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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Hello, you have a problem with your router

70 replies

LumelaMme · 18/08/2015 15:28

I was expecting a call so I picked up the phone. It clicked and whirred, and then,
'Hello, you have a problem with your router.'
'No, I don't.'
'Madam, you have a technical issue with your router.'
'No, I don't.'
'Who told you you do not have a problem with the router?'
'Well, me, because it's working just fine.'
'I am calling about this problem-'
'No, you're not, you're calling to waste my time.'
'No, madam, about your router.'
'You're wasting my time but if you want to sit there and waste your own time too, that's fine by me...'
'Click.'
AIBU to be getting so bloody rude to cold callers?

OP posts:
cleanindahouse · 18/08/2015 20:54

My dad repeated "no. No. We no have no windows in this house, it is very dark" when the guy phoned from microsoft error reports called from india. I cried with laughter.

dontcallmelen · 18/08/2015 20:56

Last cold call I had "hello madam you have recently been injured in a car accident" me - " yes thats right my head fell off" not had a call since.

AuntieStella · 18/08/2015 21:02

"I want to talk to you about your accident"

"to whom do you wish to speak"

"I can't say, data protection"

"then how can I put you through"

"I want to talk about your accident"

"OK whose accident?"

"I can't say"

"then who should I put you through to?"

"Why you keep asking me this?"

"I'm a switchboard. Which extension do you require?"

"Stop wasting my time"

CigarsofthePharoahs · 18/08/2015 21:03

Pretend to be a phone sex line and ask for credit card details to continue to talk to them.

cleanindahouse · 18/08/2015 21:05

Ask them what they're wearing

Ethelswith · 18/08/2015 21:07

I'm currently fuming with BT. I was at my (elderly) DM's when they rang asking if she would like to return to them.

I overheard her telling them this twice, with mounting frustration, and she's too old school to just hang up. So I grabbed the phone, and said the call was causing distress and what was it all about. Person said again about returning to them, so I said in my best icy tones that the customer had already said at least twice they were not interested. What else did they want to speak about? Response: "Oh. Goodbye"

Icimoi · 18/08/2015 21:09

Friend of mine got one of these calls at her work: she works in a firm of solicitors specialising in personal injury claims. So when she got the call offering to help out with her accident claim she told the caller that, given where she works, she can get her claim dealt with without charge and without any danger of costs being taken out of her damages, and asked whether they could beat those terms. They rang off.

QuestioningStuff · 18/08/2015 21:18

I had one that still makes me so angry. Got a call from 'PC Mark Croft' at XXX police station saying they'd arrested two suspects that morning after they'd been trying to use my debit card to make various purchases. Shat myself. Then realised my debit card was right there in my purse.

He gave me all of his 'details' and asked me to hang up and call 999 as ask them to double check his details so he can ask me a few questions. Apparently he then would have kept my phone line open some how so it would have been him on the 999 call so he could go on to collect all my bank account details.

I hung up and rang 111 from my mobile and reported him. He was in the papers of my local area recently, he's been jailed after successfully using this scam on several people including a 94 year old.

There is a special place in hell for people like him and I'm so glad he got caught.

Lweji · 18/08/2015 21:19

What really pisses me off is when nobody answers. It leads to me leaving them speaking to themselves on the line if they get through.
not a great story, mostly place marking

Lweji · 18/08/2015 21:28

Ah, door cold callers.

Once, I had booked for the engineers to install optic fibre Internet thingy. They arrived early Shock and I had not yet arrived home. As I got there, I noticed their car, but went through to the block of flats so that I'd have a few seconds to settle. They ring the door downstairs, I open it and shortly after the flat front door rings. I opened it to be faced with a cold caller from the same company. I barely had time to say that I was expecting the engineers who were just coming out of the lift.

LavenderRain · 18/08/2015 21:35

We have registered with the TPS but still get calls,
The other night was a classic and not one I've had before. It was an automated call asking me to press 1 if I want my BBQ cleaned Grin

I get daily calls from a lifestyle survey bloke who will not take no for an answer. Every day we have the same conversation
Me; I've told you I'm not interested in your survey
Him; please mrs.... Just answer and I will not phone again
Me; no Thankyou please go away
Him; repeat earlier sentence over and over and over
Me; can I have your phone number so I can report you
He puts phone down

And now, when the accident people call I tell them yes I had an accident and unfortunately I died Grin

I don't open the door to chuggers, I don't care if they can see me sat watching TV. Just piss off.

Gruntfuttock · 18/08/2015 21:37

QuestioningStuff how were the police able to identify and find him?

bigbluebus · 18/08/2015 21:42

I had one of those 'technical department' calls the other day. I told the caller that I had no need for their 'technical department' and I suspected that his call was a scam and that he should not be ringing as I am registered with TPS but as he probably wasn't calling from within the UK, he probably wasn't interested in that fact.
He thanked me for calling him a scammer and hung up Hmm

AnneElliott · 18/08/2015 21:44

Glad to hear that others are rude to cold callers! The guys from Microsoft crack me up. Last time I told them they'd got through to the Met control room and that Interpol were tracing the call. They couldn't put it down fast enoughGrin

QuestioningStuff · 18/08/2015 21:46

grunt no idea. I'd completely forgotten about it til it turned up in the paper.

SideOrderofChips · 18/08/2015 21:46

We've been getting the microsoft scams.

DH is microsoft certified. so he answered the phone one day. And asked them all sorts of technical questions until the scammer just said 'You work in IT don't you' and hung up

SingingTunelessly · 18/08/2015 21:54

TPS is rubbish. I got so fed up I bought the call blocker phone. Wonderful. If it rings I know it's somebody I've put on the allowed list and (most probably depending how I feel!) won't mind speaking to. No more dashing to the phone to get some rubbish about my non existent accident. Bliss.

Lweji · 18/08/2015 22:00

Just remembered there was this time I was so fed up with a certain company's cold callers that I rang their main office just to waste their time and complain about them cold calling.
The receptionist helpfully said I could call customer service. To which I replied that it was premium and I'd be dawned if I gave them my money, while calling their land line number was free to me.
Funnily enough I don't remember calls from them after that.

WandaFuca · 18/08/2015 22:21

Apparently, scammers who target older people, especially in the way that QuestioningStuff describes, are getting their info from paying for the full electoral role, which shows people's ages. That's a very nasty misuse of information. And given that DH and I are retired, we could possibly be targetted in that way as others have been in this area.

DH answers the phone when he's here. I let calls go through to the answerphone. DH is alert to the various scams, as I read about them here on Mumsnet and pass them on to him. He either winds them up or tells them to piss off, depending on his mood.

Pedestriana · 18/08/2015 22:28

We had one the other day from someone who said he was called 'Charles Smith' and was offering us a discounted office line (DH works from home).
I said, "OK. We get our phone line for 99p per month, its VOIP. Can you beat that?"
Charles: "Wow........99p?"
Me: "Yes, so I don't think you can help?"
Charles: "Wow. 99p. That's really cheap. Wow!"
Me: "Yes. Bye then"

FWIW, we do actually pay 99p pcm.

FryOneFatManic · 18/08/2015 22:33

QuestioningStuff

The scammers keep your phone line open with a very simple trick. It works on landlines, don't think it works on mobiles.

When the scammer tells the victim to hang up and dial whatever number, the call doesn't actually disconnect. This is because on land lines, the person who dialled initially must disconnect the call.

The victim thinks they have hung up, but the caller hasn't, so the phone is kept open and when the victim is dialling the number they've been given, it's not connecting to anything, because the original call hasn't been disconnected. The caller simply mutes the phone then unmutes it to make it sound like a new call.

If you're ever asked to ring a certain number to verify something, use a different phone line, or mobile.

FryOneFatManic · 18/08/2015 22:36

WandaFuca* I thought the full electoral register is restricted? I've only heard that the edited version is available to buy.

We've opted out of the edited version.

Anniesaunt · 18/08/2015 22:41

There was a scam round here at the beginning of the year. They phoned up elderly people claiming to be from their surgery, told them the Government had posted a new law

Hassled · 18/08/2015 22:41

Our landline is in DH's name, which I didn't take on marriage (use maiden name for everything). So when they ring and say "Am I speaking to Mrs Bloggs?" I know it's a scam and just hang up - they can only have got Mrs Bloggs from reading the phone book and then making some assumptions.

But reading these replies I'm beginning to think I should start to engage. Sounds fun.

VeronicaCheeseBoard · 18/08/2015 22:48

When my DM started to get scam calls I just turned the ringer on her phone off. DM would get really upset by them and found it difficult to be rude. She could still make calls. I asked family and friends to leave a message on her answerphone and she would return the calls.