nuisance phone calls

[wendyl]

I am not sure if this is the right place to pose this question but perhaps somebody can help. We are registered with the telephone preference service and so no longer receive many calls except occasionally 'international' Can anyone tell me if companies are getting round the preference service by using call centres abroad. Recently I received an international call from a debt management company the caller asked for me by first name starting with 'jolly' chat about my day. I had car insurance with Norwich Union for several years until they used similar call centres abroad - now I won't entertain a quote from any company answering in this way. However, I recently insured with them through the Post Office- at least that way I did not need to speak to them direct. I am trying to work out what has 'triggered' the call. Is there a way to stop these 'cold calls' from abroad? Any similar emails are sorted as 'spam' and deleted forthwith

[ACtheTROLL]

Hi

how's your network? ;-)

you got it in one .... international call centres are immune - but if you press to speak to a supervisor .... blah blah you can force a "repreve"

my favourites at the moment are ....
Caller ID - I don't know anyone living abroad ... so it's reasonable to ignore them.

Answer machine .... you can hear them and so be certain .... but they never leave a message.

Answer the call ... say "oh one moment someone at the door" .... (my record is over 4 minutes to hang up)

Be really abusive ... effective after a long day ... and the cat isn't half as nervous these days.

Or the ultimate .... go XDNC (ex directory ... no calls) you don't appear on any lists released ... even BT can't contact you unless it's a fault or you have initiated the dialogue.

It would take time for the calls to dry up using your existing number ... you'd really have to change your number which is a bit of a pain - but once it's done ....

My business line is xdnc and never ever rings ... (I do give the number to shops for delivery etc - but it's never been passed on) the home phone never stops ringing !!

[redcrx]

i asked about international calls when i signed up to the TPS last month.

Apparently they are still not allowed to call f you are on the list but they may not be up to date. Just advise them that you will report them if they call again unsolicited

[squarebear]

A lot of these calls start with a brief pause of silence (I assume that's when their machine registers a catch and puts them through). If any call starts with a few seconds of silence I immediatley hang up.

[VillageVicar]

This is so unfortunate. It's becoming a real problem in our country. The only way you can block these calls is by subscribing to BT's call blocking service. It's a fee based service that blocks any calls you wish, including withheld numbers. But it also extends to international calls. Sadly, because most of my calls are international I can't do this. We use caller display as well, but from overseas, in 99pct of the time, the number will not display - only some calls from Europe and the States display and I don't quite know why.

Once your number has entered the 'sub continent' call list, the only way it will be removed is if it costs them money! Otherwise, saying 'no' means nothing. Saying the person is dead only means they will call back to the next owner of the phone.

This is how I stopped my calls...and to this day, it still works!

http://bigworldsmallboat.blogspot.com/2006/06/ perseverance.html

Best of luck

Fr Bill

[wendyl]

thanks folks I usually do what redcrx does and for the particular call recently politely declined to listen to him and said 'goodbye'. At present they are not enough of a nuisance to consider changing our phone number with all the problems that would cause but if I'm not too busy I may try the 'keeping them on hold a long time' suggestion.

[VillageVicar]

Redcrx: When we first started having problems I too joined the TPS. However, I was warned that their boundaries were only as far as our borders. They had no control over international callers, which made sense, of course.

These companies sell on the details to other companies, especially in the area of mobile phones, insurance, time-share, and most exasperatingly lottery-fraud.

http://bigworldsmallboat.blogspot.com/search?q =we%27ve+just+won+the+lottery

There's a link at the bottom to the Metropolitan Police Fraud unit, but that would apply only if you start receiving lottery-type calls from abroad. And right now, if it's only a trickle, rest assured, it will grow.

I wish you well

Fr Bill

[society]

My method of combating this problem is to set up my fax machine to pick up on the second ring. I look at the callers' Id to see if I want to answer the call, otherwise I just let the fax come on. They usually give up after two times.

[B00]

May I suggest you all aquire a toddler from somewhere? I just pass the phone to Mini Boo, she spends ages babbling away to them- it's brilliant.

[redcrx]

B00 does mini-boo tell them how shes just done a 'biiiiiiiiiigggggggggg pooooooooooo on the toilet'?

Mini CRX did that one day when one of my customers called my work phone lol

Vicar, i thought that international calls werent covered by TPS so thats why i specifically asked when i registerd by phone. I was assured they are but told that many try and claim otherwise. I had a call this morning and the nice foreign guy (called brian, yeah right) asked if i could give him a moment to answer his questions. I agreed that i would after he allowed me to ask why he was calling me when i was on TPS. He apologised and removed me from their listings immediately.

Hes only one of about 5 calls ive had in last month so TPS is doing its job! :)

[B00]

Could have been worse Red- he could have told them you had!

[redcrx]

Thats true lol

my ex husband once brought my mobile into the bathroom when i was in the bath because the customer on the call sounded urgent. pmsl

[VillageVicar]

Redcrx: I suppose the simple way to think of it is that the laws of our country cannot be enforced in another�although the Americans have different views on that.

What you may have experienced is a responsible British firm that has outsourced some of its telephony services to the Sub-continent. If they are sincerely representing the UK company and upholding the company�s ethos, then certainly they would withdraw your number. And rightly so.

Where it becomes obscure where products are being sold. For example, T-Mobile sell their services in conjunction with phones. Some think of it the other way � they sell phones with their services. Nevertheless, it is a combined product. They don�t really care who the sales merchant is. They just want their services used, which just happens to come with the phone. Those types of businesses are, more or less, commission based or net price plus mark-up based businesses. T-Mobile can honestly claim innocence because they have no contract with the actual merchant.

It�s an extremely frustrating experience for most of the nation. And it�s representative of our eroding borders.

I wish you every success

Fr Bill

[wendyl]

sorry all I think answers to this are getting a bit silly and OTT and not my intention at all. The fact they used my first name was a concern and who or what might have triggered this particular call

[kid_no_all]

right some how they have got you name and phone number proberly public knowledge e.g phone directory it is strange they used your first name tho but when they ring up say immeditally im not interested can you take me off your calling list then ahng up cos thats how i stopped mine i dont get any calls anymore

[wendyl]

thanks kid_no_all a similar call yesterday "politely declined survey" plus one from Daily Telegraph again for me and phone book listing not my name believed I was a reader or former reader - never have been - they lost interest but I have their number perhaps I should report to TPS

[markjclark]

Yes, one way to prevent these calls is to simply block the caller. When you do this, there is a possibility that the caller tries to call you from a different number. To get rid of all this, you should enquire about the caller and register a complaint against him. It happened to me also and I used nz who called me to know the name and further details of the caller. You can also apply the same technique!
For more details, you can visit https://bit.ly/2qqD158.