I should make this a series.
When you hear ‘this call is being recorded’, make sure that you remember to hang up when a call has ended. There are so many recording features in our day-to-day lives that we can often ignore/forget about them. Most businesses that offer any form of customer service use them. If you call banks, stores, doctors, etc… they all have them. If you’re making a call that’s being recorded, don’t forget to hang up.
Legally, any company that uses a recording software is required to acknowledge you’re being record. Something people don’t realize though (and this is a tangent), is that you’re also legally allowed to say you do not wish to be recorded and they have to stop the recording before the call proceeds.
Anyways, a good rule for life is to always hang up your calls. This is ESPECIALLY true when you’re on a call that’s being recorded. If you don’t hang up a call that’s being recorded, you will be continuously recorded for the remainder of time taken for you to figure out you need to hang up.
A STORY TO PAIR WITH THIS LESSON
On Tuesday I had another call with the man who thinks Canadians have polar bears for pets (you can read it here, if you’d like). Our company uses a call recording software so that we can refer back to the calls and not have to frantically type meeting minutes during.
Anyways, for those of you not familiar with how this type of recording software works, it’s essentially like having a third person on the line. The ‘third person’ is the recorder. However, because it’s software and not a person, it doesn’t know to hang up when I hang up. So, when I left the meeting at 41:03 and he didn’t, he was recorded for another hour and twelve minutes.
You best believe I was listening to that.
In the hour and twelve minutes he continued to record, he continued to be at his computer. His wife came in shortly after I hung up and started asking him about me. He referred to me as ‘a hardass’ and ‘just another stupid Canadian’. He said he’d have the deal wrapped by Friday.
He won’t.
He and his wife proceeded to argue about why he needs to deal with me at all, which turned into an argument about how the dog was barking because he never takes the dog outside and she always has to do it. Then he turned on a meditation session and proceeded to listen to it, followed by calling one of his coworkers.
I will spare you the details of what happened in the remaining hour.
By the end of the recording, one hour and twelve minutes after I hung up, there was a loud ‘Shit. Fuck. Shit. Shit. Shit. Seriously? It’s been recording this whole fucking time?’ Then he hung up.
Suffice to say, when a call is over… hang up. Don’t be ‘that guy’.