Handling a Phone Call from Creditor

a tiny peek into our life, brought to you courtesy of one of our creditors:

Them: Hello. Can we speak with Jennie?

Me: Who is this?

Them: Can I speak with Jennie?

Me: (more emphatically) Who is this?

Them: It's Maria.

Me: We don't know any Maria (except Maria H. from church, but I knew this wasn't her.). What's this about? This is her husband.

Them: Can you hold on a moment?

Me: Sure.

Them: (muffled, to a coworker) Can we talk to the husband?. (then to me) This is regarding your _____ account.

Me: We cannot pay anything on that right now.

Them: We're showing a balance of $____ that's been past due for some time.

Me: (more emphatically) We cannot pay anything on that right now.

Them: We can even take a post-dated check over the phone.

Me: (more emphatically) We cannot pay anything on that right now. Here's the situation. My wife's not working, and I just filed for unemployment, and yet even with that, we're only able to concentrate on certain things like paying the mortgage, the car payment, gas in the cars, and keeping food on the table. I understand that these calls are sometimes monitored, so I'd like to say this to the person listening as well...

Them: (tries to interrupt)

Me: (continues, uninterrupted) ... it's not that we are not interested in taking care of our outstanding debts, it's just that, given our present circumstances, we're having to concentrate on other things right now. I understand that, given your nature of business, you'll probably have to make this phone call again, soon, so I guess we'll just plan on have this conversation again in between the times that we screen our incoming phone calls.

Them: I understand.

Me: Thank you and have a wonderful day. (click)