How Bizarre!

[NHGal]

We have a new phone system here at work, well, it was new in August.  So you would think that all the bugs have been worked out.

I took last Friday and this past Monday off and when I came back to work I had 12 new missed calls.  Nothing unusual.  The unusual part was that most of the calls were from the outside and since our incoming phone line hasn't been upgraded, the caller ID on the phone doesn't work so I had no idea who it was.  I did have one message though and it was this: "Hi this is Joe (garbled).  I see that I missed your call.  Call me back at xxx-xxx-xxxx."  I was trying to think what Joe I would have called and couldn't come up with one.  So I didn't call back.  I figured that he mis-dialed and not a big deal.  That was Tuesday.

When I came into work yesterday morning at 730 after leaving the office at 415 on Tuesday night, I had 13 new missed calls.  Now that is unusual.  I looked at my missed calls history and they were ALL unknown calls and in some cases more than one in the same minute (our phones tell us to the second as to when a call comes in).  I had two new messages.  Both of them were along the lines of Joe's message from the day before - that they had missed my call and to call them back.  Now I am really confused.  All of the crazy calls came between 5 and 9 PM.

All day yesterday I am waiting to get one of the weird calls, but none come.  About 515 or so, my phone rings and it says unknown caller.  I was pretty sure it was my husband seeing where I was, but it wasn't.  It was a weird caller.  She didn't say anything at first and I thought that it was a telemarketer, but she eventually started speaking.  She wanted to know who I was.  I asked her the same thing, but she said that I called her, which is when I said no, she called me.  She said that I had called her and when she picked up the connection was broken so she called back.  I don't know about you, but if I don't know who someone is and they are calling me and the connection is broken, I don't call them back.  I told her that I had been getting this lately and that I didn't call her. 

So I am trying to finish up a project and I was working late and I got two more phone calls like that where I was able to speak to the person.  I had an additional message that was the same thing.  I also had a number of missed calls where I was away from my desk.  And with every message or person I speak to, it is the same story.  Missed calls, weird messages, my number.  I haven't had any calls on my outgoing call history to numbers that I haven't called and only to people I know or are doing business with.

We have VOIP phones here and hubby thinks that there is something with the switch - though I have no idea what that means.  IT doesn't know what is causing it and since they don't know what it is, they can't fix it.  So I guess I should change my voicemail to: "Hi, you have reached Jessica Bright at Charles River Laboratories.  If you are calling me back because you have a bunch of missed calls from this number, don't leave a message and don't call again, I didn't call you.  If you are a client of mine, please leave your message after the tone and I will call you back."  But I don't think that will fly with the management!

[DanyielJ]

Dec. 18, 2008 at 9:15 AM

I like your new message.  :)  There are times I wish I could leave messages that mgt wouldn't not approve of.