A Couple of New Tactics Telemarketers are Using

Oh my gosh, I so detest telemarketers!  For years, they have bothered us on our land line even though we were on the Canadian Do Not Call List which is a total joke.  The CRTC really muffed this one up.  So when we moved, we got a new land line phone number.  Within 24 hours we started calls from a debt collection agency looking for the previous owners of our new phone number.  Man, they were beyond nasty so I blocking the calls.  Apparently our number went out onto Canada 411, something I quickly corrected.   Then as part of our move, I switched my cell phone to a pay as you go so now I had the great pleasure of paying for a debt collector to call my cell so I finally reported them to the CRTC.  The problem is all these phone numbers are recycled so if you happen to get one where the previous owner didn't pay whatever bill, you will get calls, very nasty calls even if you tell them you don't know that person but it does cost you money.  The simple solution is to not answer if you don't know the number.  Now I only answer my cell if I know the number. I set up a system with our kids that works well.  But now the telemarketers have a couple of new tactics they are using.

First, according to the CRTC newspapers can contact you for subscriptions.  It doesn't matter that we live in an electronic age where we can get information at our finger tips without ever using paper, apparently they can.  So, NCC (Newspaper Call Centre) has been pestering the living daylights out of us, calling multiple times daily as late as 9:30 PM.  I asked them to remove our phone number from their call list yet they persist.  Finally, I call blocked them.  This is really easy to do with our built in call block on our phone system and doesn't cost us anything.  All I have to do is hit menu, call list, save number to call block.  Easy, peasy. 

So, today I get a call from caller ID VO3081250500041 Out of Area.  I answered it an it was a telemarketer!  The guy went into his script then I interrupted and said I don't talk to telemarketers.  He said he wasn't a telemarketer.  I asked him if he was selling anything?  He answered yes.  I told him to quit wasting my time and hung up.  Now, this call is obviously from a Voice Over through the internet which means you cannot call block it by conventional means (eg. phone service, onboard features).  Now, I just heard of a popular online service that lets you make all the free calls you want in Canada and US in addition to the popular Skype.  If this is the case, the telemarketers have the upper hand for the time being.