Marketers Use Trickery To Evade No-Call Lists

Wall Street Journal ^ | 27 October 2007 | JENNIFER LEVITZ and KELLY GREENE

[shrinkermd]

Mailings Fool Seniors Into Accepting Pitches; States Launch Charges

Older Americans around the country are getting duped by a seemingly innocuous tactic that can expose them to hard-sell pitches from the insurance industry.

The technique is centered on a marketing tool called the lead card, and it became popular after the federal government created its Do Not Call Registry in 2003 to shield consumers from unwanted solicitors. Sent through the mail, the lead card invites the recipient to mail off an enclosed reply for free information about, say, estate planning.

"It's a huge loophole," says Pam Dixon, executive director of the World Privacy Forum, a San Diego nonprofit researcher of privacy issues including commercial use of personal information.

The technique is prompting legal action from states across the country. Because the loophole itself violates no law in most states, prosecutors are focusing their cases on other lead-card deceptions. The cards often falsely imply an affiliation with the federal government or with advocacy groups such as AARP, for instance. Many of the cards also fail to mention that replies will be turned over to insurance salespeople.

[kitkat]

I’ve had a few sales calls lately that you can’t hang up on. When you do hang up, wait a bit and assume the line has cleared, the incoming sales call is still there. And it happens a second and third time. If you needed your phone at that moment to call an ambulance, you wouldn’t be able to get it.

[Brilliant]

I still get these calls regularly even though I’m on the no call list.

I also get about 3 or 4 calls a week from bill collectors for people with my last name, even though there is no one in my house who has the first name. Congress needs to ban those calls next, I feel.

[Abathar]

This is local, I live in a small town and they do that for things like 4th of July fireworks donations, Coats for Kids, Habitat for Humanity, or if some other local crisis hits and they are raising money for local support.

The best time is when the local high school cheerleaders are standing there asking with their cute little smiles for money to go to cheer camp or some distant finals competition. Funny how many cars seem to stop for them compared to the other solicitors....

[Dustbunny]

Yes, we have Verizon. I will have to check that service out. Thanks.

[sourcery]

Check out Grand Central (a free service from Google.)

[gondramB]

If somebody signs up for “free” estate planning and then they get solicited that’s pretty much the way the real world works - if you give someone permission to solicit they usually solicit.

[Landru]

Just in case the "Unknown" call(s) become too annoying in spite of Caller ID, try this: http://www.whocalled.us/

Goes nicely w/ called ID.

...like a hand in glove.

[Larry Lucido]

I get the calls all the time from the FOP

I was a member of the FOP for several years (not by choice) and when they would call I would say I don't appreciate my own organization working against me on gun rights or supporting Bill Clinton for president.

Now I tell the American Bar Association the same thing when they call.

[skinkinthegrass]

Thanks.... :)

[bikerman]

I save all the self address stamped envelopes they send then fill them with each others junk mail and mail them back.Just remove your information such as address etc first, been doing this for years lots of fun,run out of things? cut up newspaper and stuff that into them nice and heavy.

[szweig]

I make certain to get the org.’s name right. Then I tell ‘em to send me a letter, First Class Mail, and I will send them money (assuming it’s a worthy org.) Then I tell them in no uncertain terms that if I EVER get another phone call from them they will have seen my last dime. I then hang up — hard!

[Clinging Bitterly]

...cell phone, which I can answer with total confidence because no business ever gets that one.

Maybe it's the cell phone company, because my experience has been different. A few months ago I dropped the home phone in favor of cell phones for myself and the wife. From day one my phone (but not the wife's) got recorded calls from SCG Mortgage, and also someone from the "County Records Department" hawking refi loans.

And maybe that's because of my present LTV, since I only have the original first on the house and it's almost paid off.

I have been meaning to put it on the do not call list for a long time, and this thread prompted me to do just that.

[Dominnae]

I get the calls all the time from the FOP, I can't believe how rude some of them

Exactly.

When they call me I tell them that I donate to my local PBA directly. (Which I do).

When I worked PD, there was some huge scandal where a service that made
the actual solicitations was called out for soaking the PD's they represented
for up to 80% of recieved donations.. Emergency agencies need that money for
training, vests and other expenses, that sometimes the state helps with, some
times they don't.. (like if some twit with an ipod on a bike bounces off someone's
fender .. you lose state/federal funds for "pedestrian safety" for that year.)

It is recording. They make it sound as if it is related to an existing credit card.

I get these too. "We have important information about your interest rate" :::click::

[maine-iac7]

I didn’t realize that there was anyone left who actually reads advertising stuff that comes in the mail

There's also a place we can register to opt out of junk mail -

http://www.catalogchoice.org/

I'm designing a new mail box. It's two ended -that is, also opens at the back. Underneath is a trash can. Take out private mail, push thru' junk mail.

That said; I once made my living selling advertising for a a newspaper...that has been around since 1829. I had the "milk route" = out of county. It had always been a 2 day job. Within 2 months, I had built it up to full time - plus a lot of hours unpaid overtime to get ads set up back when 'cut/paste' involved scissors and glue!

I was very good at it - but I came to the conclusion that advertising is one of the most insidious 'activities' in society. And over the years, the sheeple have been mesmerized into going shopping, not to get something they now need, but to see what's on sale, can't pass up a bargain.

My gramma used to say: "It ain't a bargain if you don't need it!"

I have saved myself a lot of money saying this in my head and putting items back on the shelf.

Another 'mantra' I use is one I devised for myself. I ask myself: "Do I need this or do I just want this?" That also saves a lot. (Not that I don't still come home with some 'wants.')

Advertisers also wield an unhealthy influence over the editorial heads...Many valid stories get spiked because it might anger a big advertiser.

I also used to draw the editorial cartoons - ditto. I had more than one scrap with the editor over cartoons he wanted to ditch...like one at the beginning of the school year with a boy standing in front of a shoe store window with a twenty dollar bill in his hand - looking at the $200 sneakers.

The cartoon ran, and the one and only shoe store in town, called rip-snorting mad.

The editor started in me and I just said; "Well now, that shoe store is the oldest shoe store in the county. I think they'll weather my little old cartoon." (That was almost 25 years ago and the store just celebrated it's 175th anniversary - so they survived me...

- well, my cartoon.

[Inspectorette]

I’ve used the Seinfeld method: Tell them I’m busy right now, but if they give me their home phone number, I’ll call them back. They sputter and stammer a bit, then say, “I can’t give you my home number”. I’ll say, “Why not? You called ME at home - why is THAT OK, but I can’t call YOU at home??”

[maine-iac7]

Heh. AARP has been mailing me for years...

Heh, heh, and I'll raise ya a "heh"

AARP includes a postage paid envelope.

They get mine back stuffed with junk mail...

[Traveler59]

The best $40 I ever spent was on the Tele-Zapper at Radio Shack. It has stopped 99% of unsolicited calls by telemarketers, at least those that use automated dial computers. The telemarketers that use good 'ol finger mashing still manage to get through.

-Traveler

[maine-iac7]

Basically, I am satisfied with the Do Not Call.

One of those little but BEST things that Pres. Bush did for us!

[blackie]

Thanks for the reminder ~ I found that one of my # hadn’t been registered, the rest have been since Jan 07.

I use Packet8 phone service and you block any calls; incoming or outgoing.

http://www.packet8.net/

[maine-iac7]

Do you have verizon service?

Better watch your next bill or so - cause Verizon just announced that unless you sign an op-out, they are going to sell your calling info - who called, when, how long, etc. - to other outfits who will then use it to target you for advertising -

Heads up!

http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Opt-Out-Of-New-Verizon-Wireless-Plan-To-Share-Your-Info-88452

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