To have lost my temper

I'm tps. I have call blocking. I block international but unfortunately Cardiff, who allocate the tribunal work also have number unavailable and I would be blocking them as well.

It drives me mad, not even TPS can cope with it. Also, did you know you have to ring them every so often to make sure they keep you on their list? I must do it again, maybe that's why I am getting so many more lately.

I don't answer the phone unless I know the number, I have call recognition. If people want me, they have to leave a message. Many automated callers seem to try mid morning, again at around 4pm, again in the evening. In other words, when you are likely to want breaks. Even the banks do it, Barclays is dreadful.

treat yourself to a call blocker galen. My MIL is able to snooze away her afternoons undisturbed since she got her Truecall.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAb8vGSRBoE

I like the way this guy deals with telesales people. I would love to do this!

In fairness, I don't think there's anything BT can do. They used to block commercial calls but now these things are "outsourced" (I believe that's the jargon), there's nothing BT can do to stop them unless you find out the name of the company behind the calls. Good luck with that .

Meanwhile, when I occasionally pick up the phone from and "out of area" caller or a "private number", I say nothing until the person on the other end of the line speaks. As often as not the line goes dead because it is just a machine doing the dialling and until they hear a human voice the call is not switched to a person. I wonder if you could do this with your work caller, galen? If you warned them that you won't speak until they do (and you recognise them) it ought to work. Worth a try anyhow.

Someone cold-called me yesterday to tell me something or other about pensions. I was happy to inform her that I was already a pensioner.

I laugh and tell them to take their scam elsewhere. Sometime not very politely! X

I know I'm tempting providence here, but I never get any unwanted calls. I don't know why. I am registered with the preference service and get my phone line via my cable company. The only other thing maybe that my number was once a fax number - to begin with I used to get a few fax calls, but these have now stopped. So I wonder if it makes a difference if you are with a cable company?

You need a call blocker. You can set those calls you don't want such as international calls. They come preprogrammed with about 200 known cold call numbers. It's worked for us. It's very easy to add other numbers also.
If it's something important they can always write to you.

I just quietly put the phone down - it saves the expenditure of emotional energy which is required elsewhere! And I feel very sorry for those who have to earn their living/waste their lives on this thankless task - and their calls are all monitored so they cannot lose their rag, however much they might feel like doing so!

There is a product you can buy - I have unhelpfully forgotten its name - which filters out calls from all but those you have OK'd. I believe this is it: www.truecall.co.uk

Obviously when the calls are from French companies I can only speak English.

We get them nearly every day, Galen. So now I say:
'Allo
'Allo oui, c'est qui? (In very irate shrieky French).
They ask if I speak English.
I say "non je ne comprends pas l'anglais" or "je dois ouvrir les fenêtres de mon ordinateur?" (Both if which would be hard to do if I didn't understand English but the irony is lost).
They give up and hang up without saying goodbye. Sadly they don't tell their friends.

I monitor all my calls now, unless I know who they are they go to voicemail and I can hear what is being said. We are getting so many nuisance/selling calls nowadays that they outnumber the wanted calls! What's worse is that there are two different numbers that come from the same source - both trying to sell me cavity insulation and solar panels, one from a UK number and one an international number. They have identical recorded messages that just get deleted...you'd think they'd take the hint!

I am at a loss as to how we prevent these calls. One day last week we had 7 cold calls before lunchtime, the answer machine was switched on and they started ringing my mobile despite the fact that I never give my number to anyone. DH did get in touch with BT and told them they were failing in their duty to prevent nuisance calls, reaction, zilch