What's your take on telemarketers?

No no, I don't agree. It is a VERY tough job being a telemarketer. Given a choice, no one likes to make a cold call to another. Given a choice, they wouldn't want to beg for your attention. Give a choice, they wouldn't want to pester you too. It is really not easy and earning is tough too. Anyone who hates them should try getting such a job. Then you will "appreciate" them better. :P

I don't care for them. So many of them wont take no for an answer and blather on and on. That is why my phone number is on the US No Call List. Right now there is some company constantly calling my stepdaughter. I have told them to stop calling, but the continue to do so. Wonder what they will do when I threaten to report them to the Federal Trade Commission.

Are they pests? Yes I would think so. They call with some great deal. When you say you don't want it they make you feel like an idiot for not taking advantage of it. I try and be nice to them until they turn into pests. Then I have fun with them. As for the telemarketers in India going to school to learn new languagues I think that is true. There is a show called 30 days and they put people in different situations for 30 days. One guy who worked over the phone was sent to India to see the out sourcing first hand. He was sent to a school to learn how to speak American.

I disagree that telemarketers are a pest, pests are usually in the form of creepy crawlies and telemarketers are not in this catagory. The companies that employ telemarketers are pretty strict on what has to be done, by that I mean that the telemarketer has targets that have to met. Thus the telemarketer must have a thick skin in order to meet these targets. I know because I have been a telemarketer. Most people that do this kind of job, usually do it on a short term basis like I did, for various reasons. So give them a break they are just trying to earn a living and that is certainly better than just drawing welfare. If you are interupted at a inappropriate time just be polite and say no thank-you I am not interested, and put the phone down. The telemarketer appreciates this more than a mouthful of abuse, believe me.

After reading this excerpt I am realising what kind of qualifications they might be having to qualify for the job,lol.They must be sound proof.Jokes apart,I too have felt frustrated with the number of calls we got from tele-marketers ,but I won't be so harsh as to call them pests.Afterall,they are doing it as professional duty and don't have a personal grievance against me. In our country a law has been introduced whereby,if a tele-marketer is declined three times,then within a quarter they must not call you back.Or you can sue the company and the marketer.His company will deduct the charges for litigation from his paychecks.This sounds harsh ,but it prevents people from getting nasty with them.I have shear respect for their resoluteness as long as it's mutual.:-P

It's a difficult job, I have to hand it to them, but I still don't appreciate the phone calls. Most of the time they're for the most impractical of things (I live in Northern Canada and I got a phone call about air-conditioning units in January) so I usually cut them off mid-sentence by saying "Not Interested" and hang up the phone. It's been a lot better since I made my number unlisted, if they've got an old book they can still find it and call, but it's really petered off a lot. I used to get a lot more when I lived in a boarding house, on the boarder's dedicated line asking for the "Head of the Household". One of the other boarders and I used to get a giggle out of telling them "Wrong Number" before we hung up the phone. Hey.. it was true!

I honestly am not bothered by them very often. I try to be gracious quickly and state, "sorry, I'm not interested thank you" and then hang up. I don't care if they're in mid sentenence or what. I figure YOU have invaded MY space and I have that right. So in all honesty I don't allow them to bother me. My answering machine screens most of my calls anyways.

My brother work as a telemarketer and I KNOW that it is a very hard job and that they work very hard. However I do not like them calling my house *lol* Here in sweden w ecan for free sign up on a list, when u have done this u are guaranteed not to have any more calls from them since they have to check this list before calling =)

Yes, well I would call the majority of telemarketers pests as you know what they have phoned me after midnight and even sworn at me so no wonder people are calling them pests but I think that some of them are more than just pests. Yes they are phoning us from overseas I found that out as well. Yes I do agree completely with your discussion.

I used to have a real problem with telemarkers ringing all the time, as evidently our phone number was on their lists. When I decided that staying online nearly 12 hours per day, was cheaper than dialling up every time, my phone is constantly engaged (can't afford broadband yet). As telemarketers won't leave messages on an answering service, I no longer have any problems with them rining.

There's not much telemarketers calling us in the house and I haven't really heard my mom complaining about them..well, my mom is just polite to end the calls in the nicest way possible.. lol and yeah, I do have friends who do called calling as per manager's demands, and worse is they have some quota to be met which is sometimes very difficult to reach especially if their products are not so salable. And they have always told me that it's never an easy thing to call people and get hanged up even in the middle of your talk. And I definitely wouldn't want to work as a telemarketer if given a choice. but even then, they shouldn't be considered pests as they are just doing their job.

I believe that telemarketers do serve a purpose however they need to be good especially with today where everyone is annoyed by them. I think this outsourcing to India and other countries is the worst thing any business can do. I use to be a telemarketer therefore I'm usually very friendly on the phone with them, in fact some of them I even try to give pointers to even though I'm not going to buy what they are selling. When it comes to a telemarketer that I can't understand I simply tell them "you know I can't understand anything you are saying and therefore this conversation is a waste of both of our times, please hangup or I will"....... That's my view on the whole thing!

I see your opinion on telemarketers is very rash, somethings you are right about. I used to be a telemarketer for a company named Sitel Corporation, they call customers of Reliant Energy (based in texas, electric company) and for Capital One (credit cards). I have a couple things to say that you are right about. Telemarketers are: 1. Abrasive and invasive 2. Rude, and perserveirent (spelled that wrong!) 3. unwilling to give up 4. programmed to respond certain ways 5. they don't care if you say no This is because most of them are just trying to make a living, I was and I wasn't cut out for it. See i'm the telemarketer that feels for you as a customer, you make me feel bad about what i'm doing. I know that its wrong for me to call you and disturb you, I know that you don't want us calling. I was on the verge of loosing my job, because I simply didn't try to push customers into it anymore. You see we have to follow a strict guideline when we call, if we don't get a "no" at least 2 to 3 times then we can't execpt " I'm not interested". In fact i'm going to help all of you today, simply because i quit my job to stay at home with my son so I wouldn't have to annoy you anymore. If a telemarket happens to call and you never want to hear them call again there are a few tips that can help, you see you learn things as a telemarketer. I not only learned that you have to be ruthless and heartless almost, but I also learned exactly what you have to say to keep us from ever calling you again. Simple steps, follow them exactly!! Step 1: Answer the phone Step 2: Tell the person yes this is mr or mrs so and so Step 3: Say may I ask what company you work for ( they may try to dogde the question don't get discouraged) Step 4: they are calling from a telemarketing company, also at the same time they are calling for a company you use(eletric,phone, water, etc...) Ask them to please put your name on the DO NOT CALL LIST for they're calling company and the company they are calling for. Step 5: don't worry about that telemarketer again. Now keep in mind you have to do this with every telemarketer that calls not just one. Just continue to repeat that and they will eventually stop. Hope that you have telemarketer free days ahead of you.

My first official job was with MBNA America as a Telemarketer. Now everyone tells me Im very sweet and nice and sometimes just to nice - with that being said I was NOT a very good telemarketer - its a tough and often dirty job. One instance I recall is my system auto dialed this little old women and the in front of me was of her husband so I requested but them she sadly informed me that he had past, she was pratically crying in the phone. I thank her for her time apologized for the loss and hung up. Little did I know it was the one call QA was listening in on, They ran from their little office to grill me - wanted to knwo why I did try to get her to agree to credit card - this made sick to my stomach. I vowed after that never to take another outbound marketing job. Its a rough job and defintly takes a special kind of person that can disassociate their feeling and morals from their job - its a position that I do not admire. just my humble 2 cents...

It is definitely very annoying to get calls on a regular basis from people who you do not know to offer you products that you do not need and sometimes they keep insisting and there is no way to get rid of them. I would not get that far to call them pests though. They are trying to make a living, they are generally underpaid and have a lot of pressure from management to sell.

Well, by listing their numbers in the telephone directory, the people are kissing their privacy goodbye. While I don't think that telemarketing by itself is pest-like behavior, most of them call up at absurd hours, like the person noted, at dinner time, to discuss some financial plan or some scheme which in all probability you would not be interested in. If a person values his privacy so much, he should get an unlisted number, which one can get for a slightly higher charge compared to the normal connection. One could also add his number to a do-not-call list, which makes it an offense for telemarketers to call. This is the only sensible solution. This is a lot more constructive that calling just calling the callers as pests.

That's unfair. To telemarketers I think it is the noblest profession they got in the moment. Humans can never be pests.

I have pretty effectively eliminated telemarketers from my life (thankfully). I only keep a cell phone, which I have registered on the national Do Not Call list, which seems to keep basically all of the telemarketers away, and I don't keep a land line. Let's just hope telemarketers don't move over to technologies like Skype!

i dont like telemarketers

although i don't like being disturb by a call - asking me to buy something... its not right to call them pests or any "Term" that is not good in my ears... what if the writer of that article is not a writer and she or he is a telemarketer can she call herself a pest???? Telemarketer is an easy job and also a difficult job... talking to a person in different moods... Anyways, thumbs up to telemarketers!