I'm just saying -- not on my phone you don't

So I get a phone call.  "May I talk to [name]"
I screen the call.
Always screen your calls.  There are always scams going around.  For a long time I got hit 3-4 times a day with the fake computer support call scam.
"Who's calling please?"
"Mr. X."
Stop.
I wait for a business name or something.
I get nothing.
So I DK'd him and hung up.
Look.  If you're calling my phone and you play cute about who you are and why you're calling, you're going to get hung up on.
I don't owe it to you to play 20 questions.
So state your business, I'll tell you I'm not interested,
and you can go on to annoy somebody who isn't tuff enuff to hang up on you.
Once I did get a call claiming to come from a company I do business with and the caller asked first for my credit card number.
DANGER, WILL ROBINSON, DANGER, that's a scam clue.
So I pretended I had to leave for an appointment and asked for a phone number to call back on.
Then I called a different phone number that I had for the company and checked things out.
It turned out to be legit and everything got settled pretty quickly.
But I told the company that their representative's approach was classic for scammers and they shouldn't be using it.

Just because somebody calls you doesn't mean you owe it to them to pick up the phone.
Don't do it, especially if you're driving and the call comes in on your mobile phone.
Screen the call with Caller ID.  Don't recognize it?
Check it out on the 800notes.com web site for free.  It may be a known scammer.
But don't assume that just because somebody called you, you owe them time or information.
Save that for people you know and do business with.  And maybe even like.

I'm just saying...

© Patricia Heil, 2013-2018 All Rights Reserved