If on your first phone call you decide to ask a prospect out on the date, you should already in advance have figured out potential dating locations and times and plan for a short hour date. You should arrange to meet in a place where you can easily leave after an hour if things don't go well. That rules out dinner; besides, do you really want to pay an expensive dinner for someone who you've never even met before?
(A) Kind of location. If you like to drink (glug glug glug!) a bar is a good location, and you can leave at any time. If you don't like to drink, coffee places are fine too. Note that some women may be turned off by coffee places, because they aren't fancy-fancy enough, but coffee places are good because (i) they are well lit so you can see who you are with (ii) they are reasonably quiet so you can hear who you are with and (iii) if a woman is turned off by a coffee place because it isn't fancy-fancy enough, you don't have to waste any more time with her.
(B) Location. You should choose a place roughly halfway between where you live/work and she lives/works. If you choose a location near yourself, she will think you're inconsiderate; if you choose a location near her, she may think you're too eager and/or a pushover.
(C) Timing. Arrange to meet for an hour after work sometime during the week. Not a Friday or Saturday night. For now, you want your prospect to think you are busy during these times.
Her reaction:
(A) She agrees. Then you're all set.
(B) She says she's busy for the next week; why don't you try her again next week?
It's possible for a person to be busy for an entire week... but unlikely, especially for only an hour's date. If she's "busy" for an entire week, it's a stalling tactic; she's seeing someone else (probably multiple people), and is trying to stretch things out; chances are if you call her next week she'll be busy then too.
(C) She agrees IN PRINCIPAL to the date, but says you must call the morning of the date to confirm. Nothing wrong with that, is there? After all, busy people with unpredictable schedules don't always know when they'll be available, right? Unfortunately, this is usually not the truth. The reason women ask you to confirm the "day of" is that they're really not interested in going out with you. They want to spend the next few days finding out if they can find someone else to date; only if they can't will they agree, at the last minute, to go out with you. They want you to keep that time available in case they decide to go out with you, and you'll find out their decision at the last minute. Whether they go out with you or not, the fact that you already rank so low in her list of priorities mean that any date you have with her will automatically fail; therefore, if she will not set a concrete date and time that doesn't require last minute confirmation, she's not really interested.
If she calls you back to cancel the date after you've arranged it, that almost always means she's not interest. Almost always. The exception is if she immediately wants to reschedule for another day within a few days thereafter. Her exact excuse (work, sick puppy, laundry) is unimportant; all the matters is whether she wants to reschedule on the spot for a concrete date. If she doesn't, or if she says vaguely "Let's talk next week", don't bother.
