Amazon Prime scam phone calls

[Dave2002]

We have had a few of these Amazon Prime scam calls lately. Total pain. They are not genuine.

[Dave2002]

They may "simply" be trying to fish for account and other details, or put malware on computers, but they might also be trying in inveigle people into making prime number calls.

[french frank]

They may "simply" be trying to fish for account and other details, or put malware on computers, but they might also be trying in inveigle people into making prime number calls.

I think I mentioned this on another thread recently. When my guard was down, due to circumstances , I answered one, did the unconscionably stupid in pressing "1" and gave the human being who answered such an earful he had no opportunity to reveal what further imbecilities he was going to ask me to do. I might have been charged for a one-minute call to India (no sign that I was), but other than that no damage.

So far I've had their calls from a UK area code, a mobile number and UNAVAILABLE. The unknown area code calls are the only ones I feel safe to ignore - but I still have to get up and consult my landline to see which it is.

[Old Grumpy]

We have repeated calls at around 0900. These are either international numbers or unrecognised area codes - some apparently from IoM on Googling.

I don't answer any number I do not recognise. We have an answer phone and if a caller is genuine, they can leave a message and I will get back to them.

OG

[oddoneout]

These come in clusters with me - there was much activity before Christmas, not surprisingly. Like FF I find that the origin of the calls varies, and that can be an added irritation if there might be a reason for me to have a call but not necessarily a number that I recognise. The "If it's important they'll call again/leave a message so ignore all unrecognised numbers" approach doesn't always work, as I found out when trying to sort out why my broadband was barred without warning. In some circumstances a message will not be left even if the caller is genuine.

[Dave2002]

I think I mentioned this on another thread recently. When my guard was down, due to circumstances , I answered one, did the unconscionably stupid in pressing "1" and gave the human being who answered such an earful he had no opportunity to reveal what further imbecilities he was going to ask me to do. I might have been charged for a one-minute call to India (no sign that I was), but other than that no damage.

So far I've had their calls from a UK area code, a mobile number and UNAVAILABLE. The unknown area code calls are the only ones I feel safe to ignore - but I still have to get up and consult my landline to see which it is.

I sadly pressed 2 - and clearly got through to someone from India or thereabouts. They were clearly unable to understand anything so I just gave up immediately. Now I'm chasing up the phone company to see if I might be charged for anything - or anything significant. Like you I doubt that I made more than a 1 minute call but there is a danger that these peolple have set up premium numbers for the return calls.

If there was a very low cost for a return call I might quite enjoy using my list of words which I don't normally vent on anything other than inanimate objects - but I'm not inclined to waste time or money checking that out.

Several of my friends now have call blocking on their phone lines. Would that minimise significantly the damage these people might cause?

[kernelbogey]

Several of my friends now have call blocking on their phone lines. Would that minimise significantly the damage these people might cause?

It's a free service if you have a BT line. Sometimes, when the caller's number is 'unavailable', they cannot block it.

[vinteuil]

.

... on my cheapo mobile I frequently (say once a fortnight or so) get calls from 08438.... numbers - which ring once and hang up. I have no idea what kind of scam this may be - at the moment it's just an occasional irritant

.

[Frances_iom]

...some apparently from IoM on Googling...

- these are readily seen either 624 area code or 7624 for mobiles - but unlikely that any spam calls originate from the IoM given the cost of using Manx Telecom

[french frank]

Several of my friends now have call blocking on their phone lines. Would that minimise significantly the damage these people might cause?

But what do you block? Even when it's an apparent area code, it's seldom the same one. And at the start of lockdown I took an UNAVAILABLE call that I wouldn't have wanted to miss for worlds. INTERNATIONAL I always ignore.

[vinteuil]

Almost certainly your neighbour retaliating when you play effing Bruckner or sing in the bath.

a) we currently have no neighbours

b) I play Bruckner on the clavichord

c) following my procedure I no longer sing in the bath

.

[alywin]

BEWARE: I'm not sure of the ins and outs of how it happened, but a friend of mine managed to get scammed by these people, and lost her life savings (fortunately, I suppose, that wasn't much). She's an intelligent woman, so it must have been quite a devious scam. They claimed, I think, that her Amazon Prime subscription had just come up for renewal, and had she meant to pay it? She hadn't, and the guy talked her into going into her online banking to put it right, and then got all "panicky" because something disastrous happened that shouldn't have ... She still swears that she didn't give him access to anything, and still doesn't know how he managed to access and empty her savings account (with the same bank, natch ...), but it happened, and the bank said she was liable and wouldn't refund the money.

[LHC]

I had one of these phone calls a few days ago. As soon as the recorded message mentioned Amazon, I hung up. We also get phone calls claiming our BT subscription (which we don’t have) is about to expire, and we will lose our internet connection without immediate action. Again, I just hang up now as soon as BT is mentioned.

[Dave2002]

Just checked with the phone company (EE) again. Phew - seems that there wasn't any damage to my bill - but those guys were presumably trying to get me to install software on my computer. If anyone gets what appears to be an automated call from Amazon about renewing Prime then ignoring it completely seems to be the safest strategy. There IS a scam going on.

[ahinton]

I've had several of these now. Synthesised voice gives it away almost before the "content" does. As with those from "Microsoft", "BT" and others purporting to tell the called party to do something about a service regardless of whether he/she actually has such a service, the only response to such calls is to terminate them which, as I have done tht to each one that I;lve received, I have never gotten as far as discovering the nature of the scam.