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At both donotcall.gov and the FCC DNC reporting site. FCC seems to take more action than the FTC.

Do you have a web address or link where to go?

https://complaints.donotcall.gov/complaint/complaintcheck.aspx

When I get a 'live' one on the line I try to get their name, company name, and a callback number. On the form you have to enter a number, but if you don't have one it takes '000-000-0000', then give as much info as you can in the comments section.

The FCC starts here and goes to a bunch of subsections, depending on whether it's a robocaller or other criteria:

http://www.fcc.gov/complaints

The FCC forms are much more comprehensive than the FTC report form, so try to get as much info as you can from the caller. There is a section for spoofed caller ID, robocalls to cellphones, etc.

"Click" and they never call back again.

Ask them for their name and home phone number. They inevitably ask why. You answer, "so I can call you at all hours of the day and night and try to sell you things you neither want nor need."

When my son was little, I'd put him on the phone and say "tell the lady about Pokemon."

I'm done with that being nice shit, though. I no longer care if I offend someone who's breaking the law. I've had several who want to argue with me about whether I'm even on the dnc list. My language tends to get a little colorful with those idiots.

I had one blowing up my phone recently (I only have a cell, no land line). Day and evening, every day of the week, for a good 6 weeks or so. These calls always came from the same number. I finally answered.

"I don't know who you are or what you want..." and the man tried to interrupt. I continued, "I'm speaking right now, or this conversation is over," and he shut up.

"I don't know who you are or what you want, but here's how it works in my life. Despite the fact that this number is on the do-not-call list, a bunch of telemarketers have decided that I'm fair game. I no longer answer my phone unless I know who is calling. If you need to speak to me, you call my number and leave a message telling me who you are and what you want, like a civilized human being. If I determine that you do indeed have business with me, I'll return your call, at my convenience. Are we clear???" He very meekly muttered, "Uh uh, yes." And I hung up. Haven't heard from them since.

Excellent!

to report these numbers is that they keep changing.

We'll get calls here from one number for a bit, then that number doesn't call anymore, but another one does. When I do a Google search, it's always the same sources for the different numbers.

Security systems. Chimney cleaning. Lowering credit card interest. etc., etc.

Same theme, different numbers.

Letting the answering machine pick up doesn't do any good, as they keep calling till they get a live person to pick up. Even then, there's often nobody on the other end until they call a few more times.

That's when I get out my 3,000,000 dB whistle and let them have it.

A few places that were calling from the same number never called back again.

The ones calling from different numbers...doesn't matter to them. They'll just wait a while and try again from a different part of the country.

that political organizations and charities are not covered by the do-not-call list, right?

When I was making phone calls for the Obama campaign, some people treated me with great contempt and anger, as if they were dealing not with a volunteer but with a paid telemarketer. They would lecture me, hang up on me, tell me to take them off the list, etc. What they didn't realize is that a political organization does not have to take you off their list just because you asked them to do so. In fact, many people refused to tell me who they were, which meant that I couldn't mark them as anything other than "not home." Sometimes, the husband of the person I was trying to reach would answer and would refuse to let me speak with his wife, once again leaving me no choice but to mark her "not home". Of course, "not home" meant that another volunteer would call her later. It would have been much more effective if they would simply identify themselves and state that they supported Romney. That would have greatly reduced the probability that we would call them again.

Others, often liberals, thought they were being clever by not answering unidentified calls. Once again, all that accomplished was that more volunteer time would be wasted trying to reach them. Simply answering and telling us that they were planning to support Obama would have been much more effective.

I understand how annoying it is to receive such calls. I find them annoying myself. However, being rude to the caller does not accomplish anything useful.

If I answer an unknown Caller ID, I am usually polite to them, but if it is a charity I tell them flat out that we NEVER make any donations based on telephone cold calls or bulk mailings.

For political calls I will politely thank them and hang up. I never give any information to unsolicited callers. Most of those calls this past year came after we have already sent in out absentee ballots, anyway. I understand that political calls are exempt, but when someone tells you that they will not give you any information, or to stop calling, common courtesy would dictate that you stop calling.

Remember that political robo-calls are still completely illegal if sent to a cellphone and the recipient has not given express permission to receive these calls. I had to contact at least 5 different campaigns this past election season to tell them to stop robocalling my cellphone. (Some of them do not make it easy to find a way to contact them.) I give them the full citation from the Telephone Consumers Protection Act that applies. I also usually let them know that they may have just lost my vote. (You're violating federal law and you want me to vote for you? If your campaign is so inept that you can't figure out the laws that apply to the calls you're making, why should you get my vote?)

When I receive unsolicited political calls the number almost always winds up going onto the blacklist. I don't normally answer unknown caller ID's, but I always do run them through a lookup to see what they were. If it shows up as a telemarketer or political caller, the next time they call their call is automatically routed to a 'blocked call' message from our VOIP provider. Our phone was blessedly silent this past political season.

If the person said, "Yes, I am Mr. X. Please take me off your list," that would be recorded as a "Refused." I did not work on data entry, but I believe a "Refused" would have been about as effective at reducing the volume of calls as an expression of strong support for Romney. Another call might have been made to confirm that the "Refused" was not recorded incorrectly.

However, many of the people I'm referring to would not even confirm that they were the person I was trying to reach. I would ask, "Is this X?" Without saying yes or no, they would ask, "What's this about?" When I explained, they would say something like "We're not interested" and hang up. The reason this was considered a "not home" is that you can't refuse a call for someone else. Suppose I live with a conservative roommate. If she answers a call that was intended for me and tells the caller to stop calling, then she is limiting my access to political speech (indeed, the call offers an opportunity to get involved in the campaign as a volunteer).

By the way, the Obama campaign did not make any robo-calls, which are known to be completely ineffective. If you got any robocalls claiming to be from OFA, they were likely from another organization. The reason we focused on calls and visits is that those are most effective way of getting out the vote. Many Democrats work several jobs and either forget to vote on election day, or they think their vote won't make a difference. Personal contact with a volunteer makes it much more likely that they will turn out to vote.

I agree that it is a good idea to avoid giving to charity over the phone. Some of those callers, if you ask them, will admit that only 15% or so of your donation will go to the actual charity. In other words, up to a certain amount collected, 85% of your donation goes to the telemarketing company!

It turns out that he was recording all of our opponent's strong supporters as refusals.

I was in a state without partisan voter registration, and by marking the GOP supporters as such, it helps the state party and VAN classify the voter as a leaning GOP.

It was a huge pet peeve of mine, and I knew that win or lose, I wanted to help classify the 55% of our district that did not have any data on them.

However, many of the people I'm referring to would not even confirm that they were the person I was trying to reach. I would ask, "Is this X?" Without saying yes or no, they would ask, "What's this about?" When I explained, they would say something like "We're not interested" and hang up.

I'm very sorry if it messes up your numbers or stats, but I usually tend toward not giving out ANY information, up to and including my name or verifying my identity, to an unknown cold-caller (possibly a little bit of over-cautiosness left over from an incident when I lived in NY). If the call is specifically for my wife I have the courtesy of letting them know that, given her working hours and location, they will be extremely unlikely to be able to contact her by phone during the hours when it is legal for them to be calling. If we have already voted (we are in a completely vote-by-mail area and we usually send the ballots back within a day or two of receiving them) I will let them know that our vote has been cast, and only that. After the first marketing/political/charitable organization call of any type, the calling number then goes onto the 'political calls' blacklist. Even if they persist in calling they will only receive the 'your number is blocked' message from our provider.

Political calls may be exempt from most of the DNC provisions, but we try to make it abundantly clear that we do not want to receive these, and we will take whatever actions we deem necessary to avoid them. The sheer number of political calls, legal or not (robo-calls to cellphones, etc.) has poisoned the well, and we have made the choice to NOT to be a target of any marketing, commercial or political, to the extent that we can.

It does not mess up anyone's stats. All it does is ensure you'll get more calls. After all, every time you don't answer, or answer and refuse to provide information, you get marked as "not home." And the volunteer who is calling you will be a different person each time, calling you from his/her own cell phone. Feel free to block them all.

I assume you don't have any credit cards and use cash for everything? Or is it only when it comes to grassroots organizing that you suddenly become concerned about your "privacy"?

I find it amusing that people on a political site would brag (!) about their one-person efforts to subvert the political system. Fortunately, most people are not so uninformed about the political system as to refer to GOTV as "marketing."

Last I knew, our votes were SUPPOSED to be private.

Seems to me it's more a subversion - or maybe perversion of the system - to use coercion and threats of harassment against people who refuse to tell you who they are voting for. And it's bizarre to claim some superior moral ground as you do it.

And yes, it's a form of marketing. The fact that you really really believe in the product doesn't change that.

I am telling people of one way that I have been able to stop a LOT of telemarketers from ever calling again. I handle charity/political calls essentially the same way. They get ONE call, and if that triggers another volunteer to waste their time calling again from another number, so be it. Any further calls do not get any more information from us; usually they just get an abrupt hangup, perhaps with a 'we've already been called'. We have made it clear as we can that we don't want these calls, and NO political organization, charity, or whatever needs to know anything when they cold-call us.

GOTV is OK, but when told that everyone at this number has already voted (without giving our names/ID, which they have no right to obtain), they still call back. GOTV turns into POTV (p-off the voter) at some point, and becomes counterproductive to your cause. It's not just GOTV, either - it's usually several calls, for every candidate, for every office out there. Enough is enough.

I'm still not sure how all of the campaigns got ahold of my cellphone number, though, since I rarely give it out for anything but personal friends to contact me, and it has NEVER been used for any type of voter registration or 'official' contact.

We are judicious in where/when we use credit cards. We never fill out any of those "Win a whatever" cards at the various home/garden/trade shows we attend (the fine print on the back of most of those tell you that this is giving them and whoever they sell your information to permission call you). We have very company-specific email addresses that we use for different things. We own several domains, so we can create a 'company_asking_for_info@whatever.com' to keep track of where the addresses are spread around.

Sorry, but even if you are exempt from certain provisions of the TCPA, you should honor a request to not contact a number. Anything else becomes, at some point harassment.

As a field director (who manages the staff and volunteers making the phone calls), I want to print this out.

The best way to get rid of a political call is to tell them that you're voting for the candidate's opponent.

do not have to abide by the do not call list, but I don't agree with that. If I say that I do not want calls soliciting from me, I mean I don't want calls soliciting me. Period. Charities and political campaigns would be smart to avoid people on the DNC list, even if they do not have to by law. It just seems to right thing to do.

I have had some times, like the primary with Hillary and Obama, where I was really torn as to which I was going to vote for. The weekend before the election, I got 10 calls from Hillary (all robocalls) and one call from Obama (robocall). And I answered the phone on every one of these calls I am talking about, so it isn't as if they kept trying until they got me. I made my mind up who I was voting for that weekend. I guess that I can thank the pain in my ass for stopping my anguish.

I will say that I am rude to all the charities that I have never donated to in the past, but I am never rude to the Democratic volunteers who call.....although I do tell them to stop, that I have made my mind up already. Hell, more than likely, I know the Democrat on the other end of the phone.

is that it assumes people have some sort of obligation to give a complete stranger ANY kind of identifying information, including their name or political leanings, and that if they refuse to give out information, they deserve to have their home lives interrupted again and again.

Next time you volunteer, why not just mark down refused even if you have to bend the interpretation a little - if it's clear the phone calls are perceived as unwelcome and harassing?

Isn't that the more ethical choice than opting to have your organization continue to harass someone over and over again because they protect their privacy?

Keep in mind I was a field organizer for three election cycles and a field director for one election cycle (looking for more). I never worked (paid) on the Obama campaign, but I have worked statewide operations before, where we were very scrutinized. Refusal rates were the most watched aspect of my program that my campaign manager had me keep an eye on.

We allowed for a few refusals and marked them down as par for the course, but a high refusal rate for a staffer meant that the staffer had a talking to with his/her superiors (in my last campaign, that was me). A high refusal rate for a volunteer meant that the volunteer had to undergo further training.

We barely called people more than once (we just did not have the manpower to do so), but I know campaigns with more manpower (coughObamacough) did.

Is it ethical to keep calling a house knowing that it's harassing and angering the residents, because they refuse to reveal personal information to a stranger over the phone?

I maintain that it's not an ethical choice to make. Not even if you do it for self-serving reasons (such as avoiding additional training with a supervisor).

But I know that other campaigns did. We had way too many people to reach out to and did not get to round 2 until GOTV. If a volunteer/staffer did complete their list, the next calls I gave them were typically in another county. We did have our candidate call the undecided voters.

If you don't want campaigns to call you, I would recommend not putting your phone number on your voter registration form.

Do you have any credit cards? If you do, and you think you're somehow protecting your privacy when you refuse to tell a campaign volunteer about your political leanings, you are only kidding yourself.

Indeed, if you're so concerned, you should not vote, period. That's how you got on the campaign call lists in the first place. Refuse to vote, and you will receive no calls. That way, you will have achieved total privacy, along with all the protection that might provide.

This kind of paranoia is part of the reason for the political problems in this country. The goal of political calls is not to "harrass" anyone but to organize around important issues. If you're so paranoid that you are afraid to share your political views with a stranger, you will simply not engage in any kind of political activism. Fortunately, most people are not so fearful. If it weren't for the millions of volunteers like me, the last election would have resulted in a Romney victory. You can disparage and blame volunteers all you want, but you will not change that fact.

If people like you have your way, political calls will be banned. At that point, big money will be the only thing that affects elections. Is that really the kind of world you want to live in? Take away people's organizing rights, just so you won't have to answer a few inconvenient phone calls?

How many phone calls a week would you consider "a few"?

How many would you consider "a few" if you were caring for someone recovering from serious surgery, and each ring woke them out of sleep?

How many a week would you consider "a few" if you worked a swing shift and each call was - for you - the equivalent of other people getting a call at 3am from a telemarketer?

How's this for a solution, do not register with a party. Register as an independent or unaffiliated.

These were the calls I received on just one day last election season, from just one organization (not all the calls I received that day):

2:32pm, 3:32pm, 4:33 pm, and again at 8:49pm.

I have that tracked because I ended up filing a complaint with the better business bureau - it was like that from that one organization every damn day. The response from filing the complaint: " This number was called on behalf of one of our political clients. Political calls of this type have an exemption from the Federal and State Do Not Call list." and they did put me on some internal do not call list at that point, but they acted like it was some big special favor they were doing by not calling me 4 times a day.

I could default on my home mortgage and not get that many harassing calls about it. I should be able to register to vote, go to the polls, and keep my vote private, without being interrupted at home hourly for months on end (that 4 times a day shit started in August!), or having people accuse me of being undemocratic.

It's not paranoia. It's straight-up rage.

...any decent organization would take you off their list if you asked them to so.

IMO, you have to be a bit of a shit-head to hear "STOP CALLING ME" and think, I'll just make a note that it's okay to call them back again.

that said "we see you are using our lawn service but not our pest service."

I said "yeah, I use (X) and they're great."

He said "well what kind of pests do you have around your house"

I said "just jerks that come around trying to convert me to their religion and other people who call me during dinner to try to sell me something"

He laughed and said "have a good evening, sir." My wife laughed too.

It could be King Gazambiki from North Africa wanting to give you 35million in pure gold.

My dad, who has Alzheimer's, but still quite functional, will give money to anyone.
We are on every do not call list. I've managed to stop a lot of calls, but now they call
pleading for the Apache Nation, from the Philippines!

I have discovered they hang up when they hear a female voice. He gets confused when
they keep talking, he is also very deaf. I always know it's a scammer when he holds the
phone to his head in silence for minutes at a time. He will hand me the phone, I ask them
to remove our number from their data-base, they always say "I will make a note of it," but
continue to call at least weekly.

I work very hard at patience, and maintaining some semblance of zen.
This is the thing that just sends me over the edge.

I can launch just thinking about it. Thank you for listening.

Keep copious notes about the callers, and file a complaint. The FCC does crack down a LOT more than the FTC (they share responsibility for the DNC registry).

Unfortunately, some of these scammers ARE registered as charities, and they don't have to abide by some portions of the DNC list, but, if I remember correctly, even they have to stop once you have told them to stop or face prosecution.

Good day.

Seriously, I'm grateful they stopped.

but there are still a bunch of them out there. Unfortunately, they'll start hitting your number again, from multiple faked Caller ID numbers. It took about 2 months before the scammers recovered enough to build up their phone databases again. Enjoy the quiet while you can!

It was a cheap Chinese model that was not UL approved and did not have FCC certification on the laser projector.



Oh wait, you said TELEMARKETER.

I share your sentiment. I've received calls like that and they're frustrating. Never really listens when you tell them to stop. This is why I've come up with pranks, too. It might not get them behind bars but at least, I've wasted their time and probably saved the person they're about to call after me.

And with all the different telemarketers that call me, I never ran out of fun ideas to annoy them. I get my tips at http://www.callercenter.com/articles/14waystoannoytelemarketers.html and they sure are effective! It always brings a smile when I hear them get frustrated. And I noticed, they never called back.