Cold Callers

My other half has warned me, time and time again, against the perils of it. But I’ve never been the suspicious type.

So when strangers come knocking at the door, be they double glazing salesmen, Jehovah’s Witnesses or gas men,I usually end up being cornered.

I don’t know if it’s just me – it usually is –but lately I’ve noticed a slight shift, in what you might call quality of cold callers.

When I was a child, in Wigan, it was Jehovah’s Witnesses. Always, every Friday night, without fail. Our estate was virtually split down the middle – Catholics one side, Proddies, as we called ’em, on t’other. Being on the Catholic side, I was bewildered enough by the Protestants. So the Jehovah’s Witnesses were aliens to my eight year old eyes.

Fast forward ten years and it was the TV licence men. They would systematically trawl the university halls of residence in Sheffield. They were merciless and even followed a friend in a cab one night as she tried to foist the incriminating evidence – her granny’s old TV – onto her boyfriend. I escaped lightly; the only telly I had ever had was the broken black and white one sitting in Wigan, complete with coat hanger aerial.

A few years later, and I’m in Leeds: picture the scene. One of my flatmates –the butch girl from Glasgow, as it happens, gets a tad jealous and accuses me flirting with the gas salesman at the door. ‘Ah haf seeeen ye,’ she sneers, looking remarkably reminiscent of Begbie from Trainspotting, minus the moustache, obviously. The scenario rapidly disintegrates from a sort of Northern Soul Friends night to a hetero-versus-lesbian version of Shallow Grave. But I digress.

Now allow me to take you to Blackburn. Please; it’s not that bad, honest. We haven’t had many cold callers – apart from the odd orange anorak wearing yokel, foaming at the mouth.

But then tonight, just as I am preparing dinner, there comes a knock at the door. I open the window, warily wondering if last month’s letter-threatening-bailiffs addressed–to-previous-residents is coming back to bite me. But no; instead, an official looking man, complete with clipboard, smiles pleasantly back at me.

‘Good evening. I am from the Office for National Statistics, can I come in please?’

‘Well I’m busy, sort of…’ I say, with a wry smile.

But he is from the Government, he says. Certain households have been selected, he adds, for a survey of factual and statistical information.

Well that’s nice, but can you come back later, I reply. He looks distinctly miffed, and shuffles off, pledging to come back tomorrow. And then it occurs to me; what will I say then? Well I just hope that my many years of ‘training’ will be enough to put him off…

55 thoughts on “Cold Callers”

  1. I had one of them turn up in Pembs years ago.
    I must have been having a weak moment or bored.
    Tell me more I said.
    One of the items they wanted to hear about medical facilities etc in the area. A thing I feel particularly strongly about, ie the lack of the facilities W of Swansea. They kill more than they cure! I always paid and went out of the area for everything and told them I wasn’t getting MRSA for anything, Haverfordwest is riddled with it, then and now!
    I had him in the kitchen until he was glassy eyed on the subject, quite amusing.

    It all takes a long time, if you want a good rant about something go ahead, but if you don’t forget it! They come back every five years to see you. I’ve had them around 3 times and had the pleasure of telling her the last time I was leaving for good because I didn’t like the UK tax base or supporting immigrants and the work shy. Strangely enough they caught me when I was back in the UK every time by sheer chance.

    Most of their questions are angled at providing a data base for service that are going to be needed in an area in the future. How I got picked I do not know, as nothing about our household was average or likely to be replicated in the area.

    Have fun, or not.

    Blackburn? You must one of the last of a ‘unprotected species’ there, aren’t you?
    Didn’t know any one still lived there under the local Caliphate.

  2. Hi Christine; thanks for the warning! I wonder what public service they are planning to axe, then…They’ll have to be good; there’s not a lot left round ‘ere.
    Blackburn: I think my French husband is still in shock. I’ve had time to gradually get used to it, what with living all over the place oop north. High point was Leeds, I think. But going from Paris to Blackburn – now there’s something. The man doesn’t know he’s born…;)

  3. Is this your husband Claire?

    A man and his wife were awoken at 3:00 am by a loud pounding on the door.
    The man gets up and goes to the door where a drunken stranger, standing in the pouring rain, is asking for a push.

    “Not a chance,” says the husband, “it is 3:00 in the morning!” He slams the door and returns to bed.

    “Who was that?” asked his wife..

    “Just some drunk guy asking for a push,” he answers.

    “Did you help him?” she asks.

    “No, I did not, it is 3:00 in the morning and it is pouring rain out there!”

    “Well, you have a short memory,” says his wife. “Can’t you remember about three months ago when we broke down, and those two guys helped us? I think you should help him, and you should be ashamed of yourself!”

    The man does as he is told, gets dressed and goes out into the pounding rain.

    He calls out into the dark, “Hello, are you still there?”

    “Yes,” comes back the answer.

    “Do you still need a push?” calls out the husband.

    “Yes, please!” comes the reply from the dark.

    “Where are you?” asks the husband.

    “Over here….. on the swing,” replied the drunk!

  4. Why do these people always turn up at meal-times?

    If you’ve been ‘chosen’ to take part in a survey you should be notified and asked when it’s convenient to call. The assumption that people will drop everything simply because an ‘official’ turns up on the doorstep is, in my opinion, a liberty.

  5. Claire, I enjoyed your blog. If I am feeling particularly cruel, I will engage the cold caller and set about tearing him apart. If you think about it they are not likely to be hugely intelligent people, so it is not usually difficult to do. The easiest people to destroy are the JWs as they really do preach a load of tosh. My sister in law come from Blackburn. My brother-in-law and his children went/go to Stoneyhurst, which I think is close by?

    Nice story Levent.

  6. Sipu – I, too, have invited in some of the JW and Mormon lot. It’s a real eye-opener as to what some people can be convinced to believe. 🙂

  7. Claire – in case you’re wondering, I put the More tag in for you… hope you don’t mind!

  8. 😀 Good one, Levent!

    The Begbie-lookalike former flatmate sounds scary, Claire. But I kind of wish she DID have the beard 🙂

  9. Thanks Sipu, Courtesy of Cheech.

    A Turkish Phd student in UK, welcomes a JW at her house. The lady JW speaks very good English and is very pleased with the hospitality she receives. The student offers tea and some cookies. She nodes while the JW speaks with a smiling face. Next evening she comes again. And again. Finally the JW asks. “You have listened and learned, what do you say?” The student replies. “I’m a devout muslim and not interested what you have been preaching”

    “So why have you been listening for day?”
    “Well I’m keeping my compatriots safe”

    A true story.

  10. I always tell cold callers that I’m just ‘out’ on licence and if they would like to call back in an hour I’ll take my ‘calming’ medication now and it should have started working by the time they return.
    Met one in Boots the other day who recognised me, usain bolt would have had trouble catching him as he shot out into the high street.

  11. Shades of No 1 husband, he had a first in history specialising in early Church history. Could spout St Thomas Aquinas by the yard, used to drag these poor sods off the street and then stand against the door so they couldn’t get out!
    He would keep them for hours, bet none of you have ever seen Mormons begging to be let out!

    Funny, after a few months we had no doorsteppers, I wonder why?

    Best place I ever lived was a house in Carms that was approached thus, half a mile down a rural uninhabited lane, which then disintegrated into a cow pat ridden muddy track, open two gates, cross railway lane, close gates, proceed to house in centre of far field through mad herd of 200 Charolais beeves, open gate, close gate to keep cattle out!
    Not even the postman would deliver, used to leave the mail in a cubby hole the other side of the tracks. I rented it deliberately to provide a place for the boy as he was totally low immunity after a years chemo. I used to padlock the gates of the house so that the bloody health visitors couldn’t get in, wearing filthy uniforms and having visited old probably dirty homes and people. Kept the boy alive a few more years!
    I once and only once found a bewildered walker in the field who had lost the River Towy, quite how, when he had nearly fallen into the damned thing I do not know!

    Clare, why on earth are you living there? Such a curious choice, surprised the husband has stayed and not run screaming back to France, job related?

  13. Levent; good to see ya again, hon. You make me laugh…I’m quite used to being forced out of bed at 3am, although I think I would object to the drunk…;)
    Sipu; thanks! It’s not so bad actually, Blackburn…Stoneyhurst is the best one in the north, btw, and not so very far from here at all.
    Boadicea; thanks; God only knows whta I am going tosay to the guy tomorrow…I felt quite sorry for him, actually. He must have been pushing 60, standing on my doorstep at teatime and in need of a cuppa! What is a more tag, by the way?

  14. I think this is something my friend used to do. But I think she had to ‘phone first and make appointments. she said it was quite well paid but very time consuming.

  15. Ah; Janh1; Mrs Begbie came on to me on the way back from a vodka fuelled night in Leeds…and thereafter felt at liberty to corner me in various nooks and cranies/recesses of the house. When I complained to our live-in landlord, he paused for a moment – making me think that he was about to vent his indignant outrage – before grinning, and adding; ‘Ah’ll av for’t put cameras up in’t’house..’ Suffice to say that there was, as they say in Yarksher, trouble at t’mill..

  16. Christina and OMG; I think that’s best policy with cold callers; pretend to be utterly insane…having said that, I think I would have a better chance of scaring them away by simply appearing at the front door minus my make up, which happens roughly once a year…
    Christina; I should be a bit more, er, positive; I’ve done nothing but whinge about the place on MyT and here…but it’s a job thing. There are worse fates though, than living in the shadow of, ahem, Thwaites brewery. In Leeds, we had drunks smashing glasses, asbo ridden teenagers and an ex army man chanting ‘right left right left’ at 3am outside the door every Saturday night. God, I paint such a lovely picture of the North of England, don’t I?!

  17. Hello Isobel; it must be a hard job. I used to have to do it, for a pittance, in Liverpool. Actually, people were really friendly there – they’d invite you in for tea, Christmas dinner and their son’s wedding.

  18. I think the problem she had with it was that they wanted her to do more and more, while she saw it as a way of getting an income so she could pursue other things.

  19. Well, Claire being insane is the best option, I feel. I feel very proud of the fact that some years ago, said JW’s interrupted at a a critical moment and I really cannot remember the conversation, but they called me an idolatrous heretic and never darkened my doorstep again. It was something to do with trying to cook Sunday lunch for fourteen and something was obviously burning. I have seen refined my technique and I NEVER answer the front door to casual callers. My friends use the tradesman’s entrance. 🙂

  20. Ara! I’ve just literally been speaking to you on t’other side…this is getting very sixth sense…Wow, idolatrous heretic, eh? I don’t recall you geting that particular praise from anyone on MyT, not even from Bubbles – or should I say Katie? -at best of times, so you must have done summat right luv. ; )

  21. Thank you for your confidence Claire; I appreciate it. I have my dark moments but not very often 🙂 Just you wait though, it will happen! Best regards from Ara, Muslim psychologist,…Ok, won’t go there 🙂

  22. Something I recalled now. Have you got the sticky insurance sellers there too?

    One of my humourous friends had suggested my name. (Note; insurance (the way it works now) is forbidden in Islam).
    Anyway a young man with fancy suit showed up. With up-lifting questions like :”What will yo do if you lose your leg?” “Who will take care of your son if you die?” And a very conviencing presentation, offering a policy for a very cheap fee.
    I listened to him to the end, thanked and said “I agree with everything you said. I’m a zealot (I use this saves a lot of time), sorry , it’s haram, I won’t take it.” He was surprised, cause people don’t think I’m like that by the way I look; long hair, jeans etc.. He said he would like to make one more appointment. I said nothing to discuss. He insisted. I said, ok we shall drink tea.
    Next day he showed up with a fatwah in his hand!!!!

  25. Ah-ha! Fatwah is synomymous with beheading and murder, there. 🙂
    Fatwah is the legal opinion or ruling in Islam, Boacidea.

  27. Ara; no problemo! From, erm, Hemmet’s Girl, Watery Tart…er, what else. Do you know, my MyT memories are fading. Quelle horreur…
    Levent; like it! What will you do if you lose your leg! My hubby is extremely sceptical where insurance and banks are concerned…he’s more of the ‘put ze muny in ze peellow’ mentality… Good job we have no money then! 😉

  28. Thank you Bilby. Always a pleasure to see you too. Sweet dreams. And moon-beams as you like to say. Tonight it’s full-moon!

  30. Levent, dear chap – I’m afraid your comments are not understood by this poor ignorant bear.

    Insurance is forbidden in Islam, you say, but you then say that it is ‘halal’ (a way of killing cows) and that if you don’t subscribe you get a ‘fatwah’ (your head cut off).

    Sorry, but that all sounds like nightmarish nonsense. Are any of you Muslims sane?

    Please don’t be offended or throw a wobbly, that’s just the way it strikes me.

  31. Levent: No…but seeing as I seem to be regaling you all with tales of depravity from oop north tonight; I did have a landlady in Leeds who dug up her boyfriend’s cellar when she found out he kept all his money hidden in the stone floor. She nicked ten grand and used it to pay for a new conservatory on her own house. They’re still together, last I heard.. ; )

  32. lol! Now you see why muslim world is in a mass Bearsy.

    Let me try to explain: As there are no clergy in sunnis. Some dare to issue fatwahs.
    Halal means permitted
    Haram means prohibited

    Insurance is not halal cause interest is involved. (Not my fatwah 🙂 )

  38. I have spend my life trying to explain myself to people. To my family at first. So I’m used to it.

    I have funny stories, that will make you confused and if you can understand laugh.

  42. Apologies Levent…
    I put my ‘confused’ comment up while you were posting the explanation, and I’ve only just found it. Thanks for ‘de-confusing me’!

  49. Night Levent. Isuspect I won’t be getting much sleep, what with three year old with chicken pox…!

  53. Well we’ve done the Calpol thingy, but might try the brandy…Jesus, there’s only so much a girl can take!

  54. Do not despair, if they survive they do normally leave home… eventually. If they give you a hard time, well you are not responsible for the scars! Take heart and do not give in; it’s all a plot to stop you blogging! 🙂

  55. I daren’t go upstairs now, in case I set them off again. Will have to sleep on sofa if this carries on 😦

Add your Comment