Phone scammers

[Bluesofa]

Six days ago I saw an incoming call from an unrecognised number.
I asked my wife to answer it, as it's invariably a wrong number or a sales call. They'll all be in Thai.
It was a Thai announcement claiming to be DHL, saying they had a parcel for us, but we needed to pay the surcharge.
Needless to say the call was ended.
I looked up the number. It was a land-line from Kep in Cambodia.

Then two days ago I received a call another unrecognised number.
Another one my wife answered.
Someone claiming to be from AIA insurance. That was interesting because I have health insurance with AIA.
They started by asking my wife for my ID number and name. Fortunately my wife has heard about scams like this and she told them we would contact the AIA office ourselves.
'Click' - they put the phone down. No, "Thanks, that will be OK" or anything like that.
The number for that call looked like it was from Fiji, but there weren't enough digits from what I could make out.
They probably 'spoofed' the number - the caller falsifies their number to mask their malicious intentions. A common practice.

[KaptainRob]

My wife gets all sorts of odd calls too.  One yesterday from UK went unanswered.   In the good old days of landline calls which did cost the caller money, I used to say "hold on a minute" ... and put the phone down, walk away... 

[Bluesofa]

16 minutes ago, KaptainRob said:

My wife gets all sorts of odd calls too.  One yesterday from UK went unanswered.   In the good old days of landline calls which did cost the caller money, I used to say "hold on a minute" ... and put the phone down, walk away... 

Ha ha!
Years ago in the UK so many people had cold callers phoning their home land-line in the evening.

I used to do the same as you Rob.
When I answered and discovered they were selling double glazing or life insurance, I'd say, "Yes, I'm interested, but there's someone at the door. Just hang on two minutes, I'll be right back."
I'd put the handset down on its side and went back to watching the TV, which they could hear, so they knew they were still connected. I left them hanging on forever.
OK, it was a local, or perhaps national call, that a company were paying for.
The point was to waste the time of the cold caller as much as possible, to slow down the number of calls they could make. as they had wasted my time.

[Marc26]

17 hours ago, Bluesofa said:

Ha ha!
Years ago in the UK so many people had cold callers phoning their home land-line in the evening.

I used to do the same as you Rob.
When I answered and discovered they were selling double glazing or life insurance, I'd say, "Yes, I'm interested, but there's someone at the door. Just hang on two minutes, I'll be right back."
I'd put the handset down on its side and went back to watching the TV, which they could hear, so they knew they were still connected. I left them hanging on forever.
OK, it was a local, or perhaps national call, that a company were paying for.
The point was to waste the time of the cold caller as much as possible, to slow down the number of calls they could make. as they had wasted my time.

I built my business on cold calling, of sorts

 

Now, I work at an extremely reputable firm that anyone I was calling would know my firm

And want to do business with my firm and knew I had something to offer them 

 

So it wasn't just dial a # random cold calling

 

I really could offer them something they would need

 

But it was still calling someone I never met before

It kind of sucked a bit, well initially 

 

So I have a soft heart for cold callers

As long as they aren't scammers 

 

I at least try and hear them out for a bit

[Bluesofa]

31 minutes ago, Marc26 said:

I built my business on cold calling, of sorts

Now, I work at an extremely reputable firm that anyone I was calling would know my firm

And want to do business with my firm and knew I had something to offer them 

So it wasn't just dial a # random cold calling

I really could offer them something they would need

But it was still calling someone I never met before

It kind of sucked a bit, well initially 

So I have a soft heart for cold callers

As long as they aren't scammers 

I at least try and hear them out for a bit

You try and hear them out, because you do the same job. I'm assuming you feel sympathetic towards them.

If it's not random cold calling and you targeted someone, say in an industry that was relevant, then that's fine.
I used to be a buyer of electronic components, so I had people within the electronics industry 'cold calling' me. That was OK, as it was part of my job, and there was a chance I could buy from them in the future.

But cold calling residential numbers in the hope of selling something. No way.
As I said in an earlier post, so many people used to suffer it, and my response was to deliberately waste their time.

[Marc26]

3 hours ago, Bluesofa said:

You try and hear them out, because you do the same job. I'm assuming you feel sympathetic towards them.

If it's not random cold calling and you targeted someone, say in an industry that was relevant, then that's fine.
I used to be a buyer of electronic components, so I had people within the electronics industry 'cold calling' me. That was OK, as it was part of my job, and there was a chance I could buy from them in the future.

But cold calling residential numbers in the hope of selling something. No way.
As I said in an earlier post, so many people used to suffer it, and my response was to deliberately waste their time.

Yeah I don't do the same job

 

The people I'm calling want to do business with my firm 

 

But I still had to make a call to someone I never met

It's not easy 

 

I don't condone scammers

And I almost certainly aren't buying anything from anyone cold calling me

 

I'm just not rude to them.......

[HolyCowCm]

I had a 081- number call me twice today but I didn’t answer it. Searched it and it linked to Ireland. 

[OOber]

My wife and I get the occasional and fairly obvious scam call. They always ask to reveal private information.

But last Friday something new happened. I was contacted by a young woman via line. She needed Baht 80.000 by Monday to have her car released from the pawn shop. She offered to be my girlfriend and do anything for as long as I wanted in return.