The Geek Afterglow

A couple of days ago, I was travelling with a client when he was disturbed by repeated incoming calls from a landline, flashing on his mobile screen. Excusing himself, he picked up the call and after listening for just 3 to 4 seconds, hung up quickly with an expletive (which was unlike him). ‘Its one of those scam automated calls to pay some bill’, he told me, adding ‘they have become such a pain in the neck, I get these calls all the time, now I am going to block this number’, he told me, before resuming our conversation. Two things struck me about the incident. First of all, he did not even hang on the line long enough to know who was calling him. Secondly, he knew that it was for bill payment (meaning it was a legitimate call by a company that had permission to use his registered phone number), yet he referred to it as a ‘scam call’. Which is not very good for the customer satisfaction rating or the image of the company making these calls. Thinking back, like me, and