Cold Calling, best practice and defence?

[Keith]

Originally Posted by tourerfogey

HSBC regularly call me and ask me to identify myself before they tell me what I want. My response is 'If it's important send me a letter'. The letter has never yet arrived.

Trouble is it is not in your case the HSBC and if you provide the answer straight off they use your naivety to authorise them to the HSBC system which is the mechanism these third party companies (if they are not scammers) use to qualify for the initial contact payment before the hard sell begins

[Keith]

Originally Posted by tourerfogey

Mustn't forget that it's only some poor so and so trying to earn a living though.

Or a scamming thieving ******* crook trying to con info out of me to rob me blind:SHOCKED:

How do I know who is really at the end of the phone line

[WeeMan]

Originally Posted by tourerfogey

Mustn't forget that it's only some poor so and so trying to earn a living though.

Yes, but I'm never rude.......but totally agree with you. Going down the "what you wearing" route usually ends up with a laugh and a goodbye or a quick click! lol

[martin1973]

Or 6 months at her majestys pleasure

[Andyb123]

Yep had them and all the other such like double glazing etc. Over the years I have found it easier to just talk to them about anything but what they want. I usually start by asking if the weather is nice were they are and then change the subject to were abouts are you in the country. I just keep talking to them asking nonsense type questions, at the end of the day its their phone bill thats going up not mine.

After about two minutes they usually give up and just put the phone down on me, gives me a nice feeling to have beaten them at the game.

[JohnDotCom]

Originally Posted by Keith

Or a scamming thieving ******* crook trying to con info out of me to rob me blind:SHOCKED:

How do I know who is really at the end of the phone line

If the caller display shows Witheld (as most are), I tell them to redial to show there number, as most of these Morons work from home/office etc they don't want you to know their direct line.

Also a High Volume 10K signal down the phone line also normally does the trick, if you have a signal generator or recording kept by phone if not.
Bit more civilised than blowing whistles down phone and less effort I find.

[Rich]

Originally Posted by tourerfogey

HSBC regularly call me and ask me to identify myself before they tell me what I want. My response is 'If it's important send me a letter'. The letter has never yet arrived.

I go along this sort of route personally.

Whenever they ask me for security information, I ask them why they want it. The response is always so I can prove who I am at which point I ask them to prove who they are before I reveal any confidential information.

Surprisingly, not one of them has been able to do it yet...