Pushy Sales people!

[bara]

I know, its thier job. They have bosses who have bosses who have bosses who tell them to get sales no matter what it takes.

But listen assholes, dont call me and say I would like to talk to you about a new free feature on my policy and then when you get here try to sell me something.

I humored the guy for exactly 3 minutes before telling him that I am not interesting in buying anything and that he should tell me what he came to the house to tell me about the new feature.

30 seconds after that I told him to get out of my house and almost canceled my policy.

Honestly, I probably should have and am still thinking about it.

[Rageaholic]

Yeah these people are annoying and frusturating to deal with.

The worst for me are those who go door to door and think that just because they see you, that you have to open the door for them to listen to their bullshit sales pitch. Then they stand their like an asshole for 5 minutes and won't get the clue that I'm NOT FUCKING INTERESTED IN THEIR BULLSHIT!!! Fuck that, I'm not gonna open the door for someone I don't know. GTFO and get a fucking clue.

Of course, for those who are pushy in stores, I mostly blame management for putting policies in place requiring employees to ask a certain number of times. I recall a story on CS about some manager who yelled at an employee for not asking 3 times even though it was clear the OP wasn't interested after the first no. The OP let the manager have a piece of his or her mind.

[blas87]

The last door to door person I had to deal with was a person from Charter (the cable company).

I was at my parents' on a Friday early afternoon doing my laundry and napping. I don't know why I even got up for the door, if it were my place I would have just ignored it, but for some reason I answered (mostly to shut the dog up) and this douchebag had a clipboard and was pitching "I see this house is not a Charter cable customer, just want to let you know what you're missing, blah blah blah"

I told him it wasn't my house. I held back on my real feelings about Charter.

[Ginger Tea]

One time I was oop norf pet sitting for my brother who was abroad for either a GP race or just a week in Spain, I forget which and was asked to answer the phone incase it was his work to remind them he was out of the country till when ever, especially if I had any messages to pass on to them, I don't really recall.

Some phone rep calls offering something and I say "This is my brothers house, I don't live here, I'm not authorised to do anything about this or anything else."
"I'm authorising you to make this purchace." for whatever the fuck it was
it's not my house, why the hell do they think someone just stopping off for a week should make purchaces on behalf of someone else without their consultation?

IIR I told them to call back in a week or two and told him about it when he got back.
He did end up with an alarm system at some point after that and I'm not sure if it was something he ordered and the call was a follow up or a cold call that they processed regardless or what. but I do recall him bitching about not even wanting it in the first place. but that could have been a call of the land lords, but in that case. wouldnt the land lord sort that crap out himself?
It might have been nothing to do with the alarm system, but not the legal tennant, not the bill payer, I am just looking after the dogs don't ask me ask my brother

[senor boogie woogie]

When I was in my early 20's, my mother decided that I needed a suit to look for jobs. Personally I HATE wearing these clothes and I super hate ties. But employers want applicants to wear this crap so I did not have much choice in the matter. Of course, being that this is my parents, they have do everything the difficult way and on the cheap.

We went to a Men's Wearhouse Outlet. I wanted a suit jacket and a pair of pants. That's it, a matching pair of pants and a jacket. However, even thought we told them what we wanted, the f'ing saleswoman was walking me to the shirts, shoes, socks, all the shit that I did not want or need. It was a whole spiel that the salesperson had to do, as if upper management figured that we the customer were too stupid to know what we want and what we do not need. I felt like a two year old. Finally, I got the ugly suit (which I wore a few times and lost the ugly jacket) and a tweed jacket that I have literally never wore and finally threw away about 10 years later.

I am an American living in China. One infuriating thing that many salespeople here do is to shadow me around in the store, following me wherever I go, which I find to be highly annoying. I have told people to please go away and not bother me! I have to be rude to get my point across. It's not like if I dont steal something I could not be easily identified (foreigner, fat, blond hair, white).

[tropicsgoddess]

I get that Sales People have to be persistent to some degree to earn a living (especially those on commission only) but to follow me around like some puppy and constantly in my face or pushing me to buy all this shit I don't want and need is downright annoying. If there's one thing I absolutely can't stand is people that don't take a hint after I tell them no. No means no, dammit!!

[Gravekeeper]

They have two options with me:

Talk to my answering machine or talk to my closed door. They are welcome to either one. -.-

The key problem though, is for every 5 people they annoy, there's one stupid fucker that goes "OH THAT SOUNDZ AMAZING" and corporate goes "See! This totally works!". As long as the revenue to be had outweighs the revenue to be lost they'll keep doing it. Simple as that.

That said, I sincerely do not understand telemarketing in this day and age or how it is effective in any way shape or form with absolutely anyone on this planet. My only conclusion is that some people are god damn idiots. -.-

[Andara Bledin]

That said, I sincerely do not understand telemarketing in this day and age or how it is effective in any way shape or form with absolutely anyone on this planet. My only conclusion is that some people are god damn idiots. -.-

Two things: Not everybody has easy access to the Internet, and some people just don't plan for tomorrow.

That, and people are god damn idiots.

^-.-^

[Fashion Lad!]

I understand hating pushy sales people. Believe me, I do.

But at this day in age, what would you rather have: pushy sales people or, higher prices that companies could charge, but instead have to make up for it elsewhere?

Honestly, pushy salespeople rants are the most annoying rant in the world to me. We all want a low price, but we forget that companies need to make money too. Guess what, in order for these "pushy sales people" to have jobs, they need to hit their numbers.

That laptop that Best Buy will sell for $299.99, it probably cost them closer to $330 to bring it into the store. If you have a bit of willpower and patience, you saved yourself at least $30, plus any sort of markup.

Don't like it, order online. Don't have easy access to internet, politely tell them no.

You're not doing them some huge favor by not sharing your personal feelings about a company, you're being a decent human being and just realizing they have a job to do.

[jackfaire]

Pushy sales people are bad period.

I am making payments to a rent to own store for my kick ass laptop. Trust me I love it. It is my everything all in one device. My TV, My library, my video game machine, my web surf interface etc. Short of my exercise this computer handles it all.

Anyway I digress so the rent to own store called me today, "Are you interested in our Black Friday sale?" "Nope sorry not this time" "Okay thank you goodbye"

That was it.

No "but we have this that and the other" nope simply accpeting my clear no and moving on to another customer.

For that reason amongst others when I have the money to upgrade my TV I will do so through them.

If they were always calling me about their sales and not taking my no for an answer I would be going somewhere else.

I understand stores have quotas to meet but they will never meet them if they annoy every potential customer.

[MadMike]

I understand stores have quotas to meet but they will never meet them if they annoy every potential customer.

My point exactly, and I was going to respond to the post above yours with that very point.

Sure, they may squeeze out another sale or two with pushy tactics, but they could be losing even more sales than they're gaining. Of course, they empty suits in the ivory towers don't see the big picture. All they see is, "We made two more sales! It works!" Never mind that they chased off five other potential customers.

I stopped shopping at Mongtomery Wards for that very reason. Anyone remember them? I had bought a camcorder there to videotape the birth of my son (who decided to pop out six weeks earlier, and I didn't take the camcorder with me when we went to the hospital because I didn't think this was it.) I had paid for it by applying for their store card. I don't think I ever used the card again after that, but just made the regular payments, and anything extra I could put on it to pay the balance down.

After I had the card for 2 or 3 years without incident, I started getting phone calls from the salespeople, trying to get me to sign up for some insurance plan. Of course, they didn't ask me if I wanted it, they pretty much tried to tell me they were doing it, and could they send the forms to my Enola address? I politely told them no, I wasn't interested, and they kept pestering me anyway. I was somewhat annoyed, but I managed to get off the phone with them, and that was the end of it. Or so I thought.

A couple weeks later, it happened again. Lather, rinse, repeat. Then the calls started coming even more frequent. After I got three of those calls in the same week, I wasn't so nice anymore. I told them in no uncertain terms that I was not interested, not now, not ever, and I didn't appreciate being called three times in the same week. The caller mumbled some sort of half-assed apology and hung up on me in mid-rant.

Right around this time, I had received a pretty decent tax refund, so I paid off the remaining balance and then called in the cancel the card. My only regret is that I didn't tell them why I was cancelling it. Then again, most places I've had cards with asked why I was cancelling, and this company did not, so they may have had some idea. More importantly, I never set foot in any of their stores again.

About a year after that, the whole chain went under. Maybe I wasn't the only one their salespeople harrassed to the point they wanted nothing to do with the company anymore.

[Rapscallion]

The question for me on that one is whether they lost repeat custom by hassling existing customers, or if they were going down (often known about ahead of time) and harassed customers as a result of trying to stave off the end?

I would suspect the latter as even a fool in business knows that you don't piss off repeat customers. I'd be interested in how long after that the chain went under, though.

Rapscallion

[Kaylyn]

Regarding pushy sales people in the store, I once bought a used Gamecube and a couple games to play in the truck when I was driving over-the-road. I bought Legend of Zelda: Windwaker, and this was back when Twilight Princess was still a year or so away from actually being released.

Cue them asking me repeatedly if I wanted to reserve Twilight Princess. I told them no, they asked again. I told them no again, and added that I lived 2 hours away, I had a Gamestop in my hometown and if I were to reserve it, I would do it there. They asked me AGAIN, saying I could transfer the reserve when I got back home.

Now, I'm not usually a super-assertive person. But I looked the salesman dead in the eye and asked him, "Do you want to make this sale that's sitting right in front of you or not? Because if you ask me again, I'm canceling my purchase."

They didn't ask me again.

Ugh, I married a Gamestop assistant manager, I know everything they're required to push, but most are polite about it and respect your "no". Not that guy. I almost had to ask for a manager. I wouldn't have been surprised if he WAS the manager.

[MadMike]

The question for me on that one is whether they lost repeat custom by hassling existing customers, or if they were going down (often known about ahead of time) and harassed customers as a result of trying to stave off the end?

Yeah, the same question came up when I posted about being harassed at Media Play by three different salespeople about their rewards program, and finding them out of business just a few months later. I actually thought of that when I finished posting, and decided to do some research. Apparently MW started having their ups and downs way before I was even born. They also lasted longer than I thought they did. I thought the chain went under in the late 90s because that's when they all disappeared from my area, but apparently they still existed in some form until shortly after 2000 or so.

But I still stand by my original point -- these corporate types see that their pushy tactics gained them 10 customers and think that it works. But they don't see that they drove away 20 other customers in the process.