller if it was his Mastercard and the guy said yes. Dad said that's funny since I don't own a Mastercard and hung up. After repeating that on every call the folks finally gave up calling him. At least Dad is still mentally with it and I don't have to worry about him falling for one of those scammers.

The funniest call I've had was a guy saying he was with the IRS and I was in trouble for many years of back taxes. I asked the IRS as in the Internal Revenue Service of the USA? The guy said yes. Then I said well that's really funny since you called a Canadian in Canada and the IRS has absolutely nothing to do with us! He hung up pretty quick.


~Diane

My kind of guy

When I get the Microsoft calls, I string them along for as long as I can and finally ask them if it matters that I'm running on a Linux desktop.