Cold Callers Who Lie

[Dips]

Cold calling is a fact of life for businesses as we cannot put our phone numbers on the do-not-call list.

Most have the good sense to give up quickly and move on when they realize they aren't going to make a sale. This guy did have have good sense...

Caller: I need speak with the person in charge of shipping supplies.

Me: We aren't interested in changing vendors. Thank you very much. Have a good day. <click> [I say this without pausing so as to not let them get in a word edgewise; it's the only way to be sure]

The phone rings again. I grab it and give my greeting.

Caller: Someone just hung up on me. I think she thought I was a cold caller. [same voice as before]

Me: Oh? What is your name, please?

Caller: Was that you before?

Me: Yes. What is the name of your company please?

Caller: Sucky Supplies.

Me: And you are our current vendor for shipping supplies?

Caller: Yes.

Me: Is this regarding a current order?

Caller: You have ten current orders.

[Up to that point I had been giving him the benefit of the doubt and feeling bad about hanging up on him. But TEN OUTSTANDING ORDERS? We have 12 employees and order shipping supplies once or twice a year. So, no.]

Me: I'm sorry. Can I get your address, please?

Caller: We have too many addresses to give you.

[Bwah?]

Me: I see. Can I get your name please?

Caller: Spencer.

Me: Hold on a moment, please.

[I call down to shipping to see if anyone there has dealt with these people. Nobody answered. Oh, well.]

Me: Hi, Spencer. Nobody is available right now. I'll be happy to pass along a message. I need your phone number please.

Caller: I'll just call back. Can you give me the name of the person in charge of shipping supplies?

Me: If you are our sales rep, wouldn't you know already?

Caller: I'm not a sales rep., I'm your customer service rep.

[Right. That's totally different.]

Me: Terrific. So what is this call regarding?

Caller: Look I just need the name of the contact person so I can send a catalog.

Me: You can just send it to the company, we're pretty small and keep those things in a central location.

Caller: I can't do that. I need a name.

Me: Oh.

Caller:...

Me:...

Caller: I'll just call back.

Me: OK.

<click>

As soon as I hung up, I asked our accoutant who our shipping supply vendor was. Big suprise, it was someone else and we had never ordered a thing from Sucky Supplies.

So I emailed everyone and let them know if someone from Sucky Supplies asks for the name of the person in charge of shipping supplies, they are not to tell them under any circumstances. Or, if they got tired of arguing, they can give my name (because that would be funny) or give them the name of Eugene's dog who comes in on occasion (which would also be funny).

[Gerrinson]

Yeah, we get this quite a bit. Normally about ink cartridges, though.

Unfortunately they get often get the front desk, who puts them through to my phone. I only say this is unfortunate because the desk gives them my name and direct dial number so they keep calling back to my phone after that.

While I enjoy dashing their hopes of making a sale , I do have other things I need to get done in the day.

[powerboy]

I had that one. Someone called and asked for the owner by name. When I told him that he was not there (which he wasn't). I asked who is calling so I could take a message. He told me that he was one of his friends. I asked him for his name and phone number. He asked me if I could give him the owners cell number. I just simply told him that I am not able to give that info out. and then hung up.

[Kiwi]

At the shipping company I was the ONLY person in charge of ordering supplies (so the stationary people literally kissed my arse as I was in charge of their biggest account by half) When they visited the regional manager, sales rep and my peronal account manager all called by and usually with a "gift" when it was convient for me. They hung on my everyword.... it was sickening really but my point is they knew me personally VERY well. Simon the account manager came by every single week to personally check everything was fine.

One day the other lady in office support was on the phone when I walked back to our desk and she looked confused. She put the caller on hold and asked if she could transfer it to me as it was about stationary. I got a guy on the phone who was NOT Simon and who wouldnt confirm his company he just wanted a "yes or no" about my next order.

I ordered my supplies online and Simon called only AFTER I had submitted it to check it with me. I hadnt ordered anything that day or the next (we had same day delivery until noon then next morning) and asked for the order number.... ours were formatted (DATE/OM_MSK) so the date ordered, there company -my company

this guys order number was nothing like that and I knew something was up. I put him on mute and ask my coworker what he had said to her, she told me he had a $3000 order waiting for confirmation but she couldnt remember if it was order day or not. I ordered photocopy paper (25 printer/copiers in the office) toner/kitchen supplies on 1 day and all other supplies two days later every single week, it was the same days. It was not an order day.

It turned out that he was a new company who had put together a "sample" package of office supplies, thats what my order was, he wanted me to buy a start up kit for an office. It took me well over 10 minutes to get rid of him, ending with me reading out his phone number over the phone and threatening to report him to the police. The same worker almost got caught when yet ANOTHER supply company simply emailed her an invoice

stating that the goods would be shipped when the invoice was paid!!!! It came back from the finance department with a question mark on it and she asked me "when did you order this" I was like.... WTF!!!!! I didnt, Ive never even heard of that company. It was a total scam!

[Crosshair]

I had that one. Someone called and asked for the owner by name. When I told him that he was not there (which he wasn't). I asked who is calling so I could take a message. He told me that he was one of his friends. I asked him for his name and phone number. He asked me if I could give him the owners cell number. I just simply told him that I am not able to give that info out. and then hung up.

Wait, if the caller REALLY was a friend of the owner, they would have his cell number already. I don't think they thought their cunning plan all the way through.

[PepperElf]

that's what i was thinking.... "If you're his friend, why didn't he give you the cell info?" .... scammer!!!!

[protege]

I've been getting quite a few of the "printer supply" idiots as of late. At least they're starting to get creative.

This last one, started his spiel by telling me that he needed my address to send me a new manual for our Canon copier. (At least they got the brand name right.) However, he didn't have our address, nor our model number. When he asked for that, I replied with "well, I can just download those from the web."

Not to worry, he then tried to insist that a "printed copy" would be better. Uh, did he think that the copy I was going to download would somehow be projected on the wall?

About that time, he started going on about how his company (which I'd never heard of) was handling all of our supplies. Of course I countered with "I find that hard to believe, since we didn't buy the machine through you...nor do we get supplies from you."

Right about that point...he was speechless

Sorry asshole, I do this for a living. It's my *job* to thwart idiots like yourself. Not only do I have an *extremely* sensitive bullshit meter, but I'm damn good at it...and it brings great joy to my day to shoot you down

[Ghel]

I get calls like this all the time, too.

My favorite one was about 2 years ago, right after we received our new copier (which we lease). I got a cold call from a woman who claimed to be calling from the company who provides our photocopier (without naming the company), and then proceded to ask what model copier we had. I glanced around the lobby to make sure that there were no customers around, then told her "you're full of shit." She hung up. Go fig.

[JLRodgers]

I don't know whether I should feel left out or not! I'm the owner of my business, have actually ordered print jobs from places before, but I don't think I've ever received one of these calls....

Maybe they figure I'm too small -- or they just have no idea how to pronounce the company name so it gets left out, or they think my company name is a "spam" name, so it's tossed out of their lists. My company name violates a "rule" about the letter q (there's no "u" in my company name).

[Rapscallion]

I just get the ones who think that by phoning up cold calling they can speak to the managing director. Laughed in the ear of one today, especially as we don't have one. As a worker-owned cooperative, I often wonder aloud to them as to whose turn it is that day.

Right, the managing director of a firm is going to take any and every call that comes in? Not bloody likely.

Rapscallion

[lordlundar]

The best ones are when they try to contact an IT professional.

Why? Well this is a simple case of (poor) attempts at social engineering, a fairly common hacking attempt. As such, one of the most repeated training for IT pros is how to thwart these attempts. And the ones that they are trained to thwart are a hell of a lot more skilled than these.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

My husband ran his own graphic/web design /application writing business out of our house for a couple years sometime back. So sometimes the same variety of asshole would call the house.

While I was there.

To their sorrow.

First of all, peckerheads, if you call up and ask to speak to the guy in charge of ordering, or the office manager, or what have you, we will pretty much know instantly that you've never called before. Because if you had, you'd know you were dealing with a single dude working out of his spare room. So lying about it will only serve to alert us to the fact that you are a dishonest liar.

Secondly, if I answer the phone, do not assume that I am Mr. Kinkoid's secretary. And for the love of God, don't assume it's okay to treat me like a serf.

Because you know who has the last say in who Mr. Kinkoid does business with as far as that goes? Me. If I say "this lying dorkfish on the phone just gave me a bunch of attitude and now I'm pissed" to Mr. Kinkoid, I can pretty much guaran-damn-tee that he will not be doing business with you.

I am boinking Mr. Kinkoid. That makes me The Boss.

[edible_hat]

We often get "Can I speak to the owner of the business?"

One time the owner pretended he wasn't there and took a message (for himself), it was about an overdue account at an office supplies wholesaler.
We get all our stuff from the wholesale coffee, canned goods and office supply store down the road (they also do weddings. Seriously, their office manager is a registered celebrant) so we knew it was a scam.

So now when he happens to answer when they call, it goes:

"Can I speak to the owner of the business?"
"No."

And if someone else answers the phone, we tell them to call back later.

[Stormraven]

I used to (for about 9 months, as I recall) work for Business to Business telemarketing. I hated it, because we weren't allowed to take someone off the list unless the person we were trying to get told us to - receptionists and gatekeepers didn't count.

The one thing, as far as I was concerned, that put it a tad above the usual cold calling was that the company at least ostensibly got the numbers legitimately. As in, the companies we called for usually provided them, from lists compiled at Trade shows and the like, of people who expressed an interest.

Oh, and we never lied (or at least, we weren't told to, and I recall specifically being trained not to.) Evasion of the gatekeeper was one thing, outright lying another.

[csdrone]

As a gatekeeper, I have had 1 call since I started. It was a toner scam maybe a couple weeks into a brand new job. When the guy talked about our toner order, I got rid of him quickly by saying "let me check with the people who do our ordering and call you back. I can't authorize anything (I did find out later I am the one who orders stuff like this through our authorized vendor and am the only one other than my boss that can do so...). Our IT guys were amused at the scam though.