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Tips for Handling Telemarketers and Snail Mail Junk Mail - Have you ever tried any of these?

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Receive this in an email and thought I would pass it along for everyone who has ever been annoyed by telemarketer calls and junk mail.
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Tips for Handling Telemarketers and Snail Mail Junk Mail -

Three Little Words That Work!!

(1)The three little words are: 'Hold On, Please...'

Saying this, while putting down your phone and walking off (instead of hanging-up immediately) would make each telemarketing call so much more time-consuming that boiler room sales would grind to a halt.

Then when you eventually hear the phone company's 'beep-beep-beep' tone, you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset, which has efficiently completed its task.

These three little words will help eliminate telephone soliciting..

(2) Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end?

This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and records the time of day when a person answers the phone.

This technique is used to determine the best time of day for a 'real' sales person to call back and get someone at home.

What you can do after answering, if you notice there is no one there, is to immediately start hitting your # button on the phone, 6 or 7 times as quickly as possible. This confuses the machine that dialled the call, and it kicks your number out of their system. Gosh, what a shame not to have your name in their system any longer!!!

(3) Junk Mail Help:

When you get ads enclosed with your phone or utility bill, return these ads with your payment. Let the sending companies throw their own junk mail away.

When you get those 'pre-approved' letters in the mail for everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and similar type junk, do not throw away the return envelope.

Most of these come with postage-paid return envelopes, right? It costs them more than the regular postage, 'IF' and when they receive them back.

It costs them nothing if you throw them away! The postage was around 50 cents before the last increase and it is according to the weight. In that case, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in these cool little, postage-paid return envelopes.

One of Andy Rooney 's (60 minutes) ideas.

Send an ad for your local chimney cleaner to American Express. Send a pizza coupon to Citibank. If you didn't get anything else that day, then just send them their blank application back!

If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn't on anything you send them.

You can even send the envelope back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing! It still costs them 60 cents.

The banks and credit card companies are currently getting a lot of their own junk back in the mail, but folks, we need to OVERWHELM them. Let's let them know what it's like to get lots of junk mail, and best of all they're paying for it...Twice!

Let's help keep our postal service busy since they are saying that e-mail is cutting into their business profits, and that's why they need to increase postage costs again . You get the idea!

If enough people follow these tips, it will work I have been doing this for years, and I get very little junk mail anymore.

THIS JUST MIGHT BE ONE E-MAIL THAT YOU WILL WANT TO FORWARD TO YOUR FRIENDS
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  • hari 2012/03/06 11:12:58
    This is the one that I have used.
    hari
    +1
    Ohhhhhhhh ........... BUSY .......... WOULD U MIND CONTACTING ME ON 25 OF NEXT MONTH ??????????
  • ~ The Button ~ 2012/03/06 04:59:20
    This is what I do.
    ~ The Button ~
    +1
    i've told them i'm dead
    i've tried selling them life insurance (although i'm not an insurance salesman)
    i've asked for their name and home number, surprisingly two gave it to me so i registered them with various 'organizations' across the web
    i pulled all kinds of pranks on them
  • Prairie Wind 2011/10/03 01:18:48
    This is the one that I have used.
    Prairie Wind
    +2
    Offer for immediate cash sale, my neighbor's rusted pickup with no engine or wheels at a cheap price of $49,000 they can make in one cash payment, only today, otherwise the price goes up!
  • Wanda52... Prairie... 2011/10/04 18:03:07
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    +1
    lol - good one.
  • Lynn 2011/09/29 04:58:28
    This is the one that I have used.
    Lynn
    +1
    I never answer the phone if I dont recognized the number, especially around meal time.

    If I do inadvertently pick up before I check for rule #1, I tersly inform any one that I can talk to that the number that they have reached is on the national 'do not call' registry and inform them that I WILL be reporting the violation and demand that they remove my number from any list they have.

    I will start using that prepaid envolope trick! Ha! I love sticking it to unsolicited advertizers.
  • Wanda52... Lynn 2011/09/29 14:34:56
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    I am on the Do Not Call list as well; but I have heard that if you apply for anything and put your phone number down that you are taking of the list - I don't know if this is true or not.

    I plan on using the junk mail trick as well.
  • ILuvMonkeys 2011/09/29 01:17:14
  • Wanda52... ILuvMon... 2011/09/29 14:35:48
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    +1
    You're welcome.
  • seadog6608PWCM 2011/09/28 23:52:47
  • Wanda52... seadog6... 2011/09/29 14:36:51
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    +1
    I hope it does as well.
  • LVslotdoc 2011/09/28 22:45:07
    This is what I do.
    LVslotdoc
    +2
    I'm not sure. I've always thrown most of this stuff away. Are there really those who dig through our garbage to retrieve even these? HONESTLY, I shred everything else that comes with it.
  • Wanda52... LVslotdoc 2011/09/29 14:39:07
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    Yes, you have people who will go through your garbage looking for any way to steal your identity. Why not have a little fun with all the junk mailers out there?
  • Anna E 2011/09/28 20:40:04
    This is what I do.
    Anna E
    +3
    On the rare occasion I actually pick up the phone when it rings and there's a scammer on the other end, I usually just hangup. Otherwise the answering machine gets it. Hubby's the same way. Our phones are for OUR convenience, not everyone else's convenience.
    We've been sending junk mail back in the prepaid envelopes for years. The ones that aren't addressed to us go back into the mail boxes. Let the PO deal with them.
  • Tudie BN Anna E 2011/09/28 22:22:16
    Tudie BN
    +5
    I know a guy when he pays his electric bill he puts all those circulars back in with his payment & mails them all right back to them !!
  • Anna E Tudie BN 2011/09/29 00:33:10
    Anna E
    +3
    Good idea. :)
  • Wanda52... Tudie BN 2011/09/29 14:41:38
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    +1
    Good idea!
  • Wanda52... Anna E 2011/09/29 14:40:24
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    +2
    Good for you.
  • Icono1 2011/09/28 20:18:27
    This is the one that I have used.
    Icono1
    +4
    Nice ideas.
  • Wanda52... Icono1 2011/09/28 20:27:35
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    +3
    I thought so too.
  • Chukroast 2011/09/28 20:07:01
    This is the one that I have used.
    Chukroast
    +3
    That's the great thing about caller ID: If we don't recognize the caller and/or it's out of our area code, we let it go to voice mail. If it's something that's important, the caller will leave a message. If not, the telemarketer gets the idea.
  • Wanda52... Chukroast 2011/09/28 20:26:57
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    +1
    Same here.
  • SK-LIBERTY OVER EQUALITY 2011/09/28 19:52:08
    This is the one that I have used.
    SK-LIBERTY OVER EQUALITY
    +4
    since i've only had a cell phone i don't get those pesky calls- very much. If i do those calls show up on my speed dial as "unavailable" so i just ignore the call.
    I do most of my bill pays online so i don't get much snail mail. The junk mail i usually get is just advertisement fliers that the EPA should be cracking down on because it all ends up in the recycle trash can by the mailboxes.

    But if i do get anything i will surely practice these principles.
  • Wanda52... SK-LIBE... 2011/09/28 20:26:25
    Wanda5245 - Citizen Activist Who Wants Spunkysmum Back On SH
    +2
    We use the Caller ID and answering machine to screen calls as well.

    We get a ton of junk mail and I plan on using some of these ideas as well.

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2013/05/24 18:01:06

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