How to get revenge on the cold callers
COLD calls in the dead of night are a new – and illegal – annoyance waking victims from peaceful slumber. They are part of a growing nuisance call disease blighting nine out of ten homes. Here, The Mail on Sunday looks at how to fight back and banish these phone pests.
HUNDREDS of people were recently rudely woken up in the early hours of the morning in the picturesque town of Market Harborough in Leicestershire by a mystery automated phone call.
But their nightmare is just the tip of an iceberg. Last year, 22million households were subjected to a variety of nuisance calls.
This latest trick involved bombarding people with a sales pitch for home alarm systems. Other cold calls are for payment protection insurance compensation or general insurance, energy and market research.
Nuisance calls come in different guises – not just recorded messages generated by remote machines. They can also be sales calls from real people and ‘silent’ calls which are computer generated and leave the recipient hanging on the phone because there is no one free at the call centre to follow through with a sales pitch.
Although all cold calls are annoying, the various ways they are made means they are policed by different watchdogs.
AUTOMATED
THE use of electronic automated call machines to make cold calls is illegal without the phone owner giving explicit consent – no matter what time of day.
The Market Harborough residents were woken up between two and five o’clock in the morning just under two weeks ago because the call machine’s time settings were incorrectly set up.
Jonathan Stamp, funeral director at J Stamp & Sons in Market Harborough, was woken at 4.20am by one of these calls to his home landline. He says: ‘At that time of the day you fear it can only be bad news – perhaps a sudden death or illness in the family.
‘I ignored it because if it had been urgent my mobile would have been rung too. It disrupted my sleep but for many residents – particularly the elderly or vulnerable – it was disturbing. This kind of unsolicited phone pest should not be allowed to invade our homes.’
Given Jonathan did not pick up his phone, he was not subjected to the recorded message others endured. But even those who picked up the phone did not know who had called them as the number was hidden.
Automated calls to households by direct marketing firms – during day or night – are illegal under The Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations.
Despite this, they still account for about a fifth of all nuisance calls. The Information Commissioner’s Office is the watchdog that oversees such calls.
A spokesman says: ‘If people receive automated calls we encourage them to report the incident to us. We have powers to fine companies that are breaking rules.’
It says complaints relating to automated calls that ask you to dial a premium rate number are dealt with by watchdog PhonepayPlus.
TELESALES
MORE than a third of nuisance calls are made by real people on the end of a phone. If they ignore your requests to stop ringing, their calls can be blocked.
Most live marketing calls should not be made to anyone who is registered to the Telephone Preference Service. This blocks telesales and is run by the Direct Marketing Association, an organisation with more than 950 members.
Phone users who sign up to this free service should stop receiving unsolicited marketing calls from its database of members.
Unfortunately, the regulator Ofcom points out that this does not stop the possibility of you being bombarded by unwanted calls from overseas firms who are not members. Kate McGown, a spokeswoman for Ofcom, says: ‘We would encourage anyone to sign up to the Telephone Preference Service as a first step to stamping out unwanted marketing calls.
‘But you must be aware that ticking the wrong box – or forgetting to tick the right one – when buying services or items could inadvertently mean you are signing an agreement that allows companies to call.’
If you receive live nuisance calls after signing up to the Telephone Preference Service, tell the caller in no uncertain terms to leave you alone.
Complain to both the service and The Information Commissioner’s Office if calls fail to stop. As well as overseeing automated calls, the ICO regulates telesales calls.
SILENT
WHEN you receive a phone call and no one speaks after you pick up the phone, it is unlikely to be a heavy breather on the line – but a computer.
Silent calls occur when automatic dialling systems used by call centres make more calls than they have people available to handle them. It means you are greeted with silence then cut off.
On top of these are abandoned calls when companies ring and then simply hang up.
Silent and abandoned calls account for a third of all nuisance calls. The regulator that tackles silent calls is Ofcom. The record fine it has imposed so far is £750,000, handed out to home insurer HomeServe in 2012 for abandoning thousands of calls made when they were answered by recipients.
McGown, of Ofcom, says: ‘We take complaints about nuisance calls extremely seriously. If you have a silent or abandoned call contact us.’