how do you deal with prank callers?

Ring!!!!!!! - A prank call, also known as a crank call, hoax call, phony call, or phony phone call is a form of practical joke committed over the telephone. As with all practical jokes, prank calls are generally done for humorous effect, though there is a thin line between humor and harassment, and the person receiving the call may not find it funny. Prank phone calls began to gain an America-wide following over a period of many years, as they gradually became a staple of the obscure and amusiing cassette tapes traded amongst musicians, sound engineers, and media traders beginning in the late 1970s.
Source: Wikipedia
Philippines
August 14, 2007 2:09am CST
i simply say "sorry, you've dialed the wrong number" hehe then put the phone down. how about you? do you argue with prank callers? my mother scolds them. hehe. she doesn't like strangers calling our phone just for fun. =)
7 responses
@Nardz13 (5055)
• New Zealand
16 Aug 07
Hi. I know when I was growing up, I would hear my mom blowing a whistle so load into the phone then hanging it up lol... When I got older I asked her why she blew a whislte into the phone and she would say, its for the prank calls...
• Philippines
16 Aug 07
hahahaha! that would teach them not to mess with moms! hahaha! =)
1 person likes this
@arcidy (5005)
• United States
15 Aug 07
Well I never get any prank callers thats because we have caller id and I know whos calling and I would never pick up the phone unless if I know who it is. Like before we had caller Id I would never pick up the phone unless if I hear thre message then I would pick it up so I dont really have to worry about prank calls and I doubt I will ever have to .
1 person likes this
• Philippines
16 Aug 07
yeah that's one thing that makes caller ID great. too bad..our phone doesn't have one..
1 person likes this
@JoyfulOne (6232)
• United States
20 Aug 07
I don't get many prank calls, and when I do it's usually little kids with the old 'did you leave your refrigerator running?' (or something like that. When it's a little kid, I just play along and listen to them giggle, and at the end I ask them if they know that they could get into trouble doing that. Sometimes I'll get a wrong number and tell them it's wrong. Once in a while if they mention the name, it's in my city, and they're calling long distance, I'll offer to look it up in the phone book for them. The ones that bug me are the ones who get mad because you are not the person that they're calling. You explain it's a wrong number, or they dialed wrong, and they get ticked off because 'well, this is the number that so & so gave me'...well, they were wrong lol. I don't mind somebody mis-dialing, but gee, it's not MY fault!
• Philippines
21 Aug 07
lol exactly! why would they get mad at you if they dialed the wrong number. lol. =)
@horsesrule (1957)
• United States
14 Aug 07
I have caller ID now and I don't answer the phone unless I know exactly who is calling. I turn the ringer on the phone OFF most of the time because I don't want to hear it. If I want to call someone, then I call them. Sometimes I check the phone [when the ringer is off] to see if anyone has called and if someone has called, do I want to talk to them? If yes, I call them back. There are times when the phone ringer is on though, mostly when the kids are in school, just in case of emergencies. But back in the day, before Caller ID when I used to always answer the phone, if a prank caller or a pervert called, I just agreed with everything they said, told them it sounded great and then hung up and laughed and didn't worry about it. My mother used to get scared of prank calls. She thought they knew where she lived. I tried to tell her, no, they don't, they randomly dial numbers. Or at least the weirdo's that called me did. Cuz I asked a couple of them and that's what they told me. They were just looking for people's extreme over-reactions and that's what they usually got. They told me that I didn't respond quite like anyone else. So, cool, I talked to a couple of them and had some really fun discussions. But this was all many many years ago, maybe 22 or so years ago. Like I said, I don't answer the phone now.
1 person likes this
• Philippines
14 Aug 07
our phone doesn't have a caller ID (tsktsktsk..) so we answer every call. That's a good way to deal with prank callers...just go with the flow. hehe. yeah almost all prank callers just dial randomly. some intended to make friends (phone pals), and most of them just wanted to annoy people. hehe. =)
1 person likes this
@lyndee22 (1210)
• Philippines
14 Aug 07
It's really hard to deal with prank callers. They keep on calling even at the wee hours at night. Sometimes I hang up the phone and the callers line is still connected to our phone, of course their meter is working. The last remedy is to change our number and unpublished it.
• Philippines
14 Aug 07
yeah i hate it when they call late at night. you have to wake up and answer the phone thinking it's an emergency call from a family member or a friend. then you get pissed off because somebody is just making fun of you. lol. i really hate it when somebody disturbs my slumber. hehe. =)
1 person likes this
• Philippines
9 Sep 07
like you , i say sorry wrong number...
• Philippines
10 Sep 07
it's better that way so you don't have to waste your time dealing with them. =)
• Philippines
10 Sep 07
i agree...
• Philippines
14 Aug 07
me, i also said what you said, but sometimes when you got dizzy you can avoid to have a little argument. Because they are sometimes make it obvious to prank call you, and i find it difficult to relate to them, when you are so busy. Sometimes i do argue with them but after a while i will realize its still nonsense coz you don't see face to face.
• Philippines
14 Aug 07
yeah..that's why i don't want to argue with them because it's just a waste of time. hehe =)