Was this a scam?

itsthelittlethings

Just interested to know really. I hung up before I gave any details except confirming I was an O2 customer.

Received a phone call the day before yesterday. They said I was entitled to a 25% discount on all O2 purchases, to which I said "yes please" as I am an O2 customer. They then went on to explain that it was new contracts, purchases like tablets etc etc. The thing that made me really suspicious is that the background was extremely noisy, which hasn't tended to be the case when I've been called by O2 to sign a new contract in the past. This made me suspicious and coupled with the fact that it seemed to be new purchases I hung up.

So, was it a scam and they were going to try and get my card details to buy something new or something? Or was it O2 using a very poor quality call centre? What say you, MSE experts? I am curious.

born_again

Sounds like a 3rd party co trying to get business.

Call centres are noisy by the very nature that a lot of people are getting paid to talk.

akm2018

I must say that when I used to answer probably-scam calls (rather than using google call screening), "I'm from O2" seemed to be a particularly popular lie for the scammers to say…

flaneurs_lobster

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82132015#Comment_82132015

O2 have 24M customers in the UK, so that's roughly a 1 in 3 chance of the scammer / cold caller getting a hit on an O2 account holder on which to hang their spiel.

dumpster_fire2025

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6682809/was-this-a-scam

Quite often the "scam" is people purporting to be from a mobile phoe company but they're a reseller (usually a business service reseller) that gets you to sign up for a lengthy and expensive contract. It's possible it just an attempt to get card details but it's usually the former.

Exodi

If it was O2, it doesn't make sense why, upon calling you, they'd ask you to confirm you are their customer…

You'd think O2 would know who their own customers are.

Did they actually say they were from O2? It's common for cold callers to imply they are your provider, without explicitly stating they are. This isn't illegal, though definitely borders on immoral.

It could be a company that sells hardware just trying to sell you stuff for cheaper than O2 offer it, where they might still make a decent margin.

Or of course it could just be a foreign call centre desperate to get your card details so they can simply steal your money without giving you anything.

Our business gets it all the time - "We've just launched a new tariff which is cheaper than your current one" (they don't know if that's true of course), "Your insurance is up for renewal soon and we just wanted to check your requirements before sending the renewal offer" (again, they don't know actually know if it is), etc.

It's a tactic, as above chances of being an O2 customer are 1/3, so while 2/3 will hang up as it will be obviously a scam as they aren't O2 customers, 1/3 it will give an illusion of credibility (as it initially did to you).

I saw a funny advert on fb the other day that took this to the extreme… it was some sort of discount on a solar panel install… but they could only offer this special deal if you banked with Nationwide, Lloyds, Halifax, Barclays, Santander, Natwest, HSBC or Metro. When I saw it, it was obvious it was to give the illusion of exclusivity, yet it was flooded with engagement and when I read the comments I see people are commenting "Does it cover Monzo?", "Does it cover Chase?", "Does it cover First Direct", etc and expectedly the answer was yes to all of them. Who you banked with was clearly irrelevant, but the tactic evidently worked well.

I think the British public needs to get significantly better at recognising where they are being exploited (this isn't directed at the OP - they did notice), especially when AI might be able to perfectly synthesize human conversation - at the moment many people inadvertently on 'Indian accent+cold call=scam'.

born_again

If it was O2, it doesn't make sense why, upon calling you, they'd ask you to confirm you are their customer…

You'd think O2 would know who their own customers are.

Then take you through security 👍

itsthelittlethings

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82132055#Comment_82132055

Suspect it was this.

itsthelittlethings

They say they are from O2 and then behave is if they are your phone provider. If they are, they've duped you (and as pointed out above there are good odds they are). If you say "I'm not with O2" they've lost nothing, or can offer you to move to O2 with a discount.

itsthelittlethings

You say call centres are noisy but it's my experience that genuine calls tend not to be, and scam calls tend to be a lot noisier

mikb

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82132039#Comment_82132039

Scammers can filter the random numbers they are calling based on the opening digits, block owned by O2 are even more likely to have O2 customers in them, upping those odds considerably (exceptions: Port in-out of numbers to other providers, and calling a number "I'm from O2" "Yes but I'm a customer of giffgaff" … which leads to "That's ok giffgaff is O2 all same, let me scam you now …" lies)