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[geep]

Hi,

I pay BT £3.91 every month for a service called "Anonymous Call Reject"
At 10.50 today the phone rang - nobody there. 1471 says "We do not have the caller's number to return the call".

The other morning at 03:39am I got a call from an American woman saying:
"Press 1 on your telephone". Again BT said "We do not have the caller's number to return the call".

The incidence of anonymous calls definitely dropped when we started taking the "Anonymous Call Reject" service.
And I had previously registered with the Telephone Preference Service http://www.mpsonline.org.uk/tps/

It was so bad before that I had even written to my MP about it.
But I am getting fed up as we are now again getting two or three a week. The 03:39 call really got my blood pressure soaring.

BT tell me that they can't stop anonymous foreign calls.

Anybody else have problems with these calls?
Or know if BT could techically easily block anonymous foreign calls?

Cheers,
Peter

[toulouse]

Hiya geep,

I have had the same problems as you in the past. I'm with PlusNet for phone and broadband and I pay something like £4.00 a month for the Anonymous Call Reject. Since taking up that service the number of anonymous calls I receive are drastically reduced, but I occasionally still get the odd one from that American sounding lady 'instructing' me to press something on the key pad. I have seen a circular about this particular scam, which indicates that should you follow those instructions you start racking up minutes charged at something like £6.00 per minute. Apparently, there is nothing that UK based service providers can do about those calls originating outside of Europe. Whatever you do, don't press any key on your keypad, but I'm sure I don't need to tell you that. I hope you can get it resolved to your satisfaction, but BT were absolutely NO help to me when I was with them and was having this problem.

Good Luck


toulouse

[pintosal]

Hi, my solution to the problem of overnight calls is a small switch fitted to the phone to turn off the ringer. I removed the phone case, drilled a small hole for the switch, soldered it in line with the ringer and - hey presto!

When I'm in bed I don't want to be disturbed - on the other hand if I am expecting a late call I leave it switched on.

My handset has the normal calling number display feature, and in the morning I review and return any valid overnight calls.

[geep]

Just got another one. (This time asking for my son - how do they know he's on this number?).
A polite lady, seemingly phoning from Limoges, trying to flog him porcelain.

Now I like Limoges a lot - there is an excellent in-bar brewery near the Ibis hotel -
but I don't want to be cold called to buy porcelain.

The Information Commissioner's Office is pathetic on this topic.
They can only act if you know who called.

Now I'm on a 21CN network there must be the technology to know where the call came from.
If I was still on a 19CN network I'd just ask the operator.

Cheers for now...

[sevenlayermuddle]

'Number withheld' is not the same as 'number not available'.

Normally the caller ID is sent through the PSTN network regardles of whether the caller withholds it.  However, PSTN calls also carry another  parameter saying whether or not the calling number is to be disclosed to the called party.  The called party's exchange then decides, based on that second parameter, whether or not the number can be disclosed.

However some calls, such as certain international calls, will not have the calling number present at all.  That can happen where the exchange equipment in  the originating country is old or incompatible, or where the two countries don't subscribe to equivalent levels of privacy legislation.

I'm guessing that BT are (on request) blocking calls that are deliberately anonymous - ie number withheld, but there letting other calls, with no number present, through, as these calls mahy not be deliberately anonymous.

In any event, I'm not sure that blocking anonymous calls is going to help much, other than to allow BT to claim to be helping.  It's all too easy, in this day and age of deregulated telecoms, to find an unscrupuolous CP that will allow you to spoof the calling number, or to generate a call without any calling number.    And most marketing calls these days do provide a calling number ID, but if you call it back you'll find it doesn't say who it is and that it doesn'c accept incoming calls.

- 7LM

[BritBrat]

Also VOIP does not show a number and may say "International" I know this is true as if I phone my own BT land line number from one of my VOIP it shows international but another shows the correct CLID.

On another note I also have a 0844 number that I give companies using 084 numbers and even if they withhold their CLID I get an Email telling me the number that called.

I think it is great, customer revenge and get to know nuisance call numbers.

And if I can get witheld numbers you can bet companies can as well.

[sevenlayermuddle]

On another note I also have a 0844 number that I give companies using 084 numbers and even if they withhold their CLID I get an Email telling me the number that called.

I suspect (not sure) that may suggest the CP that hosts your 0844 number is failing to honour the 'number withheld' parameter, and so they shouldn't really have been allowed to connect to the UK network.  But for VoIP, who knows where the point of connection actually is?  Oh, the joys of deregulation 

In the USA, calls to freephone numbers always have the CLID revealed even if the caller withheld it, I believe, on the basis that the called party is paying for the call so they've a right to see it.  But in the UK, I thought caller's privacy was meant to take precedence, and that it was only law-enforcement agencies (line the '999' operator) that were supposed to see withheld numbers in the UK.

[BritBrat]

I suspect (not sure) that may suggest the CP that hosts your 0844 number is failing to honour the 'number withheld' parameter,

Depends on what the parameter is, if it is not to show your CLID on the call they do not breach that as I do not see the CLID when I get the call, but later I get an Email telling me the number that called.

[sevenlayermuddle]

@Britbat,  Are you certain you get an email even where the call originated in the UK and the caller has explicitly withheld his number by prefixing '141'?

I often withhold my number when calling companies I don't know or don't trust, or if I think I may get voicemail and don't want to leave a message or get a callback.  I think I'm entitled to assume that's effective.

[orainsear]

There is a device that you may be interested in - trueCall.  Basically you plug your phone into it and it blocks anonymous calls and quite a lot more.  I've no experience of it myself however it seems to get some decent reviews.