Best comeback to scam callers?

[Losingthewilltolive999]

I’ve been called four times today by the ‘National Crime Agency’ to be told that my national insurance number is about to be revoked.

The number is a normal mobile number. I rang it back once out of curiosity and a lady answered whose elderly mother has also been on the receiving end of this stuff - it seems they’re mimicking other peoples numbers so it doesn’t just show as ‘unknown caller’

It makes me so annoyed. Is there anyway to inconvenience these CFs? If I don’t hang up will it hold the line and waste their phone bill? Or should I just come up with a good comeback?

I string the car crash ones along for a while before telling them the crash I was involved in was in 1985.

I do have fun keep saying 'sorry I don't speak Spanish / Afrikaans / Korean' till they put the phone down.

say "nem beszelek angolul"

that ought to do it
(that's I don't speak English in Hungarian)😁

I sometimes go along with the conversation then pretend that I am stupid - to the extent that a recent scammer said 'what the fuck is wrong with you'! Made my day.

Don't you just hang up? Why do you need a comeback? They don't care what you say, they aren't sitting in their scam boiler-room giving out awards for most amusing potential scam victim

you could always try ominous heavy breathing

I keep them chatting as long as possible to amuse myself and waste their time, so they have less time to harass vulnerable people. Last time I had “DCI someone“ from “Cardiff police”. My response, “that’s so weird, I’m DCI Stevens and I also work at Cardiff police station”. To be fair they cut the call very early on that one.

My gran used to blow a whistle down the phone to weird breathers/scammers (20 years ago)

The best thing to do is just hang up.

I know I should just hang up and get on with my day but they make me so annoyed! I think it’s because I’ve had the same one so many times.

I definitely will try the heavy breathing down the phone. Might also sing them a song.

Last time I told ‘officer Alan’ my name was Winnie DiPu but he did twig, albeit five minute later.

I remember a brilliant one once where I kept some idiot on the phone for 30 mins praising them for their amazing coloured diamonds (a scam that turned out to be led by a lad from TOWIE). The scam was that you invested in their 'coloured diamonds'. I looked up their website during the call and it was hilariously bad. I should have been working really but it was just too tempting. So after a half hour of promising them a huge investment and telling them how talented and clever they were, I said 'only one problem, I only have £10 to invest' and they hung up on me

Have you tried asking them what they’re wearing?

I play along for a bit going “ooh that does sound bad” etc, then I say “can I ask you a question” in my most serious voice. When they say yes I say “how do you sleep at night, is this the life you wanted for yourself, did you just not play attention is school, are your parents proud of you, do you even tell them what you do” etc till they hang up.

If you can be bothered, you can spin the conversation for a good 10 minutes acting the dizzy old lady -
And then tell them to fuck off.
They usually switch off the fake charm and tell you to fuck off, too!

Blow a whistle down the phone.

If it’s PC scammers, tell them you work for Microsoft

I read once that they track the numbers that answer and the length of the call (much the same as any call centre) and keep trying the ones who have long call lengths.

I just hang up. Goodness knows why any of you bother to engage these people.

I had the national crime agency.

I said I was on the run and how did they get this number snd they hung up.

I'm going to ask them to FaceTime me next time.

I've excitedly said to an operator 'from BT' that I'm so glad they rang, because my husband is a BT engineer (he's not) and could they please talk to him? Click.
My mum pretends she's mad. 'Have you got my handbag?' She screeches. Click.

I ask them does their mother know what they do for a living, is she proud of them? Generally get an abusive response.

For anybody interested, there's a couple of episodes of the Reply All podcast called Long Distance that's pretty interesting on this topic.

The host flies to India to hunt down the call centre calling him and talk to the spammers.

Mil will say playing funny buggers again are we. If she gets several in a day eventually she says piss off and the way she says it is really amusing!

My number was used a month or so ago. Had three irate calls all of whom said ‘who is this?’ Because they had received scam call abkut ni insurance number. I was incensed and said ‘we’ll you called me so who are YOU?’ That went on for a bit. Second caller and I worked out the same my number was showing in their screen even though I had nothing to do with it. It’s pretty frightening really.

strawberry is Reply All absolutely the best podcast. That story was great. Favourite ever ‘shipped to Timbuktu’ ‘boy in photo’ etc. Never really understood the awful drama which happened last June. Didn’t even understand their explanation and apology episode as it was all so oblique and never spelled out who had done quite what ! Glad it’s back. Astonishing reporting and stories.

I've had a few scam callers recently saying I called them. My number appears to have been cloned, it's pretty common.
I like playing with them sometimes..
Were you in a car accident recently?
Yes.
Were you injured?
Yes. Fatally.

Takes a while