To be angry with companies telephoning me - and then asking this...

[PickledCauliflower]

Please give me your date of birth, etc for data protection purposes!

These companies appear genuine most of the time (though I still get telephone calls from obvious scammers about missed flight compensation and the like).

I am ultra careful when it comes to phishing / scamming, but despite this had both my bank and PayPal accounts hacked this year.
I only give personal details to companies when I have contacted them - and I know who they are and that they are who they are supposed to be!

Domestic and general have just contacted me, offering additional protection on my current policy for no extra cost. All fine and dandy but then asking me to confirm my address etc. I told the man I was speaking to that I never give personal info out to anyone telephoning me. I told him he sounded genuine but was not taking the risk.
I told him that I could confirm any details - if he offered them first but he said he was not allowed to do that.

So, these companies contact me on the number that I have given them - but then ask for all my personal details for data protection? Happens all of the time and I get so annoyed with it.

Adverts on TV telling us to be wary of scammers, but so many companies expect you to bleat personal details down the phone when randomly contacted!

Generally the sensible option Lizard although they may genuinely not be able to tell you what it was about /department name without DPA. This was a real problem for us - we were calling because people hadn't made payments, so our department was called "Collections". We couldn't disclose that unless we were sure it was the customer, cos disclosing that alone was tantamount to potentially telling someone they were in financial trouble.

We did a lot of partial data (last 3 digits of postcode/bank account), coming up with combinations of questions people were happy to answer (so maybe name, address, and what product the account was for), and so on.

Shazza

Of course not, I fully understand that, but was just saying why the operator/ agent may be a little frustrated. It isn't because you haven't fallen for some scam but because they can't do their job.
I'm the same when I get calls too and expect everyone to be on their guard.
my last night completed tonight and a record number of people asked for reassurance tonight, and I don't blame them.

I only ever did inbound customer services and could see everything, was funny when people questioned why I was asking for security info (one you called me, second to make sure you are the correct person I am discussing the account with).

Even then, with all the security done and the info we could see, we would never give out info, only confirm it - regardless of being 100% sure it was the account holder. So if someone asked what numbers they had called and if it was on their mobile phone bill, or what bank their direct debit came out of, they would tell us the info and we would confirm if it was correct.