Ways to stop overseas sales calls discussion

Paddy_Landau

newlywed wrote: »

We've had a few calls from indian call centers telling us our PC has downloaded a virus.

I don't use Windows, but I have a honey-pot Windows XP machine set up just for this purpose. It is set up to be very, very slow.

When I got the last scam call, I let him get onto that machine and played along. Because it was so slow, I could put my phone on mute and carry on working while he waited for the machine to respond ("Oh, your machine is too slow!", he kept saying).

I kept him on the phone for over two hours, and got enough information to be able to report him to PayPal and LogMeIn for abuse.

Not that it will make much difference other than a minor inconvenience to him, but at least it was over two hours not scamming someone else.

Eddi_the_Seahorse

A friend in Australia recently had one of these calls. He works with computers so knew instantly that it was a scam, but had a wonderful way of dealing with it. He simply said, very politely, "We have several computers in the house, so please can you tell me the IP address of the one which you believe is affected?"

The caller (who had a strong Asian accent) replied, "Oh, you too f*cking clever!" and hung up!

RESULT! :beer:

atr3dot14

When called I just say "oh it's not me you need it's the homeowner(/my father/whatever) just hold on I'll get him(/her) - I think they might be quite interested" then I put the handset on my desk and carry on with my life while they hang on until they eventually realise they've been had. Then after 10 minutes or so I hang up. The only slight inconvenience to me is that I can't take incoming calls until I have hung up but I don't get calls very frequently so it's no problem.
Additionally, if they are on an old phone system they can't call anyone else until I hang up!
If we all did that with every cold call they would get through so few calls per hour that it would become uneconomic for them and the whole thing would stop.

golddustmedia

A couple of weeks ago I wanted some rough figures for remortgaging so went online.

Keen to avoid getting spam calls I just made up a funny name. I tried Miss F.Ake but "F" wasn't deemed long enough, so at random I picked a grandparents name of "Fanny" and didn't think anything of it.

About 15 mins later the phone rang and a call centre op asked to speak to "Miss Fanny Ache", I immediately realised the amusing oversight and the childish nature in me came out and I started laughing. The call centre Op then apologised saying there had obviously been a mistake!

We've had follow up calls that have gone:

"Hello may I speak with Miss Fan.... oh, sorry to have bothered you" - this is typically a UK call centre that realises the wind up and gives up immediately.

Or the foreign call centres that ask to speak to "Miss Akee" to whom I say there's nobody here by that name.

I'm wondering how much fun I can have with rude or amusing names before the game is up?

Azari

atr3dot14 wrote: »

Additionally, if they are on an old phone system they can't call anyone else until I hang up!

I'm afraid that's wrong.

It is the caller who can keep the line open, not the person called.

It's very easy to demonstrate his for yourself if you get a friend to all you.

(Incidentally, some scammers make use of this by telling the less tech savvy person that if they don't pay they will cut their phone off. They then invite the victim to hang up and make a call. Of course, they can't as the scammer has not terminated the call.)

Bombay_Cat

Spam calls. I leave the 'phone off the hook to disable their line and have also tried the whistle technique. I've found the TPS seems to work by and large. The main number I was getting calls from was 01772733194. This belongs to Clear Debt Solutions and I put my number into their website so that it would be removed, and it was removed from their list of 'phone numbers and faxes. I filed a complaint online to TPS for 02074801980 and haven't had any more from them. I also rang SilentGuard on 0844-3722325 asking for calls to be stopped and that worked too. Check their website for information.

Shantiji

My daughter Roop had a job in the summer holidays, before going to Uni, working in a call centre. She had to make cold calls to people offering goods and services that nobody really wanted.

All day long she had to put up with people swearing, abusing her, doing long elaborate wind ups, making her think that she might just have a sale for once, or deafening her by blowing a whistle in her her ear.

She stuck that job all summer long to earn money for her uni fees, but at the end of the day, she would come home and and cry on her bed, just from the sheer weight of peoples unkindness.

I know the calls are annoying. But there is a human being on the end of the phone, they are probably a badly paid youngster trying to make college fees or someone in a developing country whose family depends on their income.

They have feelings just like you.

Please think twice before trying any of these mean tactics. People seem so ridiculously pleased with themselves when they have thought of a particularly creative way to waste the callers time, hurt their eardrums or spout rubbish to them - its really not such a victory.

its just a few moments of your time, yes it is annoying if they persist, but just imagine how it feels to sit there for 8 hours being creatively abused. It really, really chips away at your self esteem.
They are no new insults. They have heard them all before, over and over.
Say No thank you nicely,and put the phone down .

It won't kill you. No matter how many times you have to do it.

Coffinnail

There is an amusing side to this but is it really the case that there is no solution? After the latest "Your Computer has a Virus" call today I called BT. I knew the answer I would get from them, but if everyone who gets these calls was to call BT and it started impacting on their time then maybe they would be less complacent? I asked the person I spoke to log my displeasure and altho he said he would I wasn't convinced he would. He then asked me if I would be interested in switching to the latest BT Broadband package. I presume he, in turn, was having to justify the amount of time he had spent on the call with me. Call centres hey! LOL.

Diddlums

If I get one of these nuisance phone calls, I leave the phone off the hook before the caller puts their phone down. This prevents them making another call to anybody for as long as I leave the phone off the hook - usually about ten minutes.

Waste their time like they waste ours!

Eddi_the_Seahorse

Shantiji, you are perfectly right - I know exactly how you feel, because my son once spent a grim six months working on a Customer Services helpline. Each evening he came home emotionally exhausted at having to spend days on end taking the bullets for other people's mistakes.

I have always believed that anger shouldn't be vented on the poor stooge making (or taking) the call, but that it should be saved for the person at the top. So if I receive a cold-call (which isn't often, thankfully), I first ask the caller how he got hold of my telephone number. If he can't (or won't) tell me, I ask to be transferred to someone who can.

On the rare occasions when I do get to speak to someone in authority, I tell them that my number is ex-directory and TPS-registered, and that I never give permission for it to be used for marketing purposes. But then, these calls tend to come from companies who seem to think that although calling a TPS-registered number is illegal, this rule somehow doesn't apply to them.