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do you use Caller ID?

I do. Not really to screen calls, but just to see who's calling before picking up. It's really a waste of money, but since it's only $1 a month.

I definitely use it to screen calls. Anyone who shows up as an "Unknown Call" is going to the answering machine (since 99 times out of 100, those are telemarketers).

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Originally posted by Toby
(since 99 times out of 100, those are telemarketers).

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__________________
MANY BLESSINGS!
Peace and Every Good!


Michael W. Cristiani
[email protected]

We use it and love it. Not only can you screen unknown callers out, you can get phone numbers for those who forget to leave them on your answering machine.

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Originally posted by mcristia
[...] For some reason he has his work phone set to "Private", so when he calls me for work stuff, I don't know it is him. I am tempted to let his calls go to voice mail, and tell him to be more courteous in the future, but I think he likes it this way. What do you think?

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__________________
-Joshua
Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

I don't answer any calls from people I don't know, whether or not their number shows up. That's entirely the reason I have an answering machine. Their only hope of speaking to me is pleading their case to my machine. Otherwise, I deign not to answer. I'm not putting up with my email or snail mail getting spammed, why change that philosophy for my phone?

Of course, cell phones show up correctly on my caller id. The only way I get "private" is if someone is calling from an unlisted number (or pressed *67 before the call), but a message informs the caller that I don't accept private calls. They have to press *82 to have their number show up, or my phone won't even ring. It's the unavailable ones that are telemarketers. I think out of area and unavailable are synonymous. They show up different on different equipment (but that's just because I went through 99 calls on my box and there wasn't 1 out of area, but there were 36 unavailable).

__________________
-Joshua
Abortion: Darwinism at its finest.

CLID and Outbound trunks

As a geek employed in the telco industry, part of the reason why we are seeing such a large incidence of "unknown" calls on Caller ID (which I have and love) is due to the increased use of outbound predictive dialers. These nasty machines are programmed to war-dial a set group of numbers at random times of the day until they get a pickup. After a set number of RNA (ring-no-answer) you will generally get dropped off. Voice mail, answering machines, etc will not give it a RNA, and you will stay on their list. Sad, eh?

This technology is also used by companies who are setup to dun people for money. So either you're going to get an offer for something you don't want - or you going to get an agressive bill collector whose sole purpose in life that call is to extort money out of you. It is becoming a big sector of the telco industry - search on Davox and Mosaix if you want to read up on these things.

The other nice thing that the telcos are starting to offer is privacy solutions - if you come up as unavailable/unknown the phone doesn't ring at all. Take that you lousy telemarketing scum!

Cheers!

Tucson Sailors

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Originally posted by dick-richardson
[...] a message informs the caller that I don't accept private calls. They have to press *82 to have their number show up, or my phone won't even ring.

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It's the unavailable ones that are telemarketers. I think out of area and unavailable are synonymous.

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They show up different on different equipment [...]

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We got caller ID in our office for one purpose - to avoid the calls of a certain manager in out NY office. This manager would call to speak to my (now former) boss, and spend hours just jabbering away, usually off topic. With the caller ID, somebody else could intercept the call and say "so-and-so is on the other line" and take a message. Three weeks later, the NY manager got fired.

Now, we use it all the time. there are four of us in the office, and all answer the phone. We usually recognize the numbers that call all the time for specific people and let them pick it up.

__________________
www.jphillips66.org

quote:

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Originally posted by Toby
Is that the only "Private call" that you get?

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"Private call" usually indicates an unlisted number ...

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__________________
MANY BLESSINGS!
Peace and Every Good!


Michael W. Cristiani
[email protected]

Caller ID is the best idea since sliced bread...

We had to get an unlisted residential number a few years ago because of a series of "creepy" phone calls. If we would have had caller id then, we could have busted the weirdo. It was an very unnerving experience, and it was several years before I was comfortable answering the phone.

Now I just use caller id to screen out the calls from my in-laws...

__________________
"When I am Empress...Heads will roll!"
Queen of Parts

We love it. My wife is home all the time, between running our business and homeschooling our kids she doesn't have the time to talk to everybody that calls. We also love that we can get phone numbers. People tend to speak too quickly when leaving their numbers on our machine. The service is definitely worth what we spend on it.
Michael
PS we also get alot of those auto-dials, saves us from having to pick up only to find it's a telemarketer.

__________________
"I am a debtor both to Greeks and to Barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish."

I just got rid of the phone service at home. Now I just have the cell phone. My cell phone's Caller ID only shows the number and not the name (unless the number matches a name in my directory, then it'll show that name along with the number).

and lately, i've been getting more and more calls from people not in my directory, and i can't tell who they are from just the number. oh well.