One type of pile-up management technique that bothers me more than
Danny's examples is the failure of the running station to acknowledge
the exchange sent to him. Some few think they save time by hitting a
key and having their voice or cw keyers send their call sign after the
exchange is sent to them. This leaves the station worked(?) wondering
if he was heard and is in the log or if the running station has given up
and is soliciting new QSOs. This leaves a number of stations (myself
included) calling again asking for confirmation that we are in the log
and causing QRM to new callers. Usually we are ignored (unless we have
a really big signal) and observation of the consistent operating method
leads to some comfort that maybe we are in the log after all. If a
really big signal insists on a confirmation, the running station (at
least on phone) shows irritation, but will confirm in order to clear his
run frequency of the guy who dares to insist on at least a "roger." My
own opinion of this technique is that it is wasteful. (I must confess
that I have caught myself doing this on rare occasion simply because I
hit the wrong F key and sent my call instead of "R" or "TU" and my
call.)
I think we all agree that the run station must acknowledge any
correction to avoid confusion and QRM on his frequency from stations
that he has already "worked." Trey's technique is effective if
consistently applied. If not consistently applied, you can't guess who
will or will not acknowledge the correction. I wish someone could come
up with a technique to combat the running station who doesn't
acknowledge the exchange, but I can't imagine how to do so except by
changing the operating technique by public discussions such as this.
73,
John, K4BAI/8P9HT.
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