Britsh Gas Nuisance Calls

[solwisesteve]

Okay... a good one this and not something I've come across before.

Yesterday pm we (our company) gets a call from someone with a Chinese accent (not being racist... that's just what it sounded like) saying this is British Gas and can I speak to who ever it is in your company that does your gas/electricity contracts. Anyway we say not interested at the moment but please contact us again in March when our current contract is us for renewal. So then they demand to be put through to the appropriate person. We say they need to speak to the MD but he won't discuss this until March and then hang up. Then we get 2 or 3 more calls from this same number (a London area code) until, in the end, we stop answering. Then they phone us again but with a different caller ID! There then follows several calls showing a different presentation numbers. Then when they realise that's not working they call us again but this time put our own companies phone number as the presentation number! Amazing!!! Didn't know you could do that. We have also got several calls from them again this morning... the first couple with another area code and then several, again, showing our companies phone number for the ID.

Phoned Ofcom and they said yes this is possible but they aren't interested and go away!

They gave us another number to call, 'The Information Commissioners Office', but there didn't seem anyway on their menu options of complaining about nuisance calls.

[kevkojak]

Very strange Steve, I've never heard of them using your own caller ID as a number!

Just because they said they were British Gas doesn't make it true, I get calls daily from N-Power and when pressed, that becomes "on behalf of N Power" and then "we just want to steal your business from N Power". (I wouldn't mind, I'm with EoN)

Nothing seems to deter them, from a polite no thank you to just slamming the phone down. We recently learned that 4 minutes is about how long they will stay "on hold" while you leave the phone next to a noisy speaker.

[Dave O'Sullivan]

'BT wholesale' is always a popular choice for telecom companies. Drives me mad.

[solwisesteve]

I agree...might well have not actually been British Gas. tbh I can't believe that British Gas themselves would possibly condone this sort of selling method.

[vulcangascompany]

I always sound enthusiastic say i'll get the bill payer and just put the phone in the next room, having THEIR time wasted they hate the most.

[solwisesteve]

I always sound enthusiastic say i'll get the bill payer and just put the phone in the next room, having THEIR time wasted they hate the most.

The census seems to be say you're putting them through but leave them on hold until they get the message. Will try this next time though, tbh, no calls yesterday so may the threats of Ofcom did some good; despite the fact that when I called Ofcom they couldn't give a flying...

[cessna152]

Give the Telephone Preference service (TPS) a try, it’s free to register and there is a facility to make a complaint, again free to the relevant body via their website. There is the CPTS (Corporate) service for business. They only appear to be effective for numbers in the UK and I’ve only registered my private line but I noticed a distinct drop in calls of this ilk. I think you can register mobile numbers with this or ether a similar service as well. MPS (mail) can also stop a lot of the junk mail coming through. Worth a try perhaps.

[solwisesteve]

Give the Telephone Preference service (TPS) a try, it’s free to register and there is a facility to make a complaint, again free to the relevant body via their website. There is the CPTS (Corporate) service for business. They only appear to be effective for numbers in the UK and I’ve only registered my private line but I noticed a distinct drop in calls of this ilk. I think you can register mobile numbers with this or ether a similar service as well. MPS (mail) can also stop a lot of the junk mail coming through. Worth a try perhaps.

ISTR TPS is domestic only. I'll try CPTS but when the calls are coming from outside the EU I'm not what they can do. Thanks anyway.