In September 2011 we were feeling a little generous and gave some money to the Professional Firefighters Fund of Utah. What we didn’t realize at the time was were signing up to be harassed for the next sixteen months. At first it wasn’t too bad. They waited six months before they called again. By then, however, we’d found some charities we were more concerned with and decided we would not support the PFFU anymore.
They took no for an answer then, at least after a few calls. But a few months later they were back. They have been getting more and more persistent every time, and increasingly belligerent. They’ve even made soft extortion threats, indicating that if we give them money they’ll stop calling us for another six months. The last time they called a few months ago I told them to remove our number from their call list.
Now they are back again. It sounds like the same guy every time, too. They call every night, even if they spoke to someone the night before. I reminded them that I asked them to remove our name from their lists, and his response was “Why would you do that?” Tonight my wife tried to convince him we’ve got other charities we would rather support and he still wouldn’t give up.
They know we have no intention of giving them money. They can’t possibly expect that we will ever give them money at this rate. They can’t possibly be going through the list of every person in Utah in a single day, so they are singling us out for a reason. In short, they have decided to harass us simply because they can.
So let me warn you now–if you ever get a call from these people do not talk to them. Do NOT give them money. Hang up on them if you must. You will never be rid of these people otherwise–if even then. It’s frustrating. There are a lot of worthy charities out there. Why do jerks like this have to ruin it for everyone? But I’m to the point of exploring legal action. They’ve crossed a line, and I won’t take it any more.