Wednesday 9 January 2013

Cunning Callers

Have you ever received a phone call starting, “I’m calling about your BT/EDF/British Gas account”, only to discover some considerable way into the conversation that it is not actually BT/EDF/British Gas actually ringing?

The question is do the callers actually intend to deceive us into believing that we’re talking to our existing phone line provider/energy supplier, or are they just extremely bad at wording their calls? Personally, when I received such a call I only continued with the conversation because I believed that I was talking to BT about my account. OK, so the ‘rogue’ company got my attention, but fortunately as the conversation progressed I realised that I was not speaking to any representative of BT. But supposing I hadn’t worked this out – would I have been mislead into signing up for a new, unwanted provider, quite unwittingly?

That is certainly what happened to an elderly relative of mine. The name of her then phone company was clearly stated at the beginning of the call made to her, as was the name of a call plan used by that provider. Therefore, when she was given the opportunity to sign up for an 'improved' plan, she believed she was being offered a better deal from her existing provider, and verbally agreed to it.

This was outrageous! She is elderly, hard of hearing and not always as quick to think as she would like to be – but these companies seem to believe it is fine to ‘prey’ on vulnerable, potential customers in this way.

It certainly took me time to realise that I was not speaking to who I’d first thought, even with better hearing and a (hopefully) quicker mind.

It should not be permissible for such calls to be made. Companies should only be allowed to state their own name, clearly at the start of the call, and not introduce their sales pitch by naming other firms, which at best is misleading and at worst fraudulent.

Do take time to check very carefully who is calling when an energy/phone company rings, so that you don’t sign up for a dodgy deal by mistake. Sometimes when I ring a company, I have to quote a password, or at least an account number; perhaps companies that have legitimate dealings with us, should need identifying information that they quote to us too, to verify their credentials and stop other firms from claiming to be them.

What do you think? comments@shoppersjoy.co.uk

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