Death of telephone manners

[El Tejon]

When did phone manners die?  

My life is talking on the telephone, incessantly.  The earth will crash into the sun if El Tejon does not spend hours a day talking on the phone.  

I receive dozens of voice mails every day.  Why do people not:  1.  identify themselves (I get at least three "it's me, call me" or "you know who this is, call me right away" calls a day), 2.  leave their phone number so I can call them back, 3.  Leave  short messages (I get messages slightly longer than a Russian novel ["and then in 1997 he was mean to the cat. . ."]).

When I was in kindergarten (Westlake elementary, 1975) I remember the teacher bringing out a toy phone and going over how one should behave on the phone.  I even remember filmstrips and a film (with the guy's voice that sounds like he is underwater) on phone behavior.

Is anyone else experiencing this?  

Is voice mail and the "IM culture" to blame for this?  Is it the decline of educational standards?  Is it the lack of decency and courtesy in our society (reflected as well in people's dress and lack of grooming that we have discussed earlier)?  Are George Bush and Haliburton responsible?  Why won't FEMA fix this?

[...has left the building.]

[trash accent]Kirt! Its me! I got in trouble again, call me back at my mom's place![/trash accent]

[Werewolf]

People are more self centered today than ever in the history of the good ole US of A. Consequently when they say hey, it's me they truly believe that the addressee will immediately recognize the voice and know who me is.

It's as simple as that.

[Ben]

My pet peeve is not necessarily how people behave ON the phone, but rather when they use the phone. When I have meetings with people, my desk phone goes into "do not disturb" mode, and my cell goes to vibrate and is NOT answered while I'm having a face to face meeting with someone.

The number of people I meet with nowadays that stop a face to face meeting to answer a phone call is astounding. Working in the emergency response arena, I cut slack for someone who may need to check caller ID or quickly answer a call in case it is an emergency, but if it's not an emergency, they should respond with a, "I'll call you back", not leave me cooling my heels while they take down a list of groceries they need to get on their way home.

Oh yeah, also people that constantly disrupt multi-participant meetings by not putting their cell on vibrate or "off" and getting up every ten minutes to answer various calls. Either attend the meeting or answer your phone -- make up your mind (and I HATE meetings, but if we all have to sit through it, please -- common courtesy).

[Guest]

Kirk,
As others have touched on, Society is in hurry going nowhere.

I too was taught in public elementary school how to use a phone- properly. Born in '55 and we did this in the first grade and continued throughout High School, phone etiquette, thank you notes, and other forms of interacting with others such as handshakes, opning doors for a lady...pulling chair for a lady and holding it, giving a lady / elderly men our seats...etc. Common Courtesy is not taught as it once was.

I do not use  phones as much as I once did. I used to use one  a LOT. I could gauge three things about folks. 1) What decade they were born in. 2) if educated in public school as I was (good), homeschooled ( good) or Private/ Parochial ( good) or 3) Not raised with parenting and educated in a system that put 'quanity' ahead of 'quality'.

One of the reasons I purchased a Caller ID - was to actually 'understand" whom called, the time of call, and return phone number. Sad, really sad.

Worked better than an answering machine...

[spinr]

Well, along the same lines...

As a part of my job I get a lot of calls from people wanting phone numbers, addresses, general info, etc.  It never fails that someone will call wanting something and when I get what they ask for and begin to tell them, they'll say... wait, hold on, I have to get a pen/pencil/crayon to write it down.  

Why do people do this?  It never fails; and they make you wait, sometimes up to a minute, for them to find a writing utensil while you've got other things to work on.

Just a wee bit of common sense is too much ask I guess.

[grampster]

I hate those callers with call waiting.  Someone calls me and starts to get into the conversation and then puts me on hold to take another call.  Call waiting is a rudeness device.   I always hang up on them.

[Waitone]

I just love the etiquette in fashion today which is if you reach a wrong number you simply hang up.  No muss, no fuss, no "'cuze me", no "Kiss my . . ", no nuthin'.

[bratch]

With my friends I often leave the "Call me message" if I leave a message at all.  Alot of it has to do with the caller IDs on cell phones so they already know who called.  If I have a missed call and voice mail I'll usually just call the person back.  The only time I listen to voice mail is if I don't know who it is from.

[DJJ]

As a part of my job I get a lot of calls from people wanting phone numbers, addresses, general info, etc.  It never fails that someone will call wanting something and when I get what they ask for and begin to tell them, they'll say... wait, hold on, I have to get a pen/pencil/crayon to write it down.

I worked summers at a pizza parlor. Invariably, I would answer the phone and ask if I could "take your order", and the caller would turn away from the phone and yell, "What do you guys want?" If we were busy, we were authorized to say, "We're busy right now. Could you call back once you've decided? Thanks." and hang up.

[JAlexander]

I've noticed this, too, despite the fact that I try really hard to stay off the phone.  I used to work in software pre-sales and marketing and I hated bugging people (wrong career, huh?), so I did my best to be clear and succint.  Most folks don't bother being brief anymore, much less polite, but my dad was a politician and forever getting calls from his constituents, so if I wasn't polite to anyone who called then my hide was quickly tanned.

I will admit to leaving 'it's me' or 'tag, you're it' messages, but since I only do that to my close friends and have a really distinctive voice, I don't feel too bad.

James

[Agent P]

This doesn't really count as bad manners since the person on the phone is calling a friend, but often when I babysit (for one specific family) I'll answer the phone and the mom's friends think I'm her. I get weirded out sometimes, like when one said, "You're alive!" when I answered (the mom hadn't returned her call for a few days b/c she was out of town). So now I answer with a swooping "Hellooo?" or perhaps "Moshi moshi!". At least the caller knows it's someone else!

[Chuck Dye]

ALL HOPE ABANDON, YE WHO ENTER HERE!

You have discovered one more area in which parental abdication in child rearing contributes to societal entropy.  Even if you respond with the equivalent of going thermonuclear, you will only cleanse a very small radius.

[brimic]

I don't use the phone much, except at work where I use a very curteous "hello, (company name), this is (name), how may I help you?"

At home, I have a bit of an advantage. I have a very hard to pronounce eastern European surname, you know they type where the consenant: vowel ratio seems to be way off, if someone calls and mispronounces my last name, I hang up immediately as they are someone who doesn't know me and about 100% of the time are looking for a donation for something. It may be rude, but I don't like people wasting my time or calling me during the day when I'm sleeping unless its a life or death emergency.

[Tallpine]

"Is anyone else experiencing this?"

No, but about the only calls I get are from telemarketers who can't speak english...  

(when I get a little better at it, I'm going to start talking to them in Gaidhlig  

[Standing Wolf]

One of the few side benefits of losing one's hearing is spending very little time on the telephone.

[Guest]

A good Doctor friend and shooting pard, wears two hearing aids.

He shared with me once how this is an advantage in some respects. The phone is one as mentioned. The other is these meetings he sometimes has to "make an appearance".

He does not like these people, he does not want to be in attendence, darn sure does not want to converse with anyone. Most know he has two hearing aids.

He takes them out, and can work a room with head nods and smiles. He will spot the good food, that is where he wil be - and not polite to talk with your mouth full anyway.  

[K Frame]

I had a coworker some years ago call me repeatedly and leave cryptic messages on my phone, and on the phone he did NOT sound like he did in person.

He got pissed when I never returned his calls. I had no clue who it was, no name, no number, but he just couldn't figure out why I didn't know who was calling.

[Justin]

My job entails calling a lot of clients to harangue them to send artwork.  When I have to leave a message, it goes something like this:

"Hi, this is Justin with XYZ co.  My number is 555-123-4567.  I just needed to get in touch with you regarding the artwork for your ad in ABC publication.  Please give me a call at 555-123-4567."

Short, to the freaking point, and repeats the phone number twice.  

I absolutely *hate it* when people leave long, rambling voicemail messages.  In fact, I'd say it's a pet peeve.  Get to the gorram point and stop using your timeshifting powers to yak at me.

[HForrest]

i think u all r ovreacting 2 modrn culture 2day. whenever i talk 2 my mom im all like, frickin mom pick me up some goddamn cheetos, and shes like, ok darling! she knows it me, y dont u know ur clients. U shud kno that I am not sefl centred cuz one time i was like, mom get me ice cream now!!!!!!! and she was like no and i was like, u bitch! but hey i didnt end up getting the ice cream so y wud u call us kids self centerd???

[brimic]

[quoute]i think u all r ovreacting 2 modrn culture 2day. whenever i talk 2 my mom im all like, frickin mom pick me up some goddamn cheetos, and shes like, ok darling! she knows it me, y dont u know ur clients. U shud kno that I am not sefl centred cuz one time i was like, mom get me ice cream now!!!!!!! and she was like no and i was like, u bitch! but hey i didnt end up getting the ice cream so y wud u call us kids self centerd???[/quoute]

LOL. ever ask her for some damn cheezey poofs?

[Silver Bullet]

Fight fire with fire.  My ultimate weapon for persistent telemarketers who won't take no for an answer is to put them on hold while I "get a pencil" and then go about my work for the next 30 minutes with the phone on the desk.  The next time they call I can accuse them of hanging up on me.

[Stickjockey]

Not really bad manners per se, but anyone have any creative ways for dealing with the computer that calls then puts you on hold?

>ring<

>ring<

You: "Hello?"

It: "Please hold, for an important message!"

>muzak<




>muzak<






>more muzak<


>ad nauseum<

[Silver Bullet]

I've had human callers call and try to put me on hold right away.

*SLAM*  *click* *hummmmmm*

[Lee]

Thats why all of my outgoing messages are very specific.  Leave name, number and brief message. Most do.  In person, I don't hestitate to stop people and ask them who they are, and to repeat whta they just said.  The worst offender I deal with is my boss's boss.  He is usually on the second or third sentence before I finally realize who it is.  At most, I talk to him a half dozen times a year, but he always acts like we spoke minutes ago.  He does have an ego the size of Texas, which might explain it.