Unwanted sales calls

[AnthonyBlanche]

Despite being on the TPS list I am being plagued with calls from people trying to persuade me that I am entitled to a new boiler or windows or kitchen as some sort of government scheme. The latest was a recorded message from something calling itself the national windows recycling scheme.

Anyone else get these calls? And any suggestions how to stop them (other than not answer calls from withheld numbers)?

The FAQ page for the TPS is here. It says if you haven't given prior permission to receive a recorded message, you can complain to the Information Commissioner's Office.

For a live call you can complain to the TPS here

Thanks biscuit! I think I might just complain, they are really beginning to annoy me - especially as the whole thing is a scam.

Get a callblocker. Mine was £40 from Amazon and I hardly get any of these calls now. If I do, I say "no thanks", press the block button, and done!

Does the call blocker work even for withheld numbers Sychnant? If so I am definitely getting one.

My call blocker blocks withheld numbers. They are amazing. I now have peace.

It does work for withheld numbers, because you can configure it so people with withheld numbers have to record who they are before being put through, and having heard the recording, you can reject the call without speaking to them. In practise sales people always give up when asked to state their business to the machine, so your phone doesn't ring.

(I have a Trucall machine, the BT one is based on it, so similar, I believe.)

You can configure the machine to do different things depending on the time of day, whether the number is witheld or not, whether it is whitelisted or blacklisted etc. If number is not withheld I let calls straight through during the day as these are seldom sales calls, and if they are I can blacklist the number.

Thanks everyone I'm off to investigate call blockers.

1. change your number
2. block them

Which company was it calling you OP?

Withheld numbers go straight to answerphone on mine. So if it's someone genuine they can get through to you.

I no longer have a landline. Bliss!

My friend can do a master class. No suggestions for the recorded ones but she has a wealth of fun responses for the real people. From "Jesus won't let me buy over the phone" to "are there monsters there? There are monsters here". She also likes, "what's the weather like where you are?" for calls pretending to originate in Canada (where we live) because they invariably think it's snowing.

Ha, must try some of those, MrsTP! We get a lot, but they always get our name slightly wrong in exactly the same way, so it's a huge red flag straight away that it's a sales call. Most of them clearly originate from far, far away.

DDad kept Sky TV talking for half an hour before telling them that he didn't actually have a television set.

No idea which company Pirate. Probably several considering the amount of calls I get. I think the next time I get a live call I will get some information by pretending to be interested and report them.

Just a moment, somebody at the door, I'll get rid of them.

Wait about thirty seconds

Now, let me tell you, I'm at home but I've just phoned my office which is the International Fraud Investigation Division of OFTEL, we can have any call, even a mobile or withheld number traced in about ninety seconds and then closed while we investigate, if it's out of the U.K. we can block it from ringing any U.K. number, do you want to go on with this call?

Click. Gone. And they won't be back.

That's what needs to be done AntonyBlanche Zero tolerance. They prey on the elderly and vulnerable which is why I wouldn't hesitate to report them.

Hi Everyone, I am neither married (because women - invariably with superb taste and judgement of course - scream and run off!) and don't have children. I found this forum from a Google search; this thread about nuisance calls has been brilliant.
I have been getting these automated calls from the national windows recycling scheme. It says v little other than to proceed (or something similar) press 9 (?) or to stop the calls press 5 (?). Whatever the numbers, I strongly suspect if you pressed either you would have inadvertantly given them permission for them to then hound you even more - sell your number on or all sorts or far worse - preying on the vulnerable, of course. Vile cowards...
So, friends, the golden rule is NEVER respond to automated calls.
Anyway, I checked, and the number was witheld, which is illegal these days, isn't it?
So, getting v fed up, I did actually make complaint online to the Information Commissioner. Charming - NOT: it's like they took all the info and then made no commitment to do anything about it other than waffle about all info is useful in combatting scam calls etc. They might come back to me, but frankly I'm not holding my breath.

I'm going to get a call blocker (and how to set up etc) as you suggest - THANK YOU MUMSNET!

Lose the landline ?

We did this 18 months ago, and the world hasn't ended. Just changed details with doctor and various hospital departments and off you go.

Wow! I just looked at the dates in this thread. We've been getting these calls for about 2 weeks now and I'm horrified they are still out there if you were reporting it over a year ago. Well I guess I'll try reporting it but doesn't leave you with much faith in the system.

We changed phones to the BT call guardian phones to solve this irritating problem.

www.amazon.co.uk/BT-Advanced-Blocker-Cordless-Machine/dp/B01BWMWTM6/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1498246087&sr=8-2&keywords=bt+call+guardian+phone&tag=mumsnetforum-21