I have been of late subject to robotic calls of a different sort.
My business line is a land line. There is a tiny little screen that — most of the time — tells me origination of the call. Typically, it’s “cell phone” or “local” or “out of area” or even, sometimes, an authentic name associated with the call.
Lately, though, for the past week or so, the little screen tells me the call is originating from more specific places in the United States than I care to mention; like, for instance, “Warwick, RI”; “Fargo, ND”; or, today, “Pine Valley, CA”. That last one snookered me. It’s close. So I picked it up and I went through my spiel: “Good morning,…” Thing is, I have to stop what I physically do for a living, walk to the telephone, and physically attend to it. Big goddamned interruption.
This has been going on 5-6 times a day, every day, for the last two weeks or so. If I absently-minded pick it up and go through my spiel, I am met with just a series of clicks, and nobody there. If I notice the telltale little screen, I’ve come to let it ring to no avail. Problem is, the telephone is connected to a bodacious buzzer, so I can hear it above the din of my work.
Some kind of war dialing program, I guess. Meant to find out what is an active line and what is not, for marketing purposes.
My question is, who among you is willing to admit in public that you had anything to do with programming such a thing?
Not that I would come to your door, if I found out, to wring your flucking neck.