OT caller-id

[micky]

OT This afternoon I called someone I don't know. His phone message suggested my leaving a message, or my emailing him (and he gave his email address). The message I left said I would call him back in a couple days and that it was nothing urgent. I didn't leave my number, mostly because I'm in and out all day.

About a half hour later, he called me. I concluded and he verified that he got my number from caller-id. How do you feel about being called back the way he called me back?

I tend to feel he should just ignore the phone number. I know it's probably going to be there, and when it's essential, I use *67 to suppress it (though *67 doesn't work with 800, 877, etc. numbers) but I feel like I shouldn't have to do that all the time and others should just act like the number isn't there, in the same way as if they accidentally read a personal note someone has written or accidentally see someone of the other sex undressed.

What do you think?

**Does it matter that the guy I called is someone who works at a local community organization? I had to talk to the receptionist at the organization to find out who was in charge of a particular part of what they do, and she connected me to his extension, where I got his recorded message.

[mike]

depends on where you live, but you can often suppress caller ID permanently. Then you have to *xx to enable it when the callee refuses blocked calls.

[dpb]

Mountains and mole hills come to mind for some reason...

So you called him and wanted something so what's the deal?

[Ralph Mowery]

I would have thought it was good of him to call back. Sounds good to me also. I wold not call someone if I did not want to get intouch with them.

[Ed Pawlowski]

I think it was nice of him to contact you. Evidently you wanted to have some sort of conversation or you would not have called and he was just trying to assist you.

You started it and now want to walk away untouched?

[trader4]

It totally depends on the situation. If you were calling the VD clinic, then it's probably not appropriate for them to use caller id to call you back. But since it was some community organization and you were apparently seeking to have a conversation, for the guy to call back seems reasonable. Today the far bigger problem is people not calling back and being unreachable.

PS: It wasn't the VD clinic, right?

[Meanie]

What everyone else said.

[Dan Espen]

...

So you don't know this guy but you called him and you know he works at a local community organization.

Sounds like you know a fair amount about him.

You should know that phones identify themselves by default. By calling him, you are giving him your phone number.

I don't see a problem.

If having caller ID bothers you I'm sure there are ways to fix that. I get calls with no caller ID lots of times.

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per micky:

I'm too cheap to pay for CallerID, but if I had it, I wouldn't even

*think* of answering a call that did not display a number.

Granted that solicitors sometimes spoof CallerIDs, but no CallerID would be a red flag for me.

[Ed Pawlowski]

You'd miss some important calls. Some of the missing ID are from people or places that I want to hear from. One recently was to ask about shipping information for a medical device for my wife. It was important that she had it and I could have easily ignored the call using your criteria.

[Tony Hwang]

Hmmm, Called back some one you don't know? What for, how come? If I have a message like that I won't even bother listening to it, just erase it. If it really means something He'll try again when I am home. When I answer his call and if it is spam or junk call I just hang up.

[recyclebinned]

Ditto

[default]

It's very situational, and I bet depends on one's age. Those who have grown up with caller ID see it as information to be used. Those who grew up when it didn't exist or was a luxury item are used to more anonymity and might see what happened as "presumptuous". In this case you could see it as someone being pro-active. Some younger folks might even take it as being deliberately ignored if he _didn't_ return the call, since he _has_ your number, after all.

A good question for Miss Manners!

[willshak]

I don't answer calls that only display a toll free number.

[Moe DeLoughan]

That's a good point. I remember way back in the early days of caller ID, someone in my household apparently called a wrong number, realized it when they got the answering machine, and hung up. No big deal, right? Not so to the person who had been called by mistake. She had caller ID, so the next day she called us back and demanded to know who had called her and why. We quickly figured out that one of the kids must've dialed a wrong number, but she wouldn't accept that explanation. She just kept going on and on about it. Frankly, she was a bit of a loon.

In this case you could see

I've got relatives who grew up in the pre-answering machine era and believe it is very rude to use answering machines instead of personally answering the phone every time it rings. So they will not leave messages. They'll call, hang up when the machine answers, then call again until someone finally picks up.

[Stormin Mormon]

I heard a similar story. Someone with ID blocking had been making harassing calls. Second caller (totally innocent of any harassing) called the wrong number, and hung up when s/he realized the mistake. The harass victim got the number off the call ID and "hah, I finally got you, you miserable SOB" and all kinds of attitude.

That's a good point. I remember way back in the early days of caller ID, someone in my household apparently called a wrong number, realized it when they got the answering machine, and hung up. No big deal, right? Not so to the person who had been called by mistake. She had caller ID, so the next day she called us back and demanded to know who had called her and why. We quickly figured out that one of the kids must've dialed a wrong number, but she wouldn't accept that explanation. She just kept going on and on about it. Frankly, she was a bit of a loon.

I've got relatives who grew up in the pre-answering machine era and believe it is very rude to use answering machines instead of personally answering the phone every time it rings. So they will not leave messages. They'll call, hang up when the machine answers, then call again until someone finally picks up.

[trader4]

I have caller ID and use it to screen calls all the time. I've never missed a call that was of any importance. It's rather odd that a business would hide it's caller ID. Even if I miss something once in 5 years, I'd rather do that then take all the BS calls. Plus, if it's important, ie the shipping call, they leave a message.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

I've been getting a lot of junk calls where the CallerID "name" is identical to the number. I don't answer those or where there's some meaningless business name like "WSU corp ofc".

I do have an answering machine for important calls, the junk ones almost never leave a message. Maybe they know their crap isn't any good, and anyone who has a chance to think about it won't want it.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

I don't either, unless the name is of a company I'm currently doing business with.

Also, some junk calls have the "name" as a city and state (like "OGDEN UT"). If it's just "wireless caller", it may be a person. I answer those unless from a toll-free number.

[snip]

[(PeteCresswell)]

Per Stormin Mormon:

calls. Second caller (totally innocent of any harassing) called the wrong number, and hung up when s/he realized the mistake. The harass victim got the number off the call ID and "hah, I finally got you, you miserable SOB" and all kinds of attitude.

I suspect Miss Manners would say that the proper thing to do when connected on any call is say "Hello, this is John Smith calling for Dave Jones".... and, once the error surfaced, apologize - and, maybe confirm that they really misdialed and aren't working from an incorrect number in the first place.

Saves time and hard feelings, IMHO.... especially after the second or third call to an incorrect number.