Recently I have been getting a couple of phone calls a day from an 866 number. A recorded voice says that they urgently need to speak to (computerized gibberish sounds). If I am (computerized gibberish sounds) please press 1 now.
Because I can’t selectively block numbers, I can’t do anything but mute the ringer on these calls after the phone rings once. They’re very irritating. I got a series of them once before, in 2007 or 2008, and after a few months they suddenly stopped.
Funny that collection agency has come up, because the last group of them stopped after I got a final notice to pay up for a magazine subscription that I thought I’d cancelled… and gotten no other mail about.
Gonna check up on my magazine subscriptions, I guess…
But what on earth is with the garbled computer sounds? What’s the purpose?
That makes me think it’s a telemarketer, rather than a collection agency - if the call asks for “Joe Smith”, and you’re not Joe Smith, you hang up. But if the name is garbled, a lot of people will probably press 1 “just to be on the safe side”.
Dear RunSilent, please explain to me in short sentences why a collection agency would use the computer-garbled sounds instead of my name or, alternatively, the pronoun “you”?
I’ve been getting these calls at work. The computerized voice says “This call is for [name]. If you are [name] please hold for an important message. If you are not [name] please hang up” etc. The point being that the message contains personal information, and if you are not the person they are trying to reach, you shouldn’t listen. Finally there was a call that said “If you are [name] press 1. If you are not, press 2” When I pressed two, it said “Please tell [name] to cal 866whatever”. I had never heard of the person they wanted, and I didn’t listen to the message.
My guess is that you are getting a collection call, and the text-to-speech program is mangling the name. It’s likely that you aren’t even the person they are trying to reach, especially if someone left the wrong phone number on an account they didn’t intend to pay.
Well, I can think of a reason. Collections, as they go further and further out, are worth less and less. Agencies buy huge amounts of old debt for really cheap and try to collect on it. That far away from the original debt, things aren’t very profitable and they can’t afford a working skip tracer. But it’s still better than hand dialing each number.
It sounds like a collection agency to me. I just changed by number because my old number was tied to someone named “Angela/Janet Gross,” who apparently had a lot of debt. I would get collection calls for a while until I actually connected to someone and told them I had the wrong number. They would stop for a few weeks and then pick up again. The most recent ones that came in were the same as you were describing. "This is a message for “Janet Gross (very garbled) Please press one press one if you are Janet Gross, or hang up now.” Just before I changed my number, I pressed one and it went into a debt collection thing.
It’s probably not the same people each time. The debt is being bought and sold for pennies on the dollar. Every few months someone new buys it and takes a crack at it. An old friend of mine put me down as a reference on a loan. (Not a co-signer.) He left town and I haven’t seen or heard from him in years. Every few months I get a call from a collection agency looking for him. I tell them, honestly, that I have no idea where he is.
I have found this site to be useful in learning who calls me. You enter the number from the caller ID and it identifies the number, if it knows it. Other users post comments about how they were able to get rid of the people. They also describe their experiences with them.
If they’re stupid enough to leave it going that long, they deserve that. Surely you’d know after a repetition or two that you need to hangup. In fact, I think the repetitions are just in case you are a machine, and start recording midway through the message.
Yes, Collections. And, it isn’t all that likely that they think you owe the $$. See they use something like Lexis/Nexis. On there is a list of potential neighbors and relatives. You are likely one or the other to some debtor, say Bob. What they will claim is they are trying to verify contact info of said debtor, which is legit- as long as they do not mention any debt, etc. What they are really hoping for is that you do know Bob, and you will tell Bob “Hey these guys are calling me and asking for you” which will shame Bob into paying up.
Mind you, the names, especially those of “neighbors” are often outdated or wrong. Thus you may have no idea of who Bob is. They don’t care.
Or perhaps you do have Bobs old number or even a number that was mis-reported by him. Again, they don’t care.
That’s what I’d heard, but I keep getting these messages on my answering machine, for my sister-in-law, of recordings and/or live people announcing they’re calling for [FH’s sister-in-law] and that this is an attempt to collect a debt. Did they change the laws?
Edit: I just realized, maybe the collection agency isn’t in the US? In that case they’re not bound by the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act.
That website for looking up phone numbers is so useful; thank you for posting it. My phone says I’ve been getting calls from three numbers… two of them are debt collection agencies, and the third is a collect-call system from a prison. Wheeee!
I recently got a call. When I answered, a recorded message said that it was an attempt to collect a debt, and that I must call the number XXX-XXXX* back immediately. Since I don’t have any outstanding debt, I called the number provided. The woman who answered chirped “Good morning, Ace** Timeshares!” Indignantly, I asked why they had used such an unethical method to scare people into dialing their office. The woman responded that she had no idea who was using her company’s number! Had I been Asok, I bet my nose would have punched a hole in the wall…
I don’t remember the actual number. If I get a similar call again, however, I’ll consider reporting it to the site Drum God linked.
** not the real company name, but at least I have to give them credit for using the word “timeshares” as opposed to “family leisure value” or something equally weaselly. Just in case anyone’s wondering, I most assuredly never have, and never will, own a timeshare.