Last Thursday (11/16/23) against the Las Vegas oddsmakers, I managed to keep two call center employees on the phone for ten solid minutes. I know, sounds impossible, especially when the person they're talking to is purposely being stupid, but it's true and I have witnesses to boot.
The scam in question was free Internet and phone, for the low, low fee of my SS#. It took me about fifteen seconds to figure that out, since the guy started rapid firing all kinds of legit govt programs that would allow you to actually get these items for little-to-no cost. So, once I had the required info, off I went to the greyhound races. Now in order to make this seem funny for you, please picture me speaking in an ambiguous voice that could pass for either a drunk old lady or drunk old man.
Also keep in mind that I was expecting this call to be terminated with extreme prejudice by them because I was expecting them to have some basic computer smarts to go with the fact that they had my phone # in front of them, but thankfully for me, they didn't.
Them: asking for all kinds of personal info, starting with my home address.
Me: 231 Capitol Avenue Hartford CT, 06106 (CT State Library and CT State Supreme Court).
Now I should note that the guy stepped away from the phone to check with somebody after I had given the street address, the city/state and the zip.
Then: asking for my name.
Me: Ned Lamont (governor of CT)
Now at this point, I figured that the guy would immediately understand that I was giving a fake name, but no. Thus the call continued.
Them: asking for a date of birth.
Me: March 3, 1955 (I had picked this date because I took a wild shot about our governor's age. Turns out I had the correct year, but not the month, as our governor is 68).
Here's where things went incredibly diagonal and impossibly stupid.
Them: asks for the last four digits of my social.
Me: "Why?" and "Why do you need it?"
Them: spends the next couple of minutes trying to explain to me why they need it and me sounding like a broken record. Eventually, steps away from the phone and because I hear actual silence instead of other people talking in the background, I say, "Gotcha!"
But no, the guy returns with his supervisor, who patiently tries to explain, multiple times, the reasoning why he needed my social and me acting like douchebag. Finally I come down an octave and start talking in my normal voice.
Me: Do you have Google on your computer? (I figure everyone, no matter the OS, has access to Google)
Them: Yes.
Me: Google my name (Ned Lamont) and tell me what you find.
I spent the next minute trying to get him to Google my name and him either not doing it or saying he did but it didn't have required info (aka social) on the page in question.
At this point, I'm done browbeating this yokel, so I cheerfully state the following: Tell you what, I'll Google my own name and I'll tell you what I've found. I say each letter of the governor's name and when it lands on the appropriate page, I say, "Ned Lamont, Governor of Connecticut."
Only then does he get the point and finally hangs up on me. The entire call lasted almost ten minutes and they succeeded in acquiring absolutely no useful information from me whatsoever.
When I finally came upstairs to run a few afternoon errands, the family asked me why I was on the phone for son long (my den is directly below the living room, so you can hear almost everything), so I patiently explained the entire phone call to them. They couldn't believe how dense the call center employees were.
Suffice to say, the phone calls were very few and far between for the rest of the day, which was a welcome respite, as they started back up bright and early the next day.
Believe it or not, I really do enjoy my interactions with those pesky call centers, but topics of choice are getting so stale that it's becoming not worth my time and effort to go through the robo intro in order to talk to a human being.
Thank you for spending a couple of minutes reading my tale of improvisation. I will try to do better with my next one, which is what I often tell those who try to waste my time with their pitches.👀
Everybody needs a hobby in retirement, and clearly you've found yours!
ReplyDeleteIt keeps me occupied, although after switching tactics yet again (answering the phone like Sherman from "Fractured Fairy Tales"), the calls are starting to drop off.
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