Weird sales calls from 3 mobile South Africa

digitaltoast

I got a weird sales call the other day, from 027112001100.
They said they were calling "from 3 mobile", and my heart dropped and I was about to hang up, but something intrigued me.

The call was not from China or India as 3 sales calls usually are, and they appeared to be almost able to form a comprehendible sentence and interact in my own language.
I instantly recognised a South African accent, and as I was out of contract, waiting for someone to come round, and after an HTC Desire HD and in the mood to play hardball, I didn't hang up.

Pretty soon, the sleaze started - "Hey Jon, so good to speak to you again. Remember I spoke to you a few months ago? I've been waiting to speak to you all this time, I remember what a nice man you were, I asked my supervisor if I could call you with a special deal", which was an LG GW520 and some reasonable bundle for £13 a month.
And I wasn't a "nice man" before, I distinctly remember being pretty damned rude as they wouldn't shut up or listen.

But I didn't want an LG, I desired a Desire HD. "OK, I'll pass you onto our manager here, he has a special deal for you".

Cue aggressive south african male pushing the same phone.
So I told him:
"You're not really listening to me - I keep saying I don't want that phone. If we can talk about the Desire HD, then we can talk".
Click. I was just about to hang up thinking they'd hung up on me, when I heard a third voice, this time a different SA female.
"Hi there, all calls are recorded, this is the department supervisor. Sorry, the other person had to take another call".

I asked if it was usual to be bounced around the office like this. All the time, it was difficult to hear any of them, as there was loud yelling and applause every couple of minutes.

By this time, I was just stringing them along to practise my "playing hardball with sales droids" skills.
But I still said "When you're ready to discuss the HD, then call me back".

At which point, I was passed back to the very first person I spoke to (Lisa?) who said they'd call back when they had any details of the Desire HD "probably in a couple of weeks".

24 hours later, the phone rings.
It's Lisa again - apparently, they had the Desire HD "in stock" now (5 days before others - impressive(!)).
She said she had a package for me of 500 FREE minutes for £32 over 24 months.
I notice they didn't use the old "free phone" phrase - presumably that's been outlawed now.
So a quick calculation and I said - "So, those minutes are free, this makes the phone £768, which is £300 more than I can buy it SIM free with not contract".

Long pause, then "What, you just worked that out?". She seemed genuinely surprised that anyone would work out how much a phone contract was.
"Yeah, but you get the minutes free with that", she said.
"So if the minutes are free, all the money is going on the phone. £768. That's a lot - call me back after the weekend if you can do better".

Not that any of this will be new to anyone, I just thought it was interesting the way that the tactics have changed - I remember when scammers used the term "line rental", until presumably the public woke up and thought "line rental? what line? this is a mobile!". Then they used the phrase "free phone", until someone presumably worked out that if the phone was free, then those minutes were damned expensive! Now they refer to "free minutes", which is even weirder because the more "free" minutes you have, the more money you pay for them. Perhaps I'm using the wrong dictionary.

Anyhow, I googled the number they called from, and it's right up there in the "whocallsme" charts - seems to be a "front" number for hassling sales calls from TalkTalk, Carphone Warehouse and many others.

I just wonder if they really ARE from 3 as they claim, or whether it's pure scam?

Hauptmann

I had a call from this number, supposedly from Three. Its a Jo'burg number.
I called the Three call centre and they said the call wasn't from the Three network, but possibly one of their sales agents. They said they don't have any call centres in SA.
I suspect it may be an agency working for CPW.

DanE2010

I have a 3 contract have done since 2008, have never had a problem with them *touch wood* and I have always spoken to someone South African so just assumed that is where there callcentres are based. There was a documentary on channel 4 a few years ago about the rise of UK companies using callcentres in South Africa so I think some other phone companies use S/A based callcentres too. Ive always found them pleasant and easy to deal with, of course they have sales targets and can be quite pushy but to be honest so are all sales people - had a call from EDF today trying to flog me some deal and she was like a dog with a bone!
Anyways in answer to your question the call was probably genuine as ive only ever spoken to a south african since ive joined 3

Hauptmann

Very strange. I have always found Three call centres to be either UK or Indian. Never had a call to SA.