Too many robo calls - I changed my phone number

[Nerd]

Yeh I did the TPS thing about 7 years or so ago, pointless, did nothing useful. I'd get the scam caller, tell them they shouldn't call etc. and they didn't care, just got fobbed off. Because... I ask where did they get my number from, they reply "erm.. it just came up on their computer" so has nothing to do with them or even under their control. Indeed our numbers are just computer generated and sourced from where? To bring legal action is going to be pointless.

Best I had, I told the guy I was with TPS and it's illegal for him to call and I convinved him that the legal action was going to be brought against him personally (he's holding the smoking gun) - he was almost in tears.

Sorry to hear about the no fault car crash, been there myself, stressfull getting it all sorted.

I guess I was lucky then. In my case it was annoying up to the level I was actually considering legal action. Please mind tho, Im a calm and polite type of a guy. I felt sorry for them as they are just doing their job. I have a friend who was working in call centre while in uni and he was emotionally drained because the **** he was getting from his customers. It stuck in my head but at the end of this I was screaming to them to **** right off.

With the car... the best thing ever happened to me to be fair. I was driving home after I dropped my kid to school, there was 2 guys driving a car on front of me, driving very slow. I though they are looking for parking so I tried to overtake him at one point, he turned my way and we almost crashed. I have backed of, stopped and waited. He stopped as well, selected reverse and crashed on to my car on full speed. And drow off. RTC scammer. I had a witness, there was CCTV pointed on this spot, I was covered. So back then I was driving 15 years old Peugeot 206 and I had my brand new car on order. I had a buyer for 206 for £200. After the crash insurance offered almost £900 for this. I remember when they called to tell me this. I was loughing and saying its not worth it, you overpaying, its worth a bag of crisps and a rotten onion. They still paid. I got my new car a week later and I was driving insurance paid car for the time being. So yeah, quite an incident but no drama otherwise.

They never found the guy, I think he had a fake reg number on...

 

[Gracekb]

I had a similar experience where I told the caller that it was illegal to call me and threatened legal action. It's amazing how quickly they back off when they think they might be in trouble!

 

[Triple Jim]

It's amazing how quickly they back off when they think they might be in trouble!

It was either that or they realized they weren't going to get anywhere with you so they moved on to the next number.

 

[WendyParr]

I often found myself in situations where my number was freely available. I understand how awful that is.

 

[SoniNiws]

I completely understand your frustration with robocalls. It's really annoying to constantly receive those calls, and it seems like there's nothing we can do about it. I'm sorry to hear that the TPS thing didn't work for you. It's unfortunate that these scam callers are so persistent, and they don't seem to care about our requests to stop calling. In order to solve this situation, you may need the help of special companies. It's a really helpful tool for those times when you need a free phone number for verification purposes. On a different note, I'm really sorry to hear about your car crash. I hope everything worked out okay for you.

 

[Butcher of Strats]

Five year old thread youda think dumbbots would be outlawed by now?

The robocalls that annoy me most are the ones where the bot says: I am pulling up your records (long pause) before getting on with it.

 

[crankmeister]

Anyone else?

My in coming call ratio was about 100 to 1 sales/regular. Remember back when we had 'unlisted' numbers? Now get off my lawn you young whippersnappers!

Yes. It was 5-6 calls/day from fake car warranty companies. I couldn’t stand the constant interruptions anymore.

It’s an awful combination of server hacks and companies selling your data. I’m much more selective about who gets my number nowadays.

 

[Mohlman]

It helps a little if you answer then immediately disconnect. That way it shows up on their side as successful, and it'll slow them down. A little.

 

[Dick Blackmore]

I only answer calls from my contact list. Everything else gets blocked. I get a a lot of text spam. I always answer with this ‘Your 200000 inheritance is still awaiting discharge. Please provide a 500$ PayPal deposit to unlock your 200,000. Reply Y for details’ I never get another one from that number.

 

[Robins]

Now I am tracking you
No, I am not.
Don´t fear the reaper.
Kidding aside I hate those ****bots, calling machines and guys from a country somewhere else.
But we had called for that. Some good things come with bad things as well.
The last advertising guy who called I told that I am a serial killer. He hang up and never called back. I laughed about that a few weeks later but I am bit afraid why it worked. I sounded too serious? it seems he believed me.
My voice is a bit deep but I always thought I sound like a nice guy at the phone.

Take care,
Robin

 

[tap4154]

I still have a landline number I've had some 30 years. Actually transferred it when I moved locally. However, I only keep it activated to use in case of emergency (911 gets my location from it), and pay a small access fee. I never make calls on it, or pick it up when it rings, and always use my cell, which gets very few robo calls.

 

[circles]

I have had no robocalls/spam calls for the last few years. (Did I just jinx myself?)

 

[pazman6]

I prefer to answer all calls and if I get to a person and the call is marketing/spam BS, then I do my best to sexually/vulgarly/racially harass them until they hang up. I find it brings a moment of amusement and joy. I really should record some of them - their reactions are pretty funny and every now and then you get a guy or girl on the other end that will trade "your Mom" jokes back and forth.

 

[rolandson]

We're old. We've a VOIP landline. Used to use a provider called Vonage

Because their little modem thingy ran through my computer, it was hackable...

My son wrote a program that would "answer and hang up" on any call that came from an unrecognized or anonymous caller, to give the robot that called the idea that the number was a "not a number."

The idea being that ... a human calling would figure something went wrong and call back, a computer would say f*k it and move to the next. So if the phone rang again within 10 minutes, from that number, it would go through.

Worked pretty good. Most of the time.
But then Vonage rsised their prices. A lot. So we fired them.

It doesn't work on the new voip.

Poop.
Sometimes I really miss the old days.

 

[Bazz Jass]

What the....?