The police have called my house three times...

asking me to donate money to their fraternal organization.

Each time I've hung up on them. I don't mean to be an ass, but I'm not really in a place financially where I can donate money to something that I don't even know that much about.

I'm starting to get nervous though. They've called three times in that last three months, and I'm thinking maybe it's not such a good idea to hang up on the police. I mean, they are THE POLICE after all.

I guess I could just get the balls to actually say NO, instead of hanging up. :D

The same thing you just told us. You're not in a financial position to be able to afford it.

But I have terrible phone skills, and I'm a complete sucker.

The last cop that called even had an Australian accent for some odd reason, and I was won over immediately. :)

and it turned that it wasn't really the police after all. It was a telemarketing firm that the local police departments disavowed. I'm not saying thats what it is in this case, but it may be worth checking out. Before October 1, expect a lot of telemarketing calls.

?

It's probably a high school kid or a senior citizen getting paid to make the calls. They probably get a cut of whatever they bring in, too. I've known people who've done that sort of thing before. The police usually hire out that service to a fund raising organization with a call center.

...very few of these calls are actually made by police/firemen/whatever. The calling work is almost always contracted out to telemarketing organizations. At least in big cities it is.

I always say something like "I can't help you" and hang up before they have a chance to pitch me. And another thing I've noticed is lots of times these calls are made by a real deep-voiced guy talking kind of "authoritatively". Which makes it even more fun to say "no".

The call in the name of the "Fraternal Order Of Police" or something trying to get you to donate. From what I've read, the telemarketing outfit gets 90 percent of the take.

Besides, Cops are like Teachers; overworked and underpaid in a Public Service (often dangerous) position and unlikely to volunteer time for a phone bank if it takes away from their family.

but if it's true about the telemarketing people, then I don't feel bad anymore.

"Put me on your do not call list."

But I know there are some loopholes, not sure how this fits.

That used to happen to me all the time. As soon as they say who it is just nicely say take me off the list please, and they'll be gone.

until October 1. Expect a barrage of telemarketing calls before then. I know we've had them. My wife, who is usually fairly mild mannered, actually told one of them to *#!^ off.

Just ask him: "What charity do you guys do on your off-time? I've had a few calls...."

And, Oh by-the-way we teachers work for this....

You would be surprised how common your goals are and how often the phrase "If I'd Only Known" occurs.

Bush is out of office.

Most of the time, I get a sympathetic response. Like, 'yeah, I know what you mean.'

Relax! I get this stuff once every month or two. If you really dig into this you'll find that the caller is only reading off of a script. There's even a chance that they are calling from overseas (India). This is just another phone sales pitch. I've safely ignored it and nothing happens.

This fund raising pitch is designed to intimidate you into giving money. It's deliberately made to sound vaugely threatening. Ignore it. If you want to gove money to a police welfare organization, call your local PD and ask about it. We did, and found that they didn't even know who was doing the calling, or for what.

I handed THAT phone call to a sheriff's deputy who was sitting in my house at the moment, and told the fella to talk to HIM to confirm who he was raising money for.

He hung up. it was a scam.

Cops orgs don't make phone calls to raise money, I promise.

... until they started trying to hit me up for more money each time. Because each caller intimated they were volunteers from county sheriffs, I asked if they were, or not. When one of them tried to lie about, I checked, and the campaign was being run by a professional telemarketing firm. No more money for them.

When I found out that they'd sold my name to the state police benevolent society, the first call from them, I asked, "since the law is that local police get a portion of the proceeds from seized property, have you considered placing that in the benevolent society fund, instead of using it to buy more and more exotic law-enforcement toys?" No more calls.

In your case, though, simply tell them it's not something you can afford, and please add your name to their "do not call" list.

Cheers.

They should not do it.

They should not do it.

They should not do it.

I found out by accident, because there were two big funerals in our town in a short period of time. I asked the second caller why he wasn't with his fellow officers as I was watching the funeral procession on the news. Cops from 3 states were there. I could tell the caller didn't know what I was talking about, so I started asking more questions about where he worked, what he was collecting for. I figured he'd say some suburban station. No he was in Arizona (I'm in Washington). And not a policeman. Then I asked why he was calling our city, he started sounding a bit uneasy. Could it be because there was a funeral going on, I asked him, and this telemarketing outfit saw a way to make a buck off the sympathies of citizens. What specific programs in my city could he name that the money would go to, I asked him.

As you can guess, he finally admitted he was not a cop, none of the money was earmarked for our community, and the telemarketers were not affiliated in any way with any police organization.

I went ballistic on this guy, and told him that I would call the police and file a complaint if he ever called again. That he was a con artist and probably breaking the law. After I hung up the phone, I called the newspaper who tracked down the vile company and published an article about their tactics.

It was obviously a scam. I wonder how many people will hand over money out of fear or guilt just because someone calls and says they are a cop. I admit, I fell for it too at first. But I now have learned a lesson. If you tell me you are a cop, I want to see the steenkin' badge. Otherwise, get outta my face!

It's a phone soliciting company that is making a great deal of money from
asking for our support. I engaged one of the callers in a conversation and
asked how much of my $20.00 donation was given to the police... 20% was
his reply. I was aghast! So, I said, you mean to tell me you'll give the police
$4.00 and keep $16 for making this phone call??? He said, yes sir- that is
correct. I told him I'd rather give them the whole $20.00 if I could afford to
and demanded that his company remove me from thier call list and hung up
the phone on him.

three to five times in a WEEK. Get caller ID and don't pick up your phone if you don't want to talk to whoever's calling. I even got "privacy director" on my phone so that when caller ID doesn't know who is calling, they have to say who they are, and I get to decide whether I want to talk them or not. It costs a few dollars a month, but it is worth it to me. I went from 10-15 unwanted calls a day down to 2 or 3 unwanted calls a week.

I usually won't even pick up a call from someone I don't know. I let the answer service do it. Then, if it's legitimate, they can leave a message and I'll call them back.

And I don't think it is actually the police who are calling you. It is an organization that does fund raising for the PBA. The PBA gets a little of the money. The fundraising org gets most of it. So don't feel bad. Hang up if you want to. Same for firefighters.