Well, Stella your French accent must be miles better than mine - I get about as far as “Oui Allo?” before 9 out of 10 telemarketers presumably detect the awful English accent and hang up 
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You have my sympathy, Mandy. For the first couple of years here I avoided answering the phone, and if people left a message with the ring-back number it took me up to twenty listens to catch them and write them down.
Now, if I don’t know who it is “Vous êtes ?” will do it, and “Il s’agit de quoi?” will eventually unravel the mystery. It’s almost always a cold-call seller of expensive trash. “Ça m’intéresse pas, merci”. 
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The silence … on the end of the phone… while the telesales person decides which call to take next… that is a dead giveaway… and I hang up straight away… I’ve started giving my mobile number for contact… but many folk still use the landline number…so I have to dash and answer, just in case.
Used to have an answering machine… brought it with us from the UK… Oh I was so pleased when it finally died… most folk are naff at leaving messages (me too).
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Nous sommes locataires.
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I hate to admit it but hubby always answered the phone in our house until about 6 months ago. It was always a cold caller or a wrong number and on the rare occasion it was someone we needed to talk to then he dealt with it.
I’ve learnt to recognise a cold-caller and I just cut them off. There are some numbers I recognise so will happily answer those. The rest leave me panicking.
It’s great if I come home to a message as it means I haven’t had to speak to them!!
Like you I always repeat what they say to make sure I have understood. Did just that this morning with the lady who is coming tomorrow to buy my wardrobe.
@Peter_Goble I still struggle with numbers Pete. I have to listen to a message several times to get the whole phone number. Honestly, I am so rubbish.
Oh yes Jane. Works a treat every time especially if you add “d’une HLM”. They can’t put the phone down quickly enough, don’t even bother to say goodbye.
You’re definitely not rubbish Mandy… far from it… even after all these years… the Time gives me trouble … I repeat it back…and change the wording a little …quinze heure moins quart = quattorze heure quarante cinq… 
you get my drift…
they sometimes come back in English then, but I still double check and scribble frantically…
and telephone numbers… goodness when they say soixante… I’ve written 60 just as they continue “quinze” (75, blast) and I have to correct the number, while they merrily continue on. Nothing for it, admit defeat and ask them to say it all again… slowly…
but, it is all good fun…well, nearly all the time…
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I’ve had the same conversation several times with my neighbour about numbers and there was another time this morning when she phoned me with a serial number I needed. My problem is with numbers above sixty as I instinctively write down a 6 or an 8 when I hear soixante or quatre vingts spoken then more often or not I end up having to cross out the number and replace it with a 7 or 9. I particularly like it when people give phone numbers in pairs, slowly.
It’s something I struggle with but nothing like a strange as learning to tell the time in German where ‘twenty five past five’ is given as ‘five before half six’.
Stella beat me to the same thing!
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Ha! It’s not just me then!! Phew.
The time… I do exactly the same and repeat in an English fashion, so “trois heure trente” for example. So many people will repeat it in English for me, just as you have found.
With numbers I often say “un par un svp” and that makes it a lot easier. I hate having to give my social security number as its got a 99 and a 132 in it. I usually say “Je vous donne un par un”.
We should have a “tips and hints” section on here which gives practical advice like this. I’m sure people would find it useful.
Like Mandy I’m pleased that it isn’t just me.
What is it with French counting above 69, did they just run out of ideas?
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I believe they still use the “old ways” in Quebec…
I think folk simply do not understand that all of us (well, most of us) are doing our best/struggling or whatever… to speak French… and no one person is any better or worse than any other… so, never even think that… each of us has our own way of coping… that is the only difference.
I must add, that I “feel” extremely confident after a tipple… hic… so whatever gives you “dutch courage”… go for it… 
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You don’t have to go that far - septante, huitante/octante and nonante are in use in Switzerland and Belgium according to my notes.
And, if these are the “old” ways, why on earth change?!?
Hmmm, interesting - motivated to look into this as it has come up - and I found this explanation (source “the internet” caveat emptor)
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But, I’ve never been to Switzerland… nor Belgium… but I have been to Canada and thus I have an inkling about Quebec… 
The Belgians I know here… mmm… I’ve never noticed anything other than ordinary French…or English…
Interestingly one of the longest conversations I have ever had in French was with a Belgian. But it didn’t include any numbers.
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I been to both countries a lot but to be honest those numbers were never an issue. Of course in both of them you actually have to be in the French speaking parts for it to relevant anyway.
I remember driving for the first time over the French border into Belgium and stopping in Poperinge for lunch. It’s about four miles into Belgium. It seemed to me that everyone in Poperinge spoke Dutch, looked Dutch with Dutch haircuts, clothes and manners, ate Dutch food especially fries with mayo, drank Dutch-style beer in dark Dutch bars, and gave French-speakers a snooty Dutch look. They also lived in Dutch houses and drove German cars.
Oddly Ypres, a few kilometres up the road, looked and felt French.
Maybe it’s me that’s oddly 
I often used to pass by Ypres and Poperinge on my way to Calais. I used to cross the border at Steenvorte at a small, quiet border crossing. I’ve never stopped in Poperinge but have been to Ypres a few times including for a couple of Remembrance days. The French speaking part stretches from south of Ypres over to Liege and onto Aachen. I was surprised to find that there is a part of Belgium south of Aachen where the official language is German.
When I lived and worked near Aachen I used to tune into French speaking Belgian radio stations in the car.
I had a feeling you might know those parts, David, and yes the border is scarcely noticeable. There’s a hotel in Poperinge that is listed in the Good Beer Guide in UK, and dozens of little but illustrious brasseries dotted around for beer-lovers.
Ypres is well worth a visit but people with some recollection of WW1 are mostly now passed over, so tourism is in decline, it seems.
Good heavens… inadvertently I have told a lie… went to Ypres on a UK school day-trip… when they needed extra adults to keep an eye on the kids… 