Fake Collection Agency calls

[cdnbabybubba]

Ok so the past few days there has been messages on my answering machine saying press 1 if this person is you, press 2 if you know this person, press 3 if this is not you or you do not know this person.
It was getting annoying. Anyways 10 mins ago I got the call (and actually picked it up) and pressed 2 as the name they gave was my husbands and didn't know what they wanted.

WELL....big mistake. I got :
HER-"Hello what is your phone number?"
Me ""well you just called me wouldn't you know that""
Her- I need your phone number?
Me- I just want to know what company this is please
"Her- Maam I don't have time for this what is your phone number
Me- What company is this?
Her- (yelling now) GIVE ME YOUR PHONE NUMBER!!
Me- No who is this
Her some mumbling (no idea what she said) and then she hung up

So me being me decided to *69 and call her back
Her- Hello
Me- Hi, It's me again
Her- WHAT IS YOUR PHONE NUMBER
Me- What company is this?
Her- yelling at the top of her lungs some profanity and hung up

By this time I should have let it go.....but I didn't.....I called again (can you tell I'm bored while on mat leave)

New woman with English accent- Hi there can I get your phone number please
Me- What company is this, we have been getting calls from you for the last few days
New woman- We are a collection agency maám and it is an auto dialout so I need your phone number to see your file
Me- (gave the phone number)
Her- Is this your husband? we want to talk to him about his solo account
Me- He doesn't and never has had a solo account
Her-Oh I'm very sorry we will take you off the list (and then she hung up)

Take me off the list...like a telemarketing list.....hmmm fishy. We dealt with these people last year......be careful everyone.
Here is the phone number to be aware of (or call if you are bored and want some entertainment) 1-888-441-0442

[miztia]

haha thats funny that you were able to harass them right back!

[anisa]

haha
i'm not a forward person, but when these dimwits call my house and try to be startasses, i let forth my inner pottymouth and tell them what's what

don't call MY house and try to act all snotty!

ps, thanks for the number lol! will have to note down for those lonely, rainy day afternoons when nothing good is on hehe

[aoffman]

High-Five!

[Natalka]

Hm... I guess you aren't the only one. They do collections for Telus Mobility, TD Bank, etc.

http://www.phoneowner.net/PhoneOwner...41-0442/1.html

[ashmaster]

Also; Autodialers are illegal.

[fame4ever]

Yeah my parents made the mistake of "taking a message" and now they get calls all the time. I've told them to tell them I don't live there and hang up. I ahve changed my mailing address 5 times with telus mobility and they still send my bill to my parents address. I don't owe much and will eventually pay, before it ruins credit too much, but I called the collection agency and told them I would be paying Telus directly and was told they have my file now and I can't pay telus. I told them if Telus wants my money they will take it, and I will only pay them no middle man. I then called Telus and told them to send the outstanding bill to my home address which I have changed 5 times. The gal asked for the updated address again and I said really?? There is no where on record of it being changed? I guess its not that important to Telus. You find the updated address and I'll pay.

I recall a text about texting my new credit card, which I thought was weird b/c it didn't expire for a couple of months and yeah like I'm going to text that kind of information

[taxsavey]

Press *57 after you hang up. It automatically traces it and is recorded to the police. If they do this 3 times, you can charge them formally. Scam artists!

[Gratuit]

What is *69?

[momof3heathens]

*69 allows you to hear the last number that called your phone.
*57 allows you to forward a # to the police department only for harassment charges. You must be prepared to follow through on charges.

[Insane]

When I worked collections, we'd sort of cold call. We would call a number that might belong to the person and call and see if we could get a hit. We did that for skips. They could have used 411, found his name and number and decided to try and see.

[wpgafwife]

great tips guys. I have had calls like that in the past. I don't have the patience to deal with them for long but after a particularly bad incident with one of these calls last year (I was going through counseling for PTSD and was easily upset at the time) I found a solution.

I use Primus VOIP for my home phone needs. I have my handsets just like any regular phone but instead of hooking them up to a phone line, I hook them up to a box that is connected to my internet.

As part of the Primus service, I have an online portal where I can see call logs, forward my calls, do call treatments such as 'find-me', 'go direct to VM', 'Virtual Ring (where it sounds like it's ringing - to the caller - but it doesn't actually ring through to my home) etc. I logged into my portal and checked the call logs to see the offending call, then added a call treatment and forwarded it to the same number, meaning anytime they would call me, it would forward to their own number and presumably be picked up by one of the many folks doing the annoying calls.

When I get a couple of those calls from different numbers, I just forward them to each other etc.

Strangely, I haven't had any of those kind of calls in the past 6-8 months now.