Unsolicited phone calls / "Silent" calls

[Boris]

My favourites are those I get from :-

Tucan Claims

130 Aztec

Aztec West Business Park

Bristol

BS32 4UB

Although ex-directory and registered with the TPS, I must have had two hundred calls from them since Christmas - from a seemingly never ending variety of 0845 numbers.

All callers (when someone actually speaks) have foreign accents coupled with "English" names, and say in various ways that I have been mis-sold Payment Protection Insurance by my credit card providers and can claim compensation :) which they can get back for me ! I haven't been mis sold anything - as I have never been charged for Payment Protection Insurance.

If I was stupid enough to believe them then ..........

We prefer to give our clients as much of the money owed as we possibly can and so have opted for a small upfront fee of £249.99 and an extremely low backend fee of 10%.

/>http://www.tucanclaims.co.uk/charges

Depending how busy I am, I can have hours of fun running up their phone bills by

"not understanding" what they are saying over and over again,

asking them to hang on while I go to the front door,

asking them to "speak up" as I am deaf,

and other ruses.

They are really persistent.

How do you cope with them - I am running out of ideas to keep them talking :D :D

[-pops-]

Not plagued as much as you are, Boris, but I do get similar calls.

Perhaps the reason I don't get as many is because I leave them talking to themselves while I take the dog for a walk/have a shower/do the garden/whatever else takes my fancy. If they are still at it when I return I just go and start doing something else - perhaps the hoovering near the phone but they've usually given up by then.

I did engage in conversation with them once, a few months ago and they wouldn't believe that I didn't have payment protection insurance. They believed even less that I pay my credit card bill in full every month, that I only use the card(s) as a convenience against carrying cash and as an insurance policy in its own right when buying online.

[Belatucadrus]

Try asking them what their names really are, I have huge problems with Indian call centre staff who all seem to be named Robert or James. Either they've all had their names changed by deed poll when they got the job which is too weird for my liking or they're telling porkies which doesn't incline me to deal with them any further.

[-pops-]

The problem with asking for the "real" names on these spam calls is that a similar ploy is used by, shall we say, "legitimate" outsourced call services - which I also refuse to speak to.

[Lamb Chop]

We have similar problems in Oz - some of the Indian call centres get very nasty with people - and keep ringing their numbers and become nuisance calls - been reported on current affair programs a lot of times.

Our equivalent to BT has outsourced its call centre to Phillipines and my ISP is in Malaysia and Dell tech is in Penang - being a female if I get a male they cut me off because of course males dont lower themselves to speak to females and when I ring back always seem to get a female - who are far more patient anyway and usually speak clearer English.

We had so many of these spam calls mostly as you take your first bite of dinner in the evening that we went silent number which has helped and dont get hardly any but some do slip through as seemingly they target an area and then automatically call every number or so I am told.

We have a don't call register but charities are exempt and does nothing to stop the overseas callers whom all businesses seem to be outsourcing too.

Makes me really annoyed that - we are good enough to be their market but then they take these jobs out of the country which takes the wages out of our economy and income taxes less for services to the community. If I were in charge I would then make companies pay higher rate of tax on overseas profits. That would stop them going offshore. Currently 30c in the dollar so make it 60c in the dollar for earnings overseas - bet that would make a difference!