And there's a long pause (and then if your name is Javad Hashtroudian, like me, your name is clobbered - OK there you've lost any possible rapport) and a voice on the other side starts a canned pitch.

Or it's a robot auto-dialer, and says, "You've been selected for lower interest rates on you credit card - press one."

I'm a clinical hypnotherapist and coach - persuasion is my game - so I always listen and give the telemarketer a chance to be creative or go off the script. At the same time I know they are not allowed to go off that script.

I just got a call from a lady who did have quite a well hidden but still apparent Indian accent. I had to ask her repeat the name of a person a couple of times before I could understand who she was talking about.

Recently, I had bought a product from a reputable Internet marketer and the lady was telling me that I had asked him for money making ideas (or products) and I kept listening (even though it was touch to really understand her).

Can you email me some information or tell the web site I should go to?

If the information is any good they will answer you and give you with the website name or ask for your email (I don't know if I would have given it out - this is my test question). She told me that she had all the information for me.

So I kindly and gently thanked her (I don't believe in being rude to people who are only doing their best to earn a living - unless they start being rude and then I put the receiver on the phone) and said that I was not interested.

However, I never, never send money to charities I do not know from phone solicitation. I always ask for written information and the other person slams the phone down.

This was an Internet business which you would represent top companies and a list of famous multinationals was reeled off (I do remember Coke). I was informed that I would be earning hundreds of dollars by being online. I would get these web sites and the more I did something (I could not understand what she was saying) the more money I would earn.

Next she said, the more I would stay online the more I could earn. By this time I was getting bored and decided to end the conversation. I cannot remember if I asked how much it was going to cost or she said.

Anyway, the answer was seventeen dollars. Recently I had bought and returned for a full refund a supposed online marketing scheme as part of research for my don't be scamed blog. In that old awful ebooks were sold at extreme expensive prices.

I was curious to find out if this was the same product....