Borderline harassing phone calls, what's your take?

[DutrowLLC]

This has happened to me on numerous occasions, but once more last night, so I figured I'd see if it's common.





As I'm sure with many mobile detailers, your cell phone is your work phone/personal phone. Liz always hounds me at night if it's ringing off the hook (she has a valid point). Some nights it's nothing, sometimes its 5-6 calls. Anyway, I always have a general rule of thumb when calling people:





-Call once and leave it at that. If you want to leave a message, do it, if not, your number (if not blocked) is on the caller ID...The person will call you back if they desire, when they desire.



-Call twice or more in a few minute span, EMERGENCY.







Maybe it's just conditioning over the years, but any multiple, same number calls I've recieved have always been something of urgent importance.





Back to last night... I have my voicemail setup so that you *know* it's a personal phone, yet this customer kept calling, no message. After the 4th call within 30 minutes, I picked up and was rather short with them. At first, I was pleasant, but once I caught the mentality that they were just replicating the call in efforts to reach me on the phone out of basically, IMPATIENCE, I got quick and tried my best to get off the phone in a quick fashion.



I ended up referring the client out as they were out of my area.







Anyone deal with similar situations? What is your take?

I have a toll free number forwarded to my cell phone. They have a number of features including one called "Call Announce" where it says "Auto Detailing" or something after I pick up before it connects so I know its a customer and I can answer the phone accordingly.



Another, more important feature in this situation is that it allows me to specify different actions depending on the time of day, such as forwarding straight to voicemail and having the .wav file e-mailed to me during certain times such as after 9PM and before 8AM so I don't have to deal with that.



The one I use is Toll Free Max, don't know if they're the best, but they're the one that I use.