Just fielded a call from Credit Card Services that got all the way to 6:35 before the final disconnection!
Based on the conversation, we have a few more details:
The slimeball outfit identifying itself as Credit Card Services turns out to be a wholesale demon-dialing operation, which leads one to wonder why the FTC can’t figure this out and take some action. I mean, sheesh, CCS must represent a substantial fraction of the total voice phone call traffic; a few honeytrap numbers should be productive.
Anyhow, when you answer the phone and “press 1 to speak with an associate”, CCS farms the call out to a variety of back-end operations that evidently pay for live prospects (i.e., suckers). In this case, I was talking with someone working for “Client Services”; she was remarkably friendly and patient, which suggests she’s very new to this game.
The minimum balance they’re interested in has dropped to $3k. Used to be $4k; must be a sign of the times.
She wasn’t representing a loan operation, but was quite hazy about the details of how her organization would reduce my loan rates, other than that they “worked with the lenders” to that end. I pointed out that, while I wasn’t mad at her, she should understand that I’m reluctant to discuss my financial affairs with someone who really couldn’t describe the proposition in any detail.
She said that she could “do her best” to get me off the Client Services calling list, but that would have no effect on further calls from Credit Card Services, as other companies would be paying for those calls. She had no idea why “pressing 3 to discontinue further calls” didn’t work, of course.
So I asked if she had a supervisor that might be able to explain how the whole operation worked, she said she’d try to find one, and the next minute produced the usual clunks and tinks that presage a dropped call.
Perhaps the pleasant voices are “make money at home” suckers fronting for the loan sharks?
