The unnamed woman from Pirmasens in the western state of Rhineland-Palatinate told a judge in a local court that she was so annoyed by the unending stream of calls from marketing companies last August that she snapped and blew a whistle into the receiver.
She was hoping just to deter the company from calling her again, but ended up giving herself a criminal record - and the female call-centre employee long-term hearing problems and tinnitus due to the effort she put into the high-pitched blast.
Finding her guilty of bodily harm, the judge fined the 61-year-old €800. She initially appealed the fine but decided to pay it shortly before a hearing scheduled for Tuesday.
13 comments:
Surely the phone should have a maximum volume that's well within the human pain/damage range?
I'm going to get annoyed to if people keep ringing me and selling me stuff.
That's a good idea, I'm gonna try to get a whistle and do the same. I f**king hate telemarketers and there is no way to opt out for companies calling cellphones in my country.
When a telemarketer calls, just pick up the phone and say "hold on just a minute," then set it down and walk away. They'll stay on the line for quite some time. One guy held on for over 35 minutes. I look at it as saving some other poor soul from having to listen to them.
If you really want to have fun, just pick up the receiver every ten minutes or so and say "sorry, I haven't forgotten about you; I'll be right back." Repeat as long as possible. It's fun! Keep score!
That sounds like a plan. I get calls every day all year, year after year, from a pharmacy in India, people with Anglo first names and accents that sound like Bijapur. I read all the time about arrests made of people illegally selling pain killers. The War on Drugs is big business, and yet we get calls every day from people who can send me all I want in the mail from abroad. Free Trade and The War on Drugs -- these seem to be competitive industries.
I have to deal with Dell computers on a regular basis. One day I had to phone them and the woman who answered the phone said "Hello, this is Richard speaking". It turned out that to make customers like them more, they were told to pick British names, however she'd picked one from the wrong list.
You can guess how good the customer service was. At some point I should learn Hindi, it'd save me so much time in my job.
"Hello, this is Jesus Christ", that's how I answer those annoying calls! Just one way to entertain myself.
The telemarketer is the one who should be sued for INVADING THIS WOMAN'S PRIVACY.
I would spend my life savings to fight this suit.
I would keep a DIESEL HORN next to my phone for the next SOB who thinks they have the right to bother me with chit cold calls.
In Denmark, you can sign up for the "Robinson List", which will deprive you of almost all telemarketing calls, except from humanitarian organisations.
This is absolute nonsense.
If the telemarketer could get
hearing damages from their phone or headset, the employeer violated job safety rules to provide a proper headset, which always prevents high noise levels to be transmitted to the telemarketer!
This is clearly regulated in Germany!
Telemarketing calls be fun, if you choose to play with them a bit.
I like to say, "I'm so glad you called!" and then tell them that I have a business opportunity for them called Amway that is "kind of like a pyramid scheme." One was a scammer instead of a telemarketer, and he actually went to their website while we were on the call just to keep me on the phone!
I also like to pretend that whatever service they are selling is frightening to me, or I tell the newspaper salemen than I cannot read, or the credit card companies that I enjoy paying my current high fees.
Lastly, if you know they are a telemarketer and ask for someone by a partial name, I tell them that person is deceased.
Absoluteley Astounding how people can be so rude.
I work in a call center and a woman just blew a whistle in my ear.
I'm not a telemarketer and this wasn't a sales or debt collection call. While I do understand that receiving unwanted calls can be annoying, I could have been anyone who accidently dialed a wrong # and asked to speak to someone who happened to have the same name. Ludicrous.
The reality of the situation is that it constitutes assault as she might have caused permanent auditory damage in my left ear. I have the woman's phone # and was able to do a reverse phone lookup very simply on the internet.
While I really have no interest in pressing criminal charges on a 65 year old woman I am strongly considering it., I might have to file a civil suit against her for doctor's bills and I definitely don't want her to continue doing this to unsuspecting callers.
This behavior should not be tolerated.
Yes, this article is complete nonsense. This fictitious case has been widely spread on the web, probably by an angry telemarketer. There is no reliable source to be found anywhere for this.
There is no way you can achieve a harmful volume on the receiving end of a phone call. Not unless the operator has their headset amplified to insane levels, and then *every* phone conversation would damage their hearing. It's simply not how phone lines work. The story is about as credible as the cartoons where one party reaches through the phone to hit the other's face.
That being said, whistling or blowing into the microphone is annoying, but less effective than other methods which are simply based on using up as much of the caller's time as possible, without costing you yours. Feign interest and put them on hold while you need to do a quick thing (turn off the stove, bring the dog in...), and just leave them hanging for however long they'll wait. Not only will it cost them the maximum amount of money for no return, but you will also ensure that in this time, the operator waiting for you will not be able to bother anybody else. You're protecting others from being cold-called, and you're helping the telemarketer to fail to reach their quota.
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