Fraccers

If you live in Canada and have placed your telephone numbers on the National ‘Do Not Call’ list, this might actually be the reason you’re being inundated with solicitation calls from unscrupulous telemarketers and fraudsters!

A recent report by Gloria Galloway, in the Globe and Mail, explained how an act of faith in the registry that was intended to provide assistance and relief for thousands of people, could actually be the opposite for many.

The Consumers’ Association of Canada says it has been inundated with complaints from people who have been called by scam artists after placing their telephone numbers on the registry, which went into effect last September.

The do-not-call list was created to prevent telemarketers from contacting people who do not want to be pestered with uninvited sales pitches. For companies to find out who they are not permitted to call, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission sells the list online for a fee.

“You can buy any list you want of people who subscribe to the do-not-call registry online. The whole of Toronto costs you 50 bucks for 600,000 names,” Bruce Cran, president of the CAC, said in a telephone interview yesterday.

“That’s just perfect for any telemarketer, because these are good names which they would otherwise have to pay money for to verify. In addition to that, there’s no index list of cell phone numbers that you can get. However, people were encouraged to put their cell phone numbers on there as well.”

This for sure, is about as fraccy pin-worthy as anything. I don’t know about you, but as for me… if I receive one more call from that blasted company tooting the shiphorn, lying to me that they’ve gotten my number because I’ve entered my name in a draw at a major retailer and if I’d like to win this trip I should just speak to the representative and make sure I have my money ready… I’m going to commit something far worse than assault by fraccy voodoo doll!

Oh… and then there’s that call where they try suck you into believing there’s some issue with your credit. You’re told to press ‘1′ to speak to the representative, or press ‘3′ to be removed from the list. Of course, you can press ‘3′ all you want… you will never be removed from the list. The calls will keep coming and coming… like the energizer bunny.

In what I thought was a flash of brilliance, I pressed ‘1′ to speak to the representative and then proceeded to instruct them never to call this number again. They just hang up on you.

Next time, I pressed ‘1′ and asked to speak to the manager on duty. They refused to allow me to.

Oh yes… and they hung up on me again.

I now mark their calls for trace and will report them as harrassment. You have to have a series of them before you can do this though. The folks who came up with the ‘Do Not Call’ list intend to do something about it… and you can read the rest of the Globe and Mail article to find out what, by clicking here. In the meanwhile… I’ll just use the fraccy voodoo doll… and warn you all about leaving your name on the ‘Do Not Call’ list.