iLog – Amit Srivastava

We all must have played the missed call game at some point. Ok let me clarify. What I refer to a ‘missed calls’ in this post are not genuinely missed calls, but calls which are made to someone deliberately and with a confidence that the other party wouldn’t receive them. A missed call is usually one or two rings at max. Why would one do that? Hmmm.. I can think of the following by observing people around me:

• To play! Yes, I know people play this missed call game for fun.
• To convey something without spending a penny. Some people actually use this very effectively. One missed call means ‘I am fine’, two could mean ‘call me’, three could mean……
• It is a very popular means to pass on your number to someone. Well saves money and saves effort so why not use it?
• To tease someone or to disturb someone (please don’t do this).
• To show someone how many times you remember him/her in a day!!
• Of course when you run out of balance and just have enough to be able to call. You give missed calls in anticipation that the receiver would call you back.
• Oh I just remembered one more. When you dial a number, hit the call button and then immediately realize that you have dialled the wrong number, or you have dialled the wrong person.

Alright. I think these are enough examples some of which perfectly justify those missed calls. You can, of course, find many others. My aim is not to list down all possible reasons for missed calls on this earth.

I have recently come across a breed of people who use this as a cost cutting measure in their organization!! 95% of missed calls on my mobile are from those people. And I only share a professional relation with them. They would just give a call and ensure it doesn’t ring more than twice most of the times. It takes at least 3 rings to even take the mobile out of your pocket. So anything under 3 rings is a missed call. They know that I would call them back as I usually have a habit of wrapping a few things up in time (note that I said a ‘few’ things. I am sluggish at a lot of ‘other’ things).

Fortunately we are living in times where phone calls have become dirt cheap. Unless you run a call center, telephone calls are going to be  insignificant to other operating expenses. Why create a bad impression trying to save a few hundred bucks? While you do save a few bucks, you lose your reputation. I would prefer losing a few bucks rather than losing a billion dollar reputation.

There are tons of other ways to save communication costs. For instance use of instant messengers like gtalk or yahoo. Or use Skype, gtalk etc. for crystal clear voice calls. And all this comes free. You just need to bear a nominal fixed internet cost. So just be informed and innovative rather than resorting to the ‘missed call’ game in your profession!