When I switched from Time Warner Cable to Verizon FioS, I was offered a landline with the package, essentially for free. I thought “ok, cool” given that I sometimes work from home and a landline could be useful for conference calls and such.
I was given a few choices for my new home number and chose the one with a pattern easily remembered. Since the line was set up, I have given out the number to three people, maybe. I have not set up the voice mail.
And yet I get at least five calls per day. At least.
My number used to belong to a woman named Melody. She is college educated, but apparently bad at follow-through based on the calls I get about her overdue student loans.
The number also belonged to a car service, as well a Hasidic family with many, many friends, all of whom call morning noon and night.
I don’t even look at the caller ID when the phone rings anymore. Heck, I don’t even stop what I’m doing. The calls are never for me.
I called Verizon to dump my landline and learned that doing so would increase, not decrease, my monthly bill. The Verizon rep offered to change my number. I declined.
Next, she suggested, without irony, that I simply unplug the phone.
The phone keeps ringing. For now.
OneChicklette 
Such helpful customer service, what I come to expect from Verizon
Unplug the phone. Walk to the door. Aim for nearest Verizon FIOS cable. Hurl.
Oh man, this reminds me of the time I inherited a fired coworker’s cell phone at my last job in DC…apparently it was her personal cell. I got so many calls from her rowdy son’s middle school requesting her to visit the principal, and the occasional 2 am call from a guy who always said “yo baby whatsup whatsup” when I answered. Keep fighting the good fight.
I hope you played along.
“Oh I put Johnny up for adoption last week, Principal Jones, but thanks!”
I dunno why part of my post didn’t show up. Let’s try again.
Oh man, this reminds me of the time I inherited a fired coworker’s cell phone at my last job in DC…apparently it was her personal cell. I got so many calls from her rowdy son’s middle school requesting her to visit the principal, and the occasional 2 am call from a guy who always said “yo baby whatsup whatsup” when I answered. Keep fighting the good fight.
My phone number used to get a ton of calls for the guy Tony. This guy must have been actively using my number. I’d get a call from Lowe’s asking when he was going to pay his bill. I got calls from car dealerships. Once I got a call from some guy asking about how much my business was worth. I laughed and told him I was in college. My net worth was in the negative 10,000s
Maybe they just want you to have to work a little harder for your discount. The inventor of land lines needs to feel like he or she still matters.
I had no idea how common this issue would be!
Getting calls for someone else can be incredibly aggravating. I had my cell number for 10+ years and, out of nowhere, began receiving collect calls for someone all day long. It was out of control. I would answer and explain I’ve had the number for over 10 years and had no idea who this person was and they wouldn’t believe me! I reported them after awhile but I know that isn’t the solution for your situation.
So annoying!
I remember our old landine number when I was a kid used to be a Chinese Restaurant, even after we had had the number for years and years we would still get the odd call.
I hope you asked if callers wanted steamed or fried dumplings (and now I want dumplings)
It’s like that old joke, really, one day you’ll get a call from Melody asking if there’s any messages for her.
I think it’s a conspiracy. You see Verizon has been trying ot get rid of your number for years. Everytime they assign it, the person gets so many calls, they change the number. This only adds to the number of people who call it for the next customer and so on. Right now, one customer rep is sitting on the lunch room confiding to her co-workers: ” I finally got rid of that numer, remember the one everybody complained about and then changed? It kept coming back and getting worse. Finally I got this new customer to bundle it into a package. Ha! She calls to complain and I told her that if she deleted the number from her account, we’d put her bill up. She believed me! So, I told her the best way to deal with it was to unplug the phone! HAHAHA! Can you believe that? She’s now paying us to have her number unplugged! We never have to deal with that number again. I think I’ll submit my idea to management for an award or a promotion. Imagine, if we can get all the customers to pay for phones they don’t use, how rich we can all be. Mangement is always on the look-out for good ideas like that where we can get money for no service rendered. ”
So, you see One Chicklette, you’ve been had.I recommend some sort of a counter attack, perhaps involving tanks or rocket-proplelled grenades or at least a special forces team. Good Luck!
Without you, dear reader, I’d be screwed. I am on to Verizon!
LOL! I have this same thing going on! We moved here in August, and people repeatedly call for the same three people. One of them is indebted to a lender, and when that lender calls here, the rep NEVER believes I am not her. I have invited two of them to come to the house and check my ID, but please, stop calling!
I am not alone!
the 2014 definition of irony is the horrible communication skills of communication companies
I have neither land line nor cell phone. A rather elegant solution for me; other’s results may vary….
Great post.
That is a unique solution, one I might get fired for (as well as yelled at by my mother).