This is going to be a long post…
So, I decided to buy a car…
And that was wonderful for 2 reasons in that I now have a car and I have a new verdant source of scammers to hone my craft on.
Here in the US, insurance is bizarre in comparison to my homeland – there are multitudes of “agencies”, which equate to a few people signing up as resellers of an actual insurer and hammering your inbox, mobile device and snail mail orifices with pleadings for consideration.
I am convinced, and some of the locals have confirmed my suspicions, that many of these agencies and/or insurance companies leak information more rapidly than an Australian bogan leaks liquid excrement after drinking the local tap water against all advice to the contrary whilst holidaying in the runoff of an abattoir.
So after committing to obtaining an automobile, I needed to obtain myself some insurance to protect against the litigious nature of the world, and that’s when the “fun” started.
Mildly intelligent IVRs
For those who don’t know, IVR is a TLA for “Interactive Voice Response” – an overbuilt Dell PC feeds you prerecorded and/or generated voice responses after accepting key tones or attempting poor voice recognition.
I’ve had 37 calls in the last month from such devices attempting to “talk” to me about my insurance choices, with the opening line being “we’ve received some of your auto information”…
These are fairly easy to spot, with the most popular approach seeking to collect personal information for nefarious purposes in the same way that a ’90s adventure game attempts to direct you through a dialogue tree until you finally assemble whatever joke the writers were attempting to make.
That said, there does seem to be a way to eventually be escalated to a real human so you can let them know how you feel – just give them a name, date of birth and Social Security Number.
As long as it isn’t yours – feel free to pick and choose.
Unfortunately, the window for inflicting trauma on these awful persons is limited and fairly high effort
Alas, these bastards leak as well! Which leads me to…
Mildly unintelligent humans
This category covers a few areas:
- Extended car warranty
- Loan refinancing
- Insurance pleading
- Legal representation after accidents
So, in turn…
Extended car warranty
This is akin to a sod named Shayden (because their bogan parents could not stop arguing about the merits of the names Shayne and Jayden) attempting to sell you an extended warranty for your entry-level TCL TV for 50% of the price of the item itself after failing to convince you that you needed a $200 HDMI cable to facilitate your masturbation.
Well, it would be if the persons involved were mildly as capable as Shayden.
These calls all go the same way, and it is hilarious.
Some poor fuck tells you that your extended warranty is about to expire on your 2011 Tundra, 2014 Tacoma or 1986 Virginity.
The bestest example of enjoyment I have to offer here features no profanity, exposing belief to reality or sending a collection of my pubes to the caller.
As the caller said, “Hello, I’m calling about the extended warranty on your 2014 Tacoma. How much miles does it have on it”?
In response, being the considerate Arsehole I am, “How many miles?”
The scammer did respond with, “Yes, how much?”
Alas, the scammer knew not who they were speaking to – “No, I’m not asking for clarification, I’m correcting your pathetic command of grammar.”
There was crying and a breakthrough. As that happened, I hung up and went off to raise another chargeback against an airline.
Loan refinancing
Robots
The robocalls I’ve heard in this regard would be more comprehensible if delivered via a Theremin.
“Hello – we can reduce your auto payment. Press one to talk to our advisor.”
Those calls tend to go away before long, but the humans do not.
Humans
“Hello, this is Candy Diabetes calling on a recorded line about your auto loan refinancing to connect you to our loan officer as we can reduce your rate! Can you tell me about your loan and interest rate?”
Poor Candy…
After asking Candy about what rate she can offer me, she insisted that I can only receive said information after detailing my current situation to her and then speaking to whichever Kraft Cheese bootlegger she’s in cahoots with.
Upon uttering, “Candy, you’ve stated you can reduce my rate but then have backtracked upon your words – this is not a wonderful start to our relationship”, various things happen:
- Admission of “I’m just doing what the script says”
- WHY WON’T YOU TALK TO OUR LOAN OFFICER SO I CAN EARN MONEY?!?
- We beat you British in 1983 and we’ll do it again in 1997!
Plenty of fun can be had in the US insurance space.
Just not by those working in said space…if I’m involved.
Legal representation after accidents
The fun that can be had….
Just tell the caller, in extreme detail, that you can only orgasm whilst your mother sucks you off as your father has a camera pointed at your face whilst you’re expelling your bowels off a diving board.
Of course, this is an introductory example and you can obviously do better!