Whatever happened to telephone etiquette?

Dear Heloise: Thank you so much for your wonderful hints. I have enjoyed them for years. Also, thank you for letting us vent. I work in a small bookstore, and is there anything called telephone etiquette anymore? To give you a few examples:

• Do not chomp on your gum and blow bubbles while on the phone, as it is very loud and we cannot understand you.

• If you have the hiccups, please call back, as we are open from 9 to 9, and again, we cannot understand you.

• If you are at work, please call when you are on your break, as three- or four-way conversations are hard to figure out. Are you talking to me or to someone in your office?

• Do not put me on hold, as I more than likely have customers in the store waiting for me to get off the phone so I can help them.

• Please do not have your dog on your lap. If you let your dog bark into the phone, it is painfully loud for us.

• And one for the in-store customers: Please come in and get your book before dental surgery. Do you think we can understand you with a numb mouth? —A Reader, via e-mail

Dear Reader: I, too, sometimes wonder if plain ol' phone courtesy has gone into the black hole! Good points for us all to remember.—Heloise

Dear Heloise: Whenever I get a bill for a subscription renewal, I check prices on the Internet. If I find a better price, I call the magazine's customer-service line and ask the magazine to match the price. So far, they've all said yes! —Kelley Sanderson, Chipeta Park, Colo.

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Send a money-saving or timesaving hint to Heloise, P.O. Box 795000, San Antonio, TX 78279-5000, or you can fax it to 210-435-6473 or e-mail it to Heloise@Heloise.com. I can't answer your letter personally but will use the best hints received in my column. © King Features Syndicate Inc.