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Usually it's a staged thing. Robocall -> level 2 operator -> boiler room. The level 2 people appear very, very bored and are unfazed by you yelling or swearin
by e40 11y ago
Usually it's a staged thing. Robocall -> level 2 operator -> boiler room.
The level 2 people appear very, very bored and are unfazed by you yelling or swearing. They just immediately hang up when they feel you are not a mark.
The boiler room guys are slick as fuck. I once kept one of them on the phone for 10-15 minutes, playing dumb (I told him I was looking for my CC statement). When I hung up, my phone rang immediately. I told him to fuck off and take me off his list. He said "you'll regret this" and hung up. My phone rang immediately and the person at the other end was just yelling. It was someone like me that was redirected to my phone #. I unplugged my phone for 30 minutes.
I googled for the phrases they used ("credit card services") and found a law suit in Texas from the early 2000's. The company was shutdown and fined. There was a lawyer's name on the press release. I called information, found him, dialed the number. He answered. I introduced myself and told him briefly what had happened and he was pretty interested. He lectured me, though, to not get involved. He said they were pretty nasty people. He recommended I call AT&T (my provider at the time) and file a complaint. I started the process, but AT&T made the process so fucking horrible that I abandoned it after putting in an hour or two over a few days. Useless.
- wpietri 11y agoMy tip for getting under their skin: sincerely try to persuade them that they deserve a better job than the shitty, exploitative thing they're going. They are prepared for yelling, but not so prepared for compassion and honesty. I've also had some luck opening with, "Does your family know that you lie to people for money?" That can be a good lead-in to suggesting they do something actually worthwhile.
- unclebucknasty 11y agoI don't know, but it doesn't seem that people with a conscience and a host of better options would voluntarily do this instead.
- wpietri 11y agoIn high school I was prodded to get a job, so I looked in the paper, applied for a bunch of things, and eventually got one. It was a company that did telephone fundraising for charities, which at 17 seemed ok by me. Very gradually I learned that it was run by scoundrels, and that only about 15% of the money raised actually made it to the charity in question. The work was awful, but I stuck with it because that's what you do with jobs. It was the realization that I was basically helping scam artists take money from big-hearted, too-trusting people that got me to quit. Conscience isn't some fixed thing; it's a skill you learn, a habit of ongoing evaluation. If I can wake just one of these people up so that they, like me, go and get a job that isn't net harmful to society, I'll consider my time well spent.
- srtjstjsj 11y agoUnless you are offering that person a job, you aren't helping.
- wpietri 11y agoMy goal isn't strictly to help them; my goal is to get them to stop being paid by criminals to waste everybody's time (and possibly steal their money).
- e40 11y agoMy tip for getting under their skin: sincerely try to persuade them that they deserve a better job than the shitty, exploitative thing they're going. They are prepared for yelling, but not so prepared for compassion and honesty. They'll just hang up as soon as they know you aren't a mark. I've tried everything, with these folks.
- wpietri 11y agoHave you tried actually caring that they get a better job? I've definitely had a number of conversations in the 3-5 minute range, and a few at 10-15.