I get a lot of calls. I log some things but when I give a straight “no” I don’t bother. So maybe this lady called previously, can’t be sure. Regardless, she called and starts off belligerent right away.

Lady: “You said you’d be here on Saturday and didn’t show up.”

Me: “I think you’ve got the wrong number. I’m not exactly sure who you are, sorry.”

Lady gives her name.

Me: “I’m not familiar with you. Is there something I can do for you?”

Lady goes a little bananas telling me I better get there now and mow her lawn.

Me: “I’m pretty sure you’ve got the wrong number.”

Lady: "I TALKED TO YOU LAST WEEK AND YOU SAID YOU’D BE HERE ON SATURDAY TO MOW MY LAWN!!!”

Me: “Now I know you’ve got the wrong person.”

Lady: “THEN WHO DID I TALK TO THERE?”

Me: “Ma’am, you called someone else.”

Lady: “DON’T TELL ME I DIDN’T TALK SOMEONE THERE!!!”

By this time I had enough and had to go into deescalation mode.

Me: “ma’am, I’m the only person that works here, if you called this number, I answered. I’m a Sabbath keeper so I don’t schedule work on Saturday and finally I fertilize lawns and don’t offer mowing. Can I give you an estimate for fertilizing?”

Lady: finally quiets down, pauses and processes. “Well, who did I call then?”

Me: “I surely don’t know. Are we done here?”

Lady hangs up.

{shrug}

This is probably the fifth or sixth time that someone has told me that I promised them something when I’ve never heard of them. I hope I’m not getting undeserved bad reviews.

What is it with people not remembering who they dealt with and just picking someone to berate?

Do you have a popular phone number?? Like BR 549 or something similar.

Some folks have serious memory issues as well.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
Do you have a popular phone number?? Like BR 549 or something similar.

Some folks have serious memory issues as well.

No popular number and a rather rare last name that is the business name.

Well it is Pennsylvania. Just have the phone number ready of a competitor you do not like. Tell the caller it must be so and so.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
Well it is Pennsylvania.

Lawd, you ain’t kidding.

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
Just have the phone number ready of a competitor you do not like. Tell the caller it must be so and so.

Oh, that’s an excellent idea.

Years ago I had a number that was very close to the number of a popular pizza place in my town.

I got phone calls all the time for pizza and I told them what the correct number was if they were reasonable. If they weren't and told me they knew they'd called the right number, then I took their order and told them if the pizza wasn't delivered within a half hour, it would be free.

About two weeks later the pizza joint changed its number.

^^^ I used to get calls for the Chinese place in town. I always just told them “ten minutes” and disconnected.

quote:

Originally posted by Flash-LB:
Years ago I had a number that was very close to the number of a popular pizza place in my town.

I got phone calls all the time for pizza and I told them what the correct number was if they were reasonable. If they weren't and told me they knew they'd called the right number, then I took their order and told them if the pizza wasn't delivered within a half hour, it would be free.

About two weeks later the pizza joint changed its number.

Early 70’s I worked at a car dealership and our direct line to the parts department was close to some carry out barbecue place in the city.

Anyhow, Monday was our late night and if it was slow we used to rotate early outs. We were short staffed this particular night so I was stuck there.

Around 8:30 that night a call came in on the line, after 6 it usually never rang. Guy called up wanting two orders of ribs. I tried to tell him wrong number but he just started talking over me, sounded intoxicated. So I let him go on, took his address and told him the order would be there around 9.

Wonder if he’s still waiting?

We had a phone number 1 digit different from the local Toys R Us. I used to get a lot of calls regarding if certain toys were in stock. “Hold on, let me go check. Yes, we have it.”

Self-absorption.

Such people are "right" in their head, and there's little one can do about it, except politely reply with your "de-escalation" bit from the very get go.

I recently got a similar non-customer call. This jerk called and explained he had purchased a silencer at another shop, and he had a question about it. I asked him if he had ever even come to my store. He said no, but the other store was "real busy" and he knew I could help him. I asked him, basically, "What's in it for me?" as he stammered and stuttered. Then I hung up.

Perhaps she had already called the wrong number, they pretended to be you, and accepted the Saturday mowing appointment.

For my voice mail I state my name and the number and still get long messages.
Or a 3 minute message in Spanish.

Some I do call back or answer and inform them that the number they called is the wrong one if they are blowing up my phone.
Odd how some keep asking if I know the person, it's as if they can't grasp that they called the wrong number.

I used to get a lot of telemarketers and I would tell them I was very interested but they called my business number and asked if they would call my private line.

I have them the main switchboard number to the Pentagon for awhile, then switched to a number I think was the NSA.

For years we kept getting calls looking for a woman who we didn’t know. No matter how many times I tried to explain to them that there was no one here by that name and never had been, it did no good. They kept calling. No matter how calmly I tried to explain to them they had the wrong #, no joy. I even did the thing of tell them to hold on a second and putting the phone down until they hung up. Nothing worked.

The only thing that stopped the harassing calls was when we finally disconnected our home phone.

This was obviously some kind of bill collector and the woman had given them a phone # which just turned out to be ours. If you get in their database, they are relentless.

+

When I was growing up, there was a family in Dayton that had the same last name as mine. We would get many calls for this family and rather than tell them they had the wrong number, my old man would engage them in conversation. This went on for years to the point where my father knew all the details of the lives of the other family and could talk with all of them at length.
The old man thought this was hilarious and couldnt wait to talk to them. My mother was not amused. She thought the other famlily would track us down and kill us all.

We just had one of those on Friday. Crazy. I can't figure out what appraisal company they think they've called, but it isn't us. Crazy how upset people get when they've made the mistake.

Our first business line we had back when we started this company was apparently an old fax number for a medical insurance company. Like clockwork starting at midnight we'd get nonstop calls from fax machines for several hours. It took a while to figure it out and get it fixed. I really despise telecom companies.

I had a telephone number that was one digit off a "gypsy cab" company that served the Bedford-Stuyvesant area in Brooklyn. Around closing time for bars especially on Friday and Saturday nights, I would get calls asking for a cab. My reply was always "ten minutes," and I hung up.

Worse than that was when I lived in the Chicago area. Illinois Bell had an advertised "Talk To Santa" number that was close to my number, so for a month or so before Christmas I had a constant barrage of calls from little kids, wanting to talk to Santa. Since this was a phone company problem, I sought a phone company solution. Illinois Bell agreed, after threat of lawsuit, to have all calls to my number re-directed to an intercept operator during the pre-Christmas season. The intercept operator would determine whether it was a call for me or for Santa, and put the call through to whichever number was really wanted.

In todays world all these folks that tell you how to market and advertise really are pushing in the wrong direction.
Why do I say this? I think your real problem is you are advertising too much... if you've been in business for at least 10 years then you should not need to advertise.... all your work should come from previous customer or their referrals to you.

We have a number where I work that is one dyslexic mistake away from the number to call to move your cable service to a new address. Luckily, it wasn’t our main number, just one of a big block we could use for direct-dial. I’ve got that one sent to an auto-attendant named ‘Time Warner Black Hole’. It is a message telling people they typed the number in wrong and then it hangs up. Not sure what I would have done if we actually needed that number.

- Bret