Is there anything more annoying than telemarketers who seem to have the uncanny ability to call at the most inconvenient times? It is no wonder that the Do Not Call registry in the US has become so popular and the Canadian list is slated to become operational in late 2008. But political parties, print media, charities, companies with which we deal already and survey companies are exempt from the proposed do-not-call registry. Most of the calls we get are for surveys, newspaper subscriptions and our bank anyway, which makes me wonder about the point of the registry.
Michael Geist, a professor at the University of Ottawa, has launched a website to complement the federal registry. Opting out of calls from many of the exempt organizations is very easy through the iOptOut website: register up to three phone numbers, select the organizations which you don’t want to hear from and a do-not-call request is sent to all the selected organizations. When an organization receives a request, they are obliged under current privacy laws to respect it.
I’ve registered all our phones through the iOptOut registry and will also do so when the federal registry goes live. If we still keep getting telemarketing calls from foreign countries, I might end up buying the TeleZapper, which I hear is pretty good at zapping telemarketing calls.
[Update: Thanks to George for pointing out that the Canadian Marketing Association also operates a Do Not Contact service. Click here to register for the CMA website.]
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14 responses so far ↓
1 WhereDoesAllMyMoneyGo // Apr 8, 2008 at 8:43 pm
If that wasn’t good enough - it’s free.
2 George // Apr 8, 2008 at 9:38 pm
The Canadian Marketing Association (www.the-cma.org) also operates a do-not-contact list. It only works for companies that are members of the CMA, but that covers a pretty large swath of the corporate world in Canada.
The CMA do-not-contact registry does seem to work - I rarely get any junk mail (other than the unaddressed stuff that goes to every home) or telemarketing calls.
3 What direction will my blog take? Goals and missions… « Random Things from David McKenna // Apr 8, 2008 at 10:23 pm
[...] as well as some blogs like Canadian Dream: Free at 45, which I think is incredible, as well as Canadian Capitalist, which is pretty good as [...]
4 Robillard // Apr 9, 2008 at 12:45 am
If I do recall, telemarketers are barred from calling mobile phone numbers unless the recipient has given the caller permission to be contacted on their mobile. I haven’t been called by charities or non-mobile-phone-company-affiliated surveyors since I gave up my land line years ago.
5 Frog of Finance // Apr 9, 2008 at 8:57 am
The worst of them are automated systems. Your phone rings, you answer, and you get a recorded message telling you to wait until an agent can talk to you. The gal of these people!!!
6 Traciatim // Apr 9, 2008 at 9:38 am
The problem with Telemarketers is that people buy from them. If people didn’t, it wouldn’t happen.
What we need is a national TV, Radio, Print, and online campaign (I’m sure they would be on board, since they rely on advertising revenue) to get every single person to never buy anything from a telemarketer again. Very suddenly the problem would be solved and you’d have just charities and pre-established relationships calling.
For charities we can get everyone to donate money to their favorite cause, and if any charity calls use the line: “I’ve already givin to this ”
Sheblam, telemarketing solved.
7 Traciatim // Apr 9, 2008 at 9:39 am
Hmmm, looks like my quote got mangled by the text parser, the last line should have been:
If any charity calls use the line: “I’ve already given to [my charity of choice] this [week/month/year]“
8 Novice // Apr 9, 2008 at 10:02 am
One of the most unpublicized features of the voip phone service I use (Primus TalkBroadband) is their online concierge service, where I can choose how calls from phone numbers are handled. For instance, for telemarketers I choose to either set them up as “virtual ring” where if they call my phone doesn’t actually ring once, but on their end it rings forever, or “call block” where they hear a message something like “this number is not in service”. It doesn’t work on callers that don’t have caller id, but that’s a surprisngly small number. One of the nice features is that it offers the reverse function too - if I’m expecting a phone call from say my mom, I can set it up to forward calls from that number (and that number alone) to go to my cell phone directly if I’m out. And this is all done though a nice web interface. One downside is that it does let the first call through, though caller ID usually helps me identify it before I answer.
9 Canadian Capitalist // Apr 9, 2008 at 10:10 am
George: Thanks for the information on the CMA. I’ve updated the post with that info.
Traciatim: You’re right that if people never buy anything through telemarketing calls, they will just go away. The reality though is they do. I have been guilty of this as well and have switched from a weekend subscription to a ‘limited time’ daily subscription for the same charge. I guess we are all suckers for “free” offers.
Novice: We don’t have a VoIP phone. Perhaps, it is time to shop for one. So far, I haven’t bothered because it is slightly more expensive than our current basic home phone.
10 TBB PM // Apr 9, 2008 at 11:31 am
Canadian Capitalist,
I do work for Primus and cannot imagine how traditional phone can be less expensive than VOIP. Perhaps you have been looking at commercial pricing.
We also offer a traditional home service that has Telemarketing Guard includied at no charge (identifies suspected telemarketers based on call patterns and customers reporting telemarketing calls). VoIP feature described above by Novice will be available on our traditional home phone service very soon.
11 Scott // Apr 9, 2008 at 12:39 pm
Thanks for the info! Another one you may wish to include - http://www.reddotcampaign.ca. It applies to unaddressed junk mail from Canada Post.
12 Albin Forone // Apr 9, 2008 at 2:19 pm
We will certainly subscribe to the mandatory, comprehensive federal service when it’s implemented but don’t get enough calls to warrant ad hoc sign ups. Mainly we get “courtesy” calls from vendors like banks, insurance, etc. we do business with who have some “offer” they don’t want us to miss - many customers don’t realize that most large Canadian corporations maintain their own preference lists and the callers will politely record a request to never have that company call again: “Do you have a do not call list - put me on it.” It works.
13 Jon D. // Apr 9, 2008 at 7:03 pm
Many predictive dialers used by telemarketers ignore the SIT tone that Zappers use, or people add to their voicemail message. Also, many telemarketers are, as mentioned in the article, U.S./overseas with simple recorded messages making most actions futile. Cutting your landline is probably going to be next solution, but odd numbers on my mobile have increased too…..
14 Riscario Insider // Apr 17, 2008 at 12:48 am
There’s no law or obligation to answer the telephone every time it rings — especially if you’re having dinner. Call display will helps identify who’s at the other end. If the call is important, the caller will leave voicemail (which you may be able to hear with call screening).
We have a Telemarketing Guard through Costco/Wintel. After two rings, most telemarketing calls cease.
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