I have a question I hope some you can assist me with. It's regards guys showing their numbers to make the intial booking - then reverting back to a witheld number to make subsequent bookings.

I have a couple of clients who have done this. I do answer enquiries from withheld numbers but make it clear they need to call and show their number if they want an appointment and location details. This has worked fine with chaps phoning from work, or sometimes their home number is automatically withheld and they just didn't know how to display it.

Anyway, recently I have had someone who called me from a PAYG phone he bought so I went ahead with an appointment. He now says he has lent the phone to a family member and only has his work number (which he doesn't want to reveal). This makes contact at time of appointment a nightmare - he calls early and I can't call back to tell him when I am ready etc. Another client said he was calling from a hospital payphone as he was visiting someone there........it meant I had difficulty putting the name to the voice.......and then he said he couldn't remember my address.

So how does everyone else deal with these things? Is it a case of they must always display their number even if you have met them before?

Well, on the part of the client who bought the phone, made a booking with you on it, then subsequently lent it to a family, I think that was a rather thoughtless thing to do. So are you saying now that if he's going to confirm he's going to withhold his work number which he doesn't want to reveal to you? Which in itself is fair enough. But how does he expect you to respond if he calls at an unexpected time? Sorry, I'm a lazy hooker and I wouldn't be arsed. If he was silly enough to give his only means of communication between the two of you to someone else then that would be his problem to rectify.

And the one who called from a hospital payphone whose voice you couldn't remember? I would treat that with extreme caution. There are some guys out there who, would you believe it, like to collect addresses. I don't know why. And some will call saying that they've seen you before and ask you for the address in full.
I don't give out my full address unless I know for sure I've seen the person before. And if I'm not sure then I'll give them the standard directions.
I don't trust anybody who says I've seen them before unless they go into more details. I'm good with details so something's bound to jog my memory.

Some days/times I only (and I am sure other ladies do this) pick up to guys I have spoken to before

God, I thought that was just me being lazy - sometimes I don't have the energy for the 'initial contact' calls but am happy to stop for a chat with someone I have met before, even if I am busy doing something else.

I do quite often answer withheld numbers during office hours as I get calls from people who don't always realise that their number is automatically being withheld but I don't get into a conversation, I always politely ask them to ring me back displaying their number and I will be happy to discuss a booking with them. Some do and some don't, although the ones that are genuine tend to ring back immediately - I know if I haven't heard from them within ten minutes or so that I might as well forget it.

The situations with the guys lending out the mobile/ringing from the hospital would bring out the lazy hooker in me too I'm afraid - when you can buy a PAYG for ?9.99 in Tesco, this doesn't sound the slightest bit plausible to me and is definitely making far too much hard work out of a very simple situation. Who would be nuts enough to lend his 'punting' phone out to a family member anyway?