You know how it goes – some annoying gobshite rings you to try and convince you to switch your broadband company or something, and they always start with the line ‘we are recording this conversation for training purposes’, or some such utter claptrap.
First off, you don’t have to keep being pestered by these eejits. Get in contact with your telephone service provider and tell them you don’t want any more unsolicited calls. Go ahead! Do it now! It will really piss them off and save you hours of irritating conversations with people trying to get their hands on your money. Once you call Eircom, BT, Vodafone or whoever, according to Data Protection legislation your name and number will be marked as ‘opted out’ on the National Directory Database and it will be illegal for the feckers to ring you. For some unfathomable reason, this takes them a month to achieve. How in shite’s name can it take a month to tap a few keys on a computer?
Anyway, while you’re waiting for the sleeveens to opt you out, you will probably still be pestered. Which brings us to the annoying matter of recording your conversations. Unfortunately, because our legislators are as useless as a carpet-fitter’s ladder it is perfectly legal for a company to record a conversation with only one party’s consent. However, that doesn’t mean you have to agree to it. So the next time some irritating sales gobdaw rings you and starts with the line ‘I’m obliged to tell you that this conversation is being recorded for training purposes’, tell him/her that you object to being recorded. This will totally bamboozle the poor eejit who will then start to splutter and stammer and say it is out of his or her control, at which point you tell him/her that that’s their problem and hang up.
A fun alternative is to inform the guy that, if they are recording you, you are also making your own recording. This invariably causes consternation – the poor sales pest suddenly feels like his/her privacy is being violated, or that there is some sinister motive behind your behaviour and they will often object or become completely flustered, at which point you, chuckling to yourself, can refuse to continue the conversation unless they give you permission to record the call, or hang up.
As regards calls from abroad, particularly the ones claiming to be calling from ‘the Microsoft computer department’, two sharply delivered words will bring the conversation to an abrupt end. One starts with ‘f’ and ends with ‘k’ and the other is ‘off’.
Honestly, there are no ends of fun you can have annoying the annoying phone marketers!
