CTS Lawyers and accident claims: Anyone been called by them?

[eastwestdivide]

Welcome to the 21st century, where the landline is rapidly becoming a liability.

I'd say over half the calls on my landline are claims firms, PPI or otherwise, or else "your computer has a virus", or some recording that I can't even snap back to.

... by having ye enter thy PIN into thy telephone handset...

Slightly off-topic, and not wanting to seem "holier than thou", but the usage was:
thou - thee - thy
and
ye - you - your
for
nominative - oblique - genitive
!

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Is there no restriction whatsoever on personal information held by one party as a legitimate mode of requirement for the services of that company then being resold (no doubt with thousands of others) to a third party.

What exactly is covered by the requirements of the Data Protection Act 1998?

 

[Greenback]

Without going into too much detail Paul, the intention behind the DPA 1998 was to provide protection from people passing on (usaully for a fee!) personal information to third parties.

It regulates that personal information may be held if it is relevant to the business being carried out by the parties concerned, but there are limits on how that info can be used and who has access to it.

As an example, I handle a lot of documentation containing personal information fo all types. I can use the information for any pruposes connected with my role as long as it is relevant to the reason why the individual supplied it to me, and I can pass the information on to other people who require it to process whatever it is that the individual has supplied it for.

What I can't do is to use that material for my own personal gain, or to allow it to be used by others who are not entitled to have access to the data because they do not to have it or they are not legitimately part of the process for which the information is to be used.

In order to guarantee this, we have technological features that prevent unauthorised access, we have to log out of our PC's if they are unattended, and any cupboards or cabinets containing paper based information must be kept secure.

I was thoroughly trained in many aspects of the DPA 1998 in a previous role many years ago, so some of my recollections may be a bit fuzzy now, but I hope the principles of it are still correct!

 

[william]

Can you find out who a number belongs to if you get a hold of one?

 

[SS4]

Is there no restriction whatsoever on personal information held by one party as a legitimate mode of requirement for the services of that company then being resold (no doubt with thousands of others) to a third party.

What exactly is covered by the requirements of the Data Protection Act 1998?

The Act itself mentions in article 10:

Subject to subsection (2), an individual is entitled at any time by notice in writing to a data controller to require the data controller at the end of such period as is reasonable in the circumstances to cease, or not to begin, processing, or processing for a specified purpose or in a specified manner, any personal data in respect of which he is the data subject, on the ground that, for specified reasons—

(a)the processing of those data or their processing for that purpose or in that manner is causing or is likely to cause substantial damage or substantial distress to him or to another, and
(b)that damage or distress is or would be unwarranted.

The data controller is then obliged to

The data controller must within twenty-one days of receiving a notice under subsection (1) (“the data subject notice”) give the individual who gave it a written notice—
(a)stating that he has complied or intends to comply with the data subject notice, or
(b)stating his reasons for regarding the data subject notice as to any extent unjustified and the extent (if any) to which he has complied or intends to comply with it.

If that doesn't happen it goes to court.

There are also rules on transferring data outside the EEA without safeguards which is probably overlooked or barely met.
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Can you find out who a number belongs to if you get a hold of one?

Not to my knowledge although google will probably throw something up.

 

[Ferret]

Anyone who has my landline number also gets told 'the code' - ring off after x rings, then ring back. That way I know whether it's a call worth answering or not. Only 3 people have that number anyway - my Parents, my ex-girlfriend and my closest mate at work. I blatantly stole that system from my now unfortunately deceased Uncle, but boy does it save me an increase in blood pressure!

My other tactic of choice was to answer a PPI call on my personal mobile (if I had nowt better to do), and then waste the callers time for as long as I could manage. I'd find excuses to stick them on hold for 10 minutes at a time. Usual ruses for achieving this were telling him I was cooking my dinner, hang on a moment... Returning to the phone, listening to some gibber, then going outside and ringing my own doorbell, then returning to the phone, grabbing my work phone to ring my own land line, and sticking them back on hold again - you get the idea!

 

[LE Greys]

Anyone who has my landline number also gets told 'the code' - ring off after x rings, then ring back. That way I know whether it's a call worth answering or not. Only 3 people have that number anyway - my Parents, my ex-girlfriend and my closest mate at work. I blatantly stole that system from my now unfortunately deceased Uncle, but boy does it save me an increase in blood pressure!

My other tactic of choice was to answer a PPI call on my personal mobile (if I had nowt better to do), and then waste the callers time for as long as I could manage. I'd find excuses to stick them on hold for 10 minutes at a time. Usual ruses for achieving this were telling him I was cooking my dinner, hang on a moment... Returning to the phone, listening to some gibber, then going outside and ringing my own doorbell, then returning to the phone, grabbing my work phone to ring my own land line, and sticking them back on hold again - you get the idea!

I use a similar system, partly connected to the way that BT's message service works (ring x+y times, then it goes to the message service, so I ring x times, cut off, then ring x times again. If nobody answers, it means nobody is home, so I hang up before having to pay anything. Annoyingly, it goes direct to the service if the line is engaged, which can be expensive.

As for sales calls, I use a number of systems, some of which I got from my great uncle - although it helped that he could speak Urdu, so calls from Pakistan or parts of India sometimes went on for a very long time. If it's a 'survey', I give various silly or useless answers (such as 'I don't know' or 'mind your own business' quite often). For instance, energy providers have varied from 'the nuclear reactor in the cellar' to 'Hammy the Hamster upstairs'. Our phone doesn't have a hold feature, but it is right next to a CD player, which serves just as well.
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Automated scammers are the most annoying. I had one about a week ago about PPI and I could press 5 to proceed or 9 to tell me I'd done it and they'd "take me off their list". Yeah, I wasn't falling for that one! You can't even speak to a real person to express your distaste.

Related:
[youtube]-yYjESHILGo[youtube]

Does that dial 9 thing work? Normally, I just hang up on those after the first few seconds.

 

[deltic1989]

Something that might be relevant to this thread.
Over the past couple of days, probably twice a day, we have been having calls on our landline that run something like this:

Automated Voice: You have a text message from [Number]. The meaasge is as follows. "Test"
It then repeats itself and hangs up.
Anyone got any ideas what this is all about?

 

[maniacmartin]

Yes. If someone uses a mobile phone to send an SMS to a landline number, that's what happens.

It's a bit odd that the message is "Test" though. Perhaps someone's got your number mixed up with someone else's.

 

[SS4]

Does that dial 9 thing work? Normally, I just hang up on those after the first few seconds.

I should be surprised if it does. I just hung up

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Something that might be relevant to this thread.
Over the past couple of days, probably twice a day, we have been having calls on our landline that run something like this:

Automated Voice: You have a text message from [Number]. The meaasge is as follows. "Test"
It then repeats itself and hangs up.
Anyone got any ideas what this is all about?

Not all the older-type landline phone sets can receive any text messages.

 

[wintonian]

If I''m going through one of those periods where the same (usually automated) irritant keeps calling then I just divert the number to Ofcom for a couple of days - that normally sorts them out. If Ofcomm don't like it then they can go and do something about it now that I have given them an incentive to do so.

Mind you it kind of only works if you have another number you obtained on-line that you give out to everyone except friends/ family and you telephony/ broadband provider of course.

 

[michael769]

Does that dial 9 thing work? Normally, I just hang up on those after the first few seconds.

It just confirms to them that there is someone at the end of the line. Expect even more calls!

 

[richw]

Not all the older-type landline phone sets can receive any text messages.

They can, just not as a readable message. They are received by an 0845 number as incoming call, and are read out by a voice that sounds like "microsoft Sam"

 

[swj99]

I got so fed up with irrelevant voicemail messages on my mobile that I rang the service provider and got them to disable the service. The annoyances ranged from missed sales calls where the phone defaulted to voicemail after 3 rings, to mates ringing up and saying, "Don't worry, I'll ring you at home !". Half the time, by the time I'd wasted 12p or whatever it is, I'd seen or spoken to them anyway. It's amazing how much lower the phone bills are when you don't have to waste money listening to useless messages.

 

[wintonian]

They can, just not as a readable message. They are received by an 0845 number as incoming call, and are read out by a voice that sounds like "microsoft Sam"

Except when the system goes wrong and keeps calling you at 2 - 4 o'clock in the morning! - Well it's happened to me on 2 occasions now.

 

[deltic1989]

They can, just not as a readable message. They are received by an 0845 number as incoming call, and are read out by a voice that sounds like "microsoft Sam"

That's exactly what I have been having. It has got me worried weather it's a cold calling company trying to test if the number is active before bombarding me with calls or weather it's a simple mistake.
I never knew that you could text a landline though. I am now trying to think of ways to catch it out with made up words to see if it even tries to pronounce it . I have way too much time on my hands I know.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

They can, just not as a readable message. They are received by an 0845 number as incoming call, and are read out by a voice that sounds like "microsoft Sam"

Thanks for that clarification. It was the wording of "text message" rather than hearing it in an audio form that confused me. Is this something similar to the service available to blind people ?

Can providers such as BT provide a screening service (at a cost) to vet such incoming calls ?

 

[michael769]

Thanks for that clarification. It was the wording of "text message" rather than hearing it in an audio form that confused me. Is this something similar to the service available to blind people ?

Kind of the technologies are the same, but obviously the ones for the blind are considerably more sophisticated.

Can providers such as BT provide a screening service (at a cost) to vet such incoming calls ?

They could. But they don't. BT do have serices like Anonymous caller reject and choose to refuese (block up to 10 numbers) which can help. But the same facilitiy can be obtained from BTs new 6500 handsets (Panasonic also do one) or from addon devices like True Call or CPR Call blocker.

The best way to deal with the issue is TPS registration (which stops sales calls dor reputable companies) and blocking technologies (which stop the disreputable ones). Simply blocking withheld and international numbers can drastically reduce he volume.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

The best way to deal with the issue is TPS registration (which stops sales calls for reputable companies) and blocking technologies (which stop the disreputable ones). Simply blocking withheld and international numbers can drastically reduce the volume.

Is there any truth in what I have been told that it is more difficult to place embargoes on companies whose calls emanate from outside the European Community (noting what you say in your final sentence about international calls) ?

 

[Temple Meads]

I am now trying to think of ways to catch it out with made up words to see if it even tries to pronounce it

I'm so going to try that

On a related note, I got a call from one of these compo idiots regarding "an accident someone in your household has had in the past three years", now he quoted the correct address, but we've lived at this address for well over three years now, and neither has been in any sort of accident in that time, or even holds a driving license (yet).

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

On a related note, I got a call from one of these compo idiots regarding "an accident someone in your household has had in the past three years", now he quoted the correct address, but we've lived at this address for well over three years now, and neither has been in any sort of accident in that time, or even holds a driving license (yet).

Was that person able to name the "someone" in your household by name, as this would have been available from the details of the "accident report" should that ever have existed in the first place ?

 

[Flamingo]

I had a call centre for a dodgy double-glazing firm in Neath ring me last year, and after a bit of googling, I found their number out (I am ex-directory and TPS registered, and had told them before (in their previous incarnation to take my number off their list).

So I got my land-line, home mobile. work mobile, wife's mobile, children's mobiles (I pay the bills anyway), set them all up with 141 in front of the number, and pressed dial on all six of them - and every time they eventually hung up on any one of them, I just redialed! I kept this up for about 30 minutes or so, never said anything, just kept dialing them - they were getting VERY irate by the end of it, and it passed a half an hour on a quiet afternoon!

My stock reply to people looking to speak to Mr Flamingo is to say "He doesn't live here any more", when they persist, I tell them he is serving 10 years in prison, they are welcome to ring back when he gets out!

 

[deltic1989]

I may have mentioned this before, but one time when the beggars rang I had some mates round playing Call of Duty rather loudly.
I told them I was in Afghanistan and was rather busy. Could they call back later.
Wouldn't you know it they never called back.

 

[HST Power]

I may have mentioned this before, but one time when the beggars rang I had some mates round playing Call of Duty rather loudly.
I told them I was in Afghanistan and was rather busy. Could they call back later.
Wouldn't you know it they never called back.

I have to try that some time!

 

[michael769]

Is there any truth in what I have been told that it is more difficult to place embargoes on companies whose calls emanate from outside the European Community (noting what you say in your final sentence about international calls) ?

Almost certainly. Organisations outside the UK are beyond the reach of OFCOM and the ICO. those outside the EU are not even subject to EU data protection rules. Though I suspect that many are just call centers acting on behalf of folks in the UK.

It would be hard to justify the high costs of an international investigation into someone whose only crime is to call people during Coronation Street.

It is much more difficult to act against operators from outwith the UK and with plenty operating within the UK regulators concentrate their very limited resources on those UK sources.

 

[SS4]

I'm so going to try that

On a related note, I got a call from one of these compo idiots regarding "an accident someone in your household has had in the past three years", now he quoted the correct address, but we've lived at this address for well over three years now, and neither has been in any sort of accident in that time, or even holds a driving license (yet).

Electoral Roll?

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Electoral Roll?

I do not know what your annual electoral registration form looks like, but in our area, we have the option of noting in a column, that we do not wish our electoral roll details to be forwarded onto a third party.

 

[Greenback]

I had a call centre for a dodgy double-glazing firm in Neath ring me last year, and after a bit of googling, I found their number out (I am ex-directory and TPS registered, and had told them before (in their previous incarnation to take my number off their list).

I think I know the firm you are talking about - I had a bit of trouble with them myself!

I like what you did to them, I wish I'd thought of it!

 

[Temple Meads]

Was that person able to name the "someone" in your household by name, as this would have been available from the details of the "accident report" should that ever have existed in the first place ?

I didn't let it get to that point, the caller specifically asked for me, but didn't give a name of the person "involved in an accident", I insisted they had a wrong number, then hung up.