TheBuzz
TheBuzz
Hung up on
telemarketingTelemarketing is such big business that there is money to be made in preventing it from disrupting you.
The 104 million daily telemarketing calls generate annual sales of $600 billion, according to federal estimates, but there are several ways to opt out of contributing to that bottom line.
One company claims its device will zap your phone number out of auto-dialing systems; the phone company has a competing service which does not require hardware. Some state governments have or are looking at creating "do not call" lists of consumer phone numbers, which the federal government is also considering.
The New York-based Direct Marketing Association offers ways to vanish from mailing, e-mailing and telemarketing lists. Make it happen online for a $5 fee at www.DMAConsumers.org, or by mail for the cost of first-class postage. Not all direct marketers avail themselves of your expressed preferences.
Telemarketers can use the phone all they want to make money, but the phone company has a lot more experience in that endeavor.
Verizon is introducing "Call Intercept" service in Hawaii, which already has 900,000 subscribers in 15 states. To use it "customers also must subscribe to Caller ID with name, which is $7.95 a month," according to a statement. The additional intercept costs either $5 or $4 per month depending on your service plan. So the minimum $11.95 cost multiplied by the number of subscribers is $10.75 million in Verizon revenue for one month of blocked calls.
The $49.95 TeleZapper is manufactured by a subsidiary of Ohio's Royal Appliance Manufacturing Co. It is available locally through variety of retailers, but a consumer report on a California television station quoted customers who after five weeks used it only as a paperweight.
Erika Engle is a reporter with the Star-Bulletin.
Call 529-4302, fax 529-4750 or write to Erika Engle,
Honolulu Star-Bulletin, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., No. 7-210,
Honolulu, HI 96813. She can also be reached
at: eengle@starbulletin.com