It may be sick, but it works
I have two main means of dealing with cold callers, and which I choose basically depends on whether I am the only one in the office (I'm the boss, but it doesn't look too good to mess around loads in front of staff).

In company, just start answering in a monotone, then cut them off dead and ask them about Jesus. I have a handy couple of pages ripped out of Revelation in my top drawer, and I find reading from them normally produces a dead line inside of a minute.

Quiet office: heavy breathing is a must. This expands into panting and if you rub your hand back and forth over some papers on the desk, the noise is quite realistic.
I have only ever had one caller stay with me through the whole peformance, and I was quite disturbed to discover he WAS doing what I was pretending to do (or he was a VERY good actor who likes out-hoaxing people)

I always knew that the Tiscali call centres were staffed by wankers, but I didn't know it was literally true.....
(justin7926, Thu 3 Sep 2009, 23:25, Reply)