Strange Phone call --how could it happen?

[The Annoyed Man]

I guess I don't really understand the logic behind starting off a sales call with a lie and a trick. I don't quite see how that is going to make anyone more receptive.

I'm not buying that it owes to a telemarketer. This has happened to us a couple of times too (Verizon land line) and I was as baffled by it as you.

I am inclined to believe it may be something like a check on the lines by the providers' service people or perhaps (in my case) a Vz computer.

Happens to me all the time, and ALL phones in my house are either VOIP (RingCentral) or Verizon Wireless.

[JSThane]

Thanks for all the replies.....it's just old normal AT&T. We screen all calls and only pick up for numbers we recognize. My wife only picked up this time because she thought it was me messing with her. A telemarketing scammer makes sense as we get such calls every day and we never pick up. Anyone calling we don't recognize, but has a legitimate reason to call, leaves a message if they really want to talk to us.

I guess I don't really understand the logic behind starting off a sales call with a lie and a trick. I don't quite see how that is going to make anyone more receptive.

It's a trick used by bill collectors, telemarketers, and scammers, who are in the business of illegally pestering people for money. Unscrupulous bill collectors might use it in hopes of fooling their target into answering the phone out of confusion. Telemarketers use it to mask their trail, especially with the Do Not Call list (unless you mark down date/time and then get the real caller info matching that from your phone company, it's as good as untraceable for them). And scammers use it to appear to be legitimate businesses in order to steal your money (the ever-persistent pests calling themselves "Cardholder Services" are one of the big offenders here).

The real downside to it is that the caller doesn't even have to be inside the United States in order to pull this scam. I've gotten some that I'm fair certain are calls from Skype accounts, set up to spoof state-side Caller ID.

It's up to you what you do about them; I'm becoming more and more in favor of wasting their time. Their systems will "listen" for you to say "hello," and confirm that a person, not an answering machine, is on your end, before connecting to the person on their end, or they'll have you press a number, etc. I like to do that, get connected, and then come up with some way of tying them up for several minutes until they hang up. Pretending to have a bad phone connection, not speak English, etc., are classics. Whatever you do, though, NEVER give out personal information! The moment they get one piece of Personal Identifying Information, if they're a scammer, they'll never leave you alone again until they can get enough to rob you blind.

[Keith B]

It's up to you what you do about them; I'm becoming more and more in favor of wasting their time. Their systems will "listen" for you to say "hello," and confirm that a person, not an answering machine, is on your end, before connecting to the person on their end, or they'll have you press a number, etc. I like to do that, get connected, and then come up with some way of tying them up for several minutes until they hang up. Pretending to have a bad phone connection, not speak English, etc., are classics. Whatever you do, though, NEVER give out personal information! The moment they get one piece of Personal Identifying Information, if they're a scammer, they'll never leave you alone again until they can get enough to rob you blind.

I had a friend that started that years ago, pre-cell phones. He got a call one day about replacement windows. He was on call for work, but had two lines in his house and he wasn't busy, so he just listened to their spiel. Once he had the info he asked a couple of questions to hook them into thinking he was interested. He then told the guy 'Let me go talk to my wife about it and will be right back'. He laid the phone down for about 30 minutes and went to do some other things.

When he happened to come back by the phone that was off the hook he picked it up and started to hang up but could tell there was someone still on the line. He said 'Hello?', the voice on the phone said 'What did your wife say?' Surprised the guy hadn't hung up he said 'Well, my wife wants to know about a couple of things' and then asked a couple of questions again about the windows. My friend then says 'OK, let me pass that info to my wife; be right back'.

He laid the phone down again for about 30 minutes, then comes back by and the guy is STILL on the phone! My friends says 'Well, I have the answer from my wife.' The telemarketer says 'What did she say?' My buddy says 'She says you have to be the stupidest telemarketer ever. I have laid this phone down twice thinking you would get annoyed and hang up and you have just sat there. I don't want any of your stupid windows, goodbye!' and then hung up the phone.

I guess some of these guys are so hungry to make a sale they don't care how long they have to wait or how much they have to lie cheat or fraud to make a buck.

[jimlongley]

As a telecomm professional of long standing, now retired, who also used to investigate such things, I agree with Keith, this is most likely a telemarketer spoofing Caller ID. Caller ID is NOT Automatic Number Identification, which the phone companies use to identify who placed a call, it is an "in band" signal, a little burst of data between the rings of the phone. If you could listen to your phone line (I can) when a call was coming in, you would hear the ring signal and then a little "modem tone" and then the next ring, and the spoofers are just replacing that information with their own.

I was a Transmission Technical Support Engineer, which is a fancy title for someone who is just a better than average troubleshooter and has some extra special equipment, at New York Telephone Company when we were running field tests for Caller ID, so I had CID long before most people had ever even heard of it. I got promoted to Technical Trainer at Bellcore in Illinois, and I took my CID equipment with me. The first week we were in our new house, we got a call from an insurance salesman, who was very rude when I told him that I charge a $100.00 fee for the use of my telephone line for marketing purposes. And then he called back, and I knew who it was because of CID, so I recorded each subsequent call. It seems that in his major insurance company office, he and his buddies thought it was quite a joke to call me up and give me fake names and laugh and laugh and say obscene and insulting things. Each call recorded.

I never got the $100.00, but he did lose his licenses after he was arrested and convicted of harassment.

I would do the same for anyone today, still use CID with full awareness that it is not ANI, and record all such calls.

[victory]

I remember when the phone company wanted to charge for caller ID. I might have been willing to pay for real ID like ANI but not for unreliable, easily spoofed misinformation. The telco rep seemed to be offended when I said I had no use for their fake ID.

[TomsTXCHL]

I agree with Keith, this is most likely a telemarketer spoofing Caller ID.

OK I'll defer to all y'all's expertise in this matter.

But as a telemarketing ploy it is wildly ineffective. At least, the couple of times it's happened to me (answered once, let it ring another iirc) there was no one at the other end of the line, and the next time they didn't even let it ring long enough for me to get to the phone.

How impossibly stupid are these people? Cuz as VM177 already said, I'm never going to talk to someone who'd trick me in this way.

BTW @victory -- Verizon charges some $12 bucks plus a boatload of taxes for CallerID for their land lines. Not cheap! And $6/mo just to Unpublish your telno!

[Jim Beaux]

I agree with Keith, this is most likely a telemarketer spoofing Caller ID.

OK I'll defer to all y'all's expertise in this matter.

But as a telemarketing ploy it is wildly ineffective. At least, the couple of times it's happened to me (answered once, let it ring another iirc) there was no one at the other end of the line, and the next time they didn't even let it ring long enough for me to get to the phone.

How impossibly stupid are these people? Cuz as VM177 already said, I'm never going to talk to someone who'd trick me in this way.

BTW @victory -- Verizon charges some $12 bucks plus a boatload of taxes for CallerID for their land lines. Not cheap! And $6/mo just to Unpublish your telno!

I switched my phone service to Time Warner and like it a lot. I have several options such as caller ID & call blocker. I can block up to 30 phone numbers (and that is a lot).

[Jumping Frog]

BTW @victory -- Verizon charges some $12 bucks plus a boatload of taxes for CallerID for their land lines. Not cheap! And $6/mo just to Unpublish your telno!

Why in the world would someone still get landline service from Verizon?

[Jim Beaux]

A lot of these scams, such as the 419 scams out of Nigeria are designed to weed out the skeptics and attract the gullible because the gullible are easier to scam. It takes too much effort & time to work a skeptic.

This link is to a website that scams the scammers. I have read some of Mr. Shiver Metimbers "work" and have had many good laughs at how long he can work these clowns and make them jump through hoops.

Enjoy

http://www.419eater.com/html/letters.htm

[RottenApple]

BTW @victory -- Verizon charges some $12 bucks plus a boatload of taxes for CallerID for their land lines. Not cheap! And $6/mo just to Unpublish your telno!

Why in the world would someone still get landline service from Verizon?

Alarm system, medic alert, storm prone area, etc, etc. All are valid reasons to have a landline (and no, VoIP is not a landline) and Verizon may be the only provider in that area. I work for U-Verse (for now. I've got something else in the works though) and I routinely recommend my customer who have the above situations get rid of U-Verse Voice or other VoIP services and go with a traditional POTS line.

[MechAg94]

I don't have a land line anymore and the silence is nice.

That said, when I did have one, it was surprising to me that some organizations would spook that caller ID to show nothing when it was someone I would answer the phone for. I think it was 12th Man Association who would call just asking if I was going to renew that year. If the caller ID would have said who they were, I would have answered the phone the first time.
The annoying part to me was the same telemarketing services would call your house at the same time every day for 2 or 3 weeks waiting for you to pick up.

[txglock21]

I don't have a land line anymore and the silence is nice.

That said, when I did have one, it was surprising to me that some organizations would spook that caller ID to show nothing when it was someone I would answer the phone for. I think it was 12th Man Association who would call just asking if I was going to renew that year. If the caller ID would have said who they were, I would have answered the phone the first time.
The annoying part to me was the same telemarketing services would call your house at the same time every day for 2 or 3 weeks waiting for you to pick up.

I too for the first time in my adult life (about 30 years) have no land line at my house for about 2 months now. I love it! The only downside is I have to carry my cell phone around the house if I'm expecting a call from someone. Before, I would get on average 10-15 calls per day from telemarketers at all hours of the day. I highly recommend it if possible. I know some need a land line for work or business, but it's great if you don't.

[Jumping Frog]

I don't have a land line anymore ...

I too for the first time in my adult life (about 30 years) have no land line at my house for about 2 months now. I love it! The only downside is I have to carry my cell phone around the house if I'm expecting a call from someone. ...

95% of the phone calls in our house are to one of the five cell phones.

However, I do keep a backup home phone. Have used Magic Jack VOIP for the last 3 years for $25 per year. Before that, I cut the Verizon cord with using Vonage at $25 per month for the previous 6-7 years (I lose track of the number of years).

If the Magic Jack was any more expensive, I'd simply drop it and be 100% wireless, but I can afford $25 per year for the convenience.

[2farnorth]

I keep my Verizon because their DSL is the only reasonably priced reliable internet access available in this area. The Verizon LL has been 100 % reliable. The only time it's really a problem is during the election season with the stupid robo-calls. The nice thing about a land line is they work even when the power is out (with a corded phone). Sometimes it takes 20-30 minutes for the power company to answer their phone to give them the outage report. My mobile phone is not reliable enough for that purpose.
We too have had our caller ID spoofed with our own number a couple of times, but the people/places that matter usually show correctly. We normally don't answer any calls from numbers we don't know. If it says "unknown" or "unavailable" it goes unanswered.
I had Vonage when I lived in another city but the stinking cable went out 2 to 3 times a week. That meant no phone when the cable was down. No way to report the cable outage!!!!
We don't Tweet, Facebook, or other social media and don't need an Iphone. We have a couple of Tracfones for traveling but their reliability has become more spotty in the last 2 years. They do have limited internet access but we don't use that feature.