Jon neglected to return a couple DVDs to the rental store on time and had to suffer the telephonic wrath of someone who bombarded him with 8 consecutive calls from both the store phone and his personal cell.

He reported the problem to corporate and was told it was, at times, company policy for workers to call customers from private phones.

He writes:

I recently had two overdue movies at a Family Video here in [redacted], MO. At 10:20 this morning, I received a call from the video store. 10 seconds later, I received another call. And another. And another. And another. After eight consecutive calls, I received a call which showed up on caller ID as “Jake P.” (name changed to protect the guilty), followed by another call from Family Video, this time with a voice mail message from “Jake”. I immediately went to the store and returned the movies, asking whether or not “Jake” had used his personal cell phone to make a call to a customer. Jake, who seemed to think the whole ordeal was pretty funny, confirmed that he had used his cell to call me, and removed my number from his phone at my request. I contacted Jake’s district manager, who claimed that in certain cases (although not mine) it is actually Family video policy to attempt to contact customers on personal phones.

It seems unethical at best and dangerous at worst. Is it legal for a company’s employee to load my information onto his personal cell phone? I would be equally mad if I were an employee instructed to make collections calls on a personal phone. I now have this guy’s full name and phone number, after all.

In case you haven’t heard of Family Video, its site says it’s a large chain, with 625 stores in 18 states, making it the second largest video store company in the U.S., presumably after Blockbuster.

What’s the greatest length a video store dude has gone to spur you to return your DVDs?

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