SABAHE@macalstr.edu (Arun Baheti <SABahe@Macalstr.EDU>) (11/09/90)
Seeing someone else's wrong number story has prompted me to appeal to the listing in hopes that someone has a creative idea at solving my problem... One of the lines in my house in So. Cal. is 213/xxx-xxxx. It turns out that a car dealership in Downey (I am in Torrance) has the same line, but in the 714 for its Orange County customers. Most people, however, just assume that Downey is alwasy 213, and it doesn't help that it appears as 213 on many of the firms business cards. For a LONG time, we received calls and msgs on our answering machine (no, people didn't listen to the msg telling them that this was not the Car Lot; in fact the problem is compouneded by the fact that the line is apparently the car place's Spanish line!)... We have complained to the phone company and to the dealership to fix the problem, but everyone seems to think that we should pay to have our line changed or simply wait for their or simply wait for their cards, flyers, etc to cycle through in a year or so... sigh. I consider myself polite, but after getting 15 wrong numbers and messages asking "When can I pick up my truck?" (in Spanish and English) a day, I am beginning to grow tired of the whole game. Any ideas? I've already tried threatening the car dealer with the idea that I would begin to be rude to the wrong numbers and not refer them to the 714 area code. Someone? Anyone? It is amusing in one sense to listen to people on my answering machine (which makes no mention of cars) telling me about their trucks, billing problems, and car loan difficulties, but enough is enough. :-) Arun Baheti NBaheti.ElSegundo@Xerox.COM SABahe@Macalstr.EDU
john@mojave.ati.com (John Higdon) (11/10/90)
"Arun Baheti <SABahe@Macalstr.EDU>" <SABAHE@macalstr.edu> writes: > We have complained to the phone company and to the dealership to fix > the problem, but everyone seems to think that we should pay to have > our line changed or simply wait for their or simply wait for their > cards, flyers, etc to cycle through in a year or so... sigh. I > consider myself polite, but after getting 15 wrong numbers and > messages asking "When can I pick up my truck?" (in Spanish and > English) a day, I am beginning to grow tired of the whole game. Any > ideas? I've already tried threatening the car dealer with the idea > that I would begin to be rude to the wrong numbers and not refer them > to the 714 area code. Someone? Anyone? Time to actually implement "the final solution". Tell the callers that the dealership has probably gone out of business (with the implication that maybe they have lost their money!) or any other smart-aleck comment that you may deem appropriate. If that doesn't seem to help, then you will have to convince GTE that it really would be in its best interests to give you a free number change. (I'm surprised that even GTE would insist that you pay for a number change to avoid harrassing calls, but then GTE never ceases to amaze and astound.) In any event, remember that you are the innocent victim here and under no circumstances should you have to pay for a car dealer's (especially a car dealer's!) negligence. John Higdon <john@mojave.ati.com> (hiding out in the desert)
cmoore@brl.mil (VLD/VMB) (11/16/90)
In other words, the car dealership has a number in the 714 area for customers in Orange County, but when it went out on many of that firm's business cards, it was printed with area 213 instead of area 714 -- that is, it printed your number on those cards. If that is indeed supposed to be a special number for Spanish-speaking customers, you might have to explain (in Spanish on your answering machine tape?) that the business card was printed wrong and that you should redial your call using area 714? (Could this confuse English-speaking callers who do indeed want to reach you?) There have been some cases where a local newspaper had to publish the problem to cut down on such wrong-number calls. Back around 1975-76, when Gerald Ford was U.S. president, some calls for the White House (202-456-1414) ended up going to a residence in Springfield, Va. at 703-451-1414, where Springfield was among those suburban points then reachable via area code 202. (You can no longer reach DC area suburban points using area code 202; use 301 for Md. and 703 for Va.) Back around 1964, there was some recording in Washington (at the Smithsonian?) which was advertised, and many people called that number from New York City and forgot to dial area code 202, and wound up reaching a Schlosser family in Brooklyn. (New York City had only one area code then: 212.)