Nuisance calls

[Harry Bloomfield]

Brian Gaff explained on 15/05/2019 :

Around here, NHS and doctors are well aware of these call filters and do get through the process.

[Jethro_uk]

Dump the landline. Even then, scammers are starting to call mobiles.

[tabbypurr]

If you simply block or put the phone down when they call, I expect they do the easiest thing for themselves which is call someone else and not alter their list. If you play games with them & waste their time I suspect they're then motivated to correct the list so they don't waste more time next time.

I used to get the odd nuisance call, occasionally I'd take the time to mess with them or just point out they were parasites that were so useless they failed to get a proper job & the calls soon dried up. I've had none in ages now. How to win no friends & influence people.

NT

[John Rumm]

Also a bit problematic is that is how your broadband arrives...

[TMH]

Over the last 2 weeks I've had a few calls to my mobile from normal looking numbers, some land line, some mobile. All I hear is a recorded Chinese female voice (in Chinese) with background music.

[TMH]

Don't know how it works, but a few of my customers have some sort of screening. If you call them it asks you for your name and they have the choice of answering or not.

[tabbypurr]

An old fashioned answerphone can do that.

[alan_m]

That's the Chinese secret service courtesy of your mobile supplier using Huawei equipment.

[alan_m]

That's one of the Trucall methods of filtering. You can configure the filtering to accept certain numbers, reject certain numbers or class of numbers. A fall back is that the caller gets a message asking to give their name. The recipient is then given the option of accepting the call, routing it to answerphone or dropping it. Trucall can be configured in a variety of mix and match filtering options.

[Chris J Dixon]

Or, they tick as many boxes as they can, so that they have a win-win: their stats are improved, and their revenge is you get lots of calls from whoever they sell your number to.

Chris

[Scott]

I think they were stolen:

[Scott]

I've got a mate and every time I phoned him I got the same rigmarole. I assume he hadn't set it up properly. I just stopped phoning. If I need him I just send an email. Maybe that is what he wants of course.

[Steve Walker]

I'm not sure what the point of them calling day after day, with different numbers is though. If I wasn't interested in the first call, I'm going to be even less interested in subsequent ones!

I've had this twice recently - although they did give up after I blocked each number used over the course of a week.

SteveW

[Steve Walker]

Our GP surgery is fine, but the hospitals all withhold their numbers. Why not send out the switchboard number, so you can recognise who is calling or whitelist them on your phone?

A couple of companies (financial/legal) that I deal with withold their numbers and will not leave messages (even when asked to do so) because of their "data protection policy."

SteveW

[alan_m]

There is the facility for a white list where all numbers in that list are routed through and the phone rings.

[Martin Brown]

It has a fairly deep list 1000 I think. Purging the oldest works for me.

Answer with dead air silence if you don't recognise the CLID number.

It fairly often causes the autodialer to drop the line but if you do get a human scammer on the line. It can be quite entertaining listening to them frantically try to get a response from their silent caller.

It turns the tables on them. Likewise with the "I'm from Microsoft scammers" I engage them for long enough to convince them I need to go and get the IT guy Fred to talk to them because I don't understand and leave them hanging optimistically on the line while I get on with my work. After a few minutes I hang up. I figure it ties them up for a bit and stops them exploiting someone who might be taken in by their spiel.

[billj]

Yes, but others like someone who happens to come across someone you care about who is dying waiting for the ambulance to show up who has that person still able to say what number to call may well not and by the time the ambulance turns up, it may be too late to show up in person before they die etc.

[billj]

Trouble is that by the time you get around to checking the answerphone, it may well be too late and the individual you care about may be dead.

[alan_m]

My call blocking phone has an annoying beep every 15/30 seconds if there is a answerphone message that hasn't been played.

My phone is set for call monitoring so I can hear what is being recorded on the answerphone so I can, if I wish, pick up the phone to speak to the caller directly rather than let them finish on the answerphone

I agree with other posters - 99% cold callers hang up on getting the outgoing answerphone message and don't leave any message on the answerphone.

[alan_m]

These phones have an easy way of allowing you to get through. You get an alternative message which requires a simple response from a human. This defeats spammers' automated diallers with associated recorded messages and 99% of cold callers who hang up because they have a long list of other numbers to call and cannot be bothered with a call that has already been intercepted by a machine. They prefer to deal with people who always immediately answer the phone.