VB reader Steve Parkes got in touch with VentnorBlog today to spread the message to the Island that he’d just received a scam phone call.
He said, “I’ve just had a phone call from a withheld number from some chap with a dreadful Asian accent claiming to be enquiring about mis-sold credit agreements. When I asked to speak to his supervisor he hung up: obviously a scoundrel trying to weasel out my bank account details and the like.”
We put it out on VentnorBlog’s Facebook page and got a lot of reaction from other Islanders that had also received scam calls today.
By way of a general warning, we thought we’d share them with you too, to spread the news.
- Kim Shell – Me too – watch out for the scammers phoning regarding gas & elec contracts too…
- Nik Taylor – Are we ever safe?
- Rich Baker – Had a great one once, tried asking if I’d had a free mobile phone. I hung up, at which point I was bombarded with 10 calls in 5 minutes. I answered and told them to stop harassing me, whereupon I was told I was “the most stupid person” she had spoken to. Charming!
- Caroline Morrell – Me too-hung up when I asked him who he worked for
- Sheila Thompson – I say that I will go and get the person that they want to speak to then forget to get them and forget to hang up the phone . Payback for all that piped music. I don’t get many nuisance calls now . Wonder why
- Alison Butcher – An elderly lady I know had a call from someone saying it had shown up something wrong with her internet security. She said oh yes I’ll just get details she came back asked if they had pen and paper ready then told them 1 I don’t have the internet, 2 I’m 80 and don’t want the internet and 3 I’m constipated. Then hung up. She still gets phone calls from them.
- Mandy Willmott – I’ve just had a call from an Asian bloke saying he was calling from Microsoft regarding the problems i was having with my PC, told him i wasn’t having any and he said a report had been sent to Microsoft from my IP Address stating that my PC had serious Issues, told him to F Off and he started giving me loads of abuse so obviously I hung up, did a dialback but surprise surprise the number was unavailable.
- John Heelan – A neat approach is to just keep silent apart from a few monosyllables and say loudly, apparently to somebody else: “Have you tracked this call yet?” It gets rid of them quickly and they don’t ring back!
- Jackie Hawkins – Yes Mandy I had that one too and he got abusive with me when I said I didn’t have any problems. I also got an east European sounding woman telling me I had been missold payment protection she got stroppy when I asked how she got hold of my details. Where are these people getting our phone numbers and banking and computer details from I’d like to know and what can we do about stopping it
- John Heelan – An alternative strategy is to show a lot of interest and ask them to ring your agent,” Dr. du Lidl” at his London office on 0844 225 1826 (Regents Park Zoo). It pees them off greatly! :-))
- John Heelan – @Jackie “Where are these people getting our phone numbers and banking and computer details from I’d like to know and what can we do about stopping it”. From off-shore call centres in India. What to do about it? Refuse to deal with any company that has call centres outside the UK as you have no legal protection against any damage you might suffer from their illegal activities.
