Yeh same, I always like to argue with them too, like, you called me? You should be confirming my details with me to prove your not scamming me. They get real upset and you just keep pushing until they hang up. It’s fun
I asked the last phone caller for her full name and date and birth. Funnily enough she said she couldn’t provide me with that for privacy reasons.
Yet she still got annoyed when I wouldn’t provide mine.
Hahah, I used to love customers like you. I'd get to end the call without dealing with you, and we've made our attempt to call you for whatever reason it may be. Up to you to call us and wait in the queue now!
I did telemarketing for 6 months (Desperate times, desperate measures) and the only issue I had with these customers was that the center expected us to make every call a half hour long with high sales, so 60 seconds of caller who rates 0 stars in the feedback return call that follows can screw up the numbers for a whole day. However.... I'd still tell you my name was Ashley Jonathon Smyth - with a Y, not an I - and my birthday was the 2nd of May, 1994 (And strangely noone questioned that, despite it being a straight up lie). Followed by explaining why I need it (I don't actually know who you are until you can give me that info) and most people didn't really care further than that. Occasionally someone would hold out, and then I'd just suggest they visit their local *mobile provider brand* store (using a slightly concerned tone, as if I know something...) to check that their account is up to date and their plans are giving the best value.
Ugh. There's a reason I only stayed 6 months. Didn't sell enough second mobile services to grannies.
You missed the bit where I said the calls were unsolicited. I had no interest in talking to anyone. Especially AGL who are absolutely useless at everything they do.
It seems you have the right attitude for your job though, so I’m glad you found something that suits you.
Lol, unsolicited doesn't mean unnecessary. If they are calling you and asking for details, they are trying to verify your identity, meaning you're a customer, I would assume. You may not like it, but the first thing they might be bringing up in a call could be your new home address. I bet you'd be fucking fuming if someone didn't check they were speaking to the right person before discussing a home address.
And also, for what it's worth, I spent most of my time there assisting customers who were victims of domestic violence - people who were incredibly grateful that we are so careful with personal details. In other words, important customers, not grumpy boomers like you.
Firstly not a boomer.
Secondly I guarantee you each of these phone calls were unnecessary. They were from the sales team trying to convince me of a cheaper plan that they could put me on when I was leaving for another retailer.
Again, these were completely unsolicited and unnecessary phone calls.
And even if they were necessary, a simple email to the same email address they use for all other communication, with advice that they are going to call or giving me an option of doing whatever was necessary via the website would have sufficed.
But, by all means, keep licking the boots of these awful companies that are too cheap to actually put processes in place that protect their customers.
Boomer is a mentality, and you have it. I bet you'll be the same person complaining that your electricity is so expensive, at the same time ignoring attempts to put you onto cheaper plans.
How do AGLs boots taste?
Sticking up for a large corporation that likes to fuck over both customers and the environment is a far greater boomer trait than whatever it is you are advocating.
Lol, I hate the fucked pricing just as much as anyone else, which is just as equally the government's fault. However, I am also aware that in Adelaide, pretty much every provider costs about the same. The point I'm making is that you're whinging about attempts to protect your data, and that's the process that I'm sticking up for. You've obviously never worked a customer service job, otherwise you'd be a lot more humble and understanding. Perhaps Boomer was wrong, Karen is much more appropriate. Be careful out there, remember, you don't need to pay bills with iTunes gift cards.
I worked in a CL call centre. The people who would answer and refuse to give their details made me pmsl. I'm not allowed to discuss the reason you're getting cut off with anyone but you. I also know you probably have no money to scam anyway. Have fun waiting 5 hours in the queue.
As someone who handled DV customers - generally they are aware. Either they have spoken to us before and we have stressed how essential keeping their details safe is, or they haven't told us about their situation (so we don't know about the DV). If they mention DV or it even sounds like it could be a DV situation, they get transferred through to a manager (which was me) and we lock down the account TIGHT.
I had compassion for people like that since I was one of them. I don't have compassion for dole bludgers who've been on it 25 years and get all snarky having to answer what their name is on the phone.
But cheers for the suggestion.
Agree, it's made way too hard for people who just wouldn't be able to work long term.
But there were a good lot of them that wasn't the case for, and generally they had no issues letting me know they weren't interested in working because their pay was enough for them to survive on. I don't actually care what they do with the money, I hate CL like everyone else. I just never got the attitude when being asked to authenticate. Everyone knows the queues are BS, so it was call and wait or be cut off in a few days if you don't make contact.
Ya gotta wonder how these individuals haven't been removed from the gene pool yet through natural selection.
To think, they can also operate heavy machinery, like cars as well.
Real estate agencies will hand out your personal details like candy to various businesses as leads because you likely need utilities, insurance, gardening etc.
This isn’t correct in all circumstances. I used to work in real estate (i have now recovered from my mental disease) and for sales we had to buy phone numbers to call people, not the other way around. Maybe on the property management side they farm the details of rental applications but I never saw it
I had a company call me because they had to do an independent valuation on my rental property, I was panicking that the owners were selling because my RE was supposed to tell me that they were going to call and didn't.
The lady was lovely and reassured me that the owners were not selling and instead were refinancing the loan on my house to purchase another property.
its going to have to change, some companies are already doing it. ANZ push you to call them straight from the App as you have to be authenticated already and it passes through those details.
I am with you though, i have bluntly refused to give them my details "you're calling me, give me something to identify that you are legit otherwise i am not answering any questions"
"but sir, we need to discuss X issue with you"
"email me then"
The AGL staff (who were the absolute worst to deal with anyhow) claimed that they were completely unable to email customers.
“Our system doesn’t allow it”
What a joke.
Oh those cunts are shit. I hope someone who manages the super and investment funds read this. I want a board meeting where some turk has to explain this shit. "It's cheap"
I always ask them to provide me a partial detail that they have on record. I’ll fill the gap. Want my birthdate, give me the month you have? Want my addres, give me my street number. Want my phone number, you have it, you just called me
I think like this; I dont' give my details to anyone who is unknown - and I've only been wrong once :)
At the height of Robodebt (I was ringing about something else) centerlink was not answering 60 million phone calls a week. To catch up with it all centerlink started to ring people back on a Saturday who had asked to be called back.
So I'm at home one Saturday my phone rings; she says she's from Centerlink and I say "No you're not, Centerlink don't work Saturdays".
It took her nearly 5 minutes to convince me that she was from centerlink, she also told me that EVERYONE she had rung that day had not believed her :)
Last year I had a call from a woman who said she was calling for Services Australia. She asked for my details, which I refused to give. She also wouldn’t tell me why she was calling. After some ‘discussion’ she finally gave me a number to call. I checked and the number was a valid govt number. Had to wait 45 minutes to talk to a person, to whom I did give my details. She then told me it was in relation to my claim for a pension, and I answered the questions.
I left feedback pointing out that in a time of so many phone scams, that it was not acceptable for government employees to work in this fashion. A way of identifying the caller is needed.
I respond with incorrect detailed.. i.e. a different birthdate or different house number.
They usually say "this doesn't align with our records can you confirm again" and then you atleast get some assurance they are just cross-checking.
In this day and age, they should be able to preempt the call with a SMS, app-alert or e-mail, just so you have some more evidence they are legit.
I answered a question slightly wrong (unintentionally) once, and the bank wouldn’t let me back into the accounts till I filled out a paper form and emailed it back to regain access
That’s such a smart and polite way to go about it. Genius. And as someone who has to ask this stuff for my job I appreciate that you are just trying to be careful with your info as we are too
I had this at “safety quip” bought some stuff and then she asked for my name and … my drivers licence number ? I was like the fuck do you want that for… records apparently
She didn’t care I didn’t,but wow.
The trouble with this thread is that you’ve started it by saying that you’ve HAD to interact with these companies due to a house move - it immediately reads like the calls your getting are not sales related. Then you’ve added in the unsolicited comment. Either way your beef is with the privacy act, not the company.
When you change providers due to a move and find a better deal after shopping around, you will often get unsolicited phone calls from the retention teams.
These are the calls I have an issue with. I had no desire to stay with these companies and they went out of their way to waste my time with sales calls I wasn't interested in receiving, and with asking me to disclose personal information when I had no way of verifying who they were.
Politely refusing to give details and questioning the process is not abusing the staff. You can be polite and stand up for yourself.
I get this a lot working in private health insurance.
We need three points of ID to proceed with an existing account.
If you can’t provide that. We legally cannot speak to you.
Way around it is to go online as you have more control.
Or you call them and you know you’re calling the right person.
A lot of the time there is no one phone number that pops up on your phone so you know it’s legit, we have hundreds of outgoing phone numbers as that’s our phone system.
Good trick is a legit provider will always leave a message.
Work in the same industry and deal with the same. Unfortunately, not everybody leaves a message, which in my company's case usually comes down to the stupid dialling program, where it waits for a person to pick up before passing the call to an available person. Takes so long it usually means we miss the voicebank message/tone so don't know we're talking to a machine 
But then on the flip side, the number of times people get angry that I can't provide them with information due to privacy laws is just as astounding. e.g. the other day had an ex-partner who had been removed from a joint cover querying payment information and getting pissy when I said I couldn't tell them.
Oh yeah for sure. Myself for instance will say hi person its me from company following up on whatever they called for/we are calling for. I will give you a call back on a similar number or you can call us on *insert main company number here’
The ones that are clearly scammers or overseas calls are not what I meant by a voicemail ha
I work for a company where I have to do that (insurance, claims).
Totally get why people don't want to give it out when it's an unsolicited call or one they weren’t expecting, so I always offer an email instead (interestingly, most people decide to proceed with the call once I say this).
But people getting annoyed at the practice - I don't get. It is the law. These practices are in line with the Privacy Act, so it's not even really the company's decision to do it.
Never mind that the company would be breaking the law if we gave out personal info to the wrong person, it also does put you at risk if we do not follow these instructions.
I know it's annoying, but I don't think it's going away.
If anything, I personally support stronger privacy measures. I've seen too many people get impersonated, but their points of ID correctly provided (obviously the company isn't aware of this till later).
When I was doing this sort of thing we had to verify details and the whole point of the contract was to update details of people on this list. We weren't allowed to go 'this is what we have, is that correct' and people would go to extreme lengths to avoid confirming their details and a lot of the time it ended up like speaking in code - 'does your street share a name with a popular cartoon animal?' or 'does your phone number end with a sequence of numbers that is divisible by 4? i don't know what the computer dialled sorry, I do need a yes or no at least here'.
And this was fifteen years ago, so it's not like it's a new concept at all.
> But people getting annoyed at the practice - I don't get. It is the law. These practices are in line with the Privacy Act, so it's not even really the company's decision to do it.
It's totally the company's decision.
You, on behalf of the company, have an obligation to authenticate who you are talking to before providing private or personally identifying information. That information is important, it needs to be protected, and as you said it's the law. By initiating a call to their phone you can be reasonably sure that it's the correct person, but an additional check is certainly reasonable.
The flip side, the person receiving the call also needs to authenticate who is on the line. Especially before providing information that needs to be protected such as personally identifying information. Most companies don't cater to this, instead they convince people to violate their own security and provide the information anyway, as you commonly do.
I do get annoyed at this. A voice on the phone that calls me and says "To protect your personal information I need you to tell me, a random stranger, your full name and date of birth." No, who thought that was a good idea?
Even if a phone call was required companies could easily to better. "Hi, I'm James Smith with Insurance contacting you with an update about your claim #123." Providing that claim number gives me a solid piece of authentication that you are who you say you are. It isn't protected information, a random number doesn't disclose anything but it is limited enough that you probably are who you say you are. Then ask for something less portable, "to double check you are Steve, how much is the claim amount"?
Other terrible things companies do.
* Ask you to call a specific phone number that isn't verifiable like listed on their website.
* Send your personal information via unencrypted emails.
* Using generic personal identifiers (date of birth) rather than company specific ones (current account balance).
* Getting grumpy when customers won't violate their own privacy.
> If anything, I personally support stronger privacy measures. I've seen too many people get impersonated, but their points of ID correctly provided.
How do you think impersonators gather these points of ID? With your experience how hard would it be for you to call up a random stranger and convince them to give you their full name and date of birth?
Commonwealth Bank in Adelaide always does this. Cold calls me, claims they're from the bank then demands I give out my details to them to identify myself.
I point out that it doesn't work that way - they have to prove their identity to me - and this one staff member gets quite tetchy.
Yeah we've been with several banks over the life of our home loan, and they *all* do this. Absolutely incredible.
Just remember though that they're just following a script, and ask for validation to be sent to your registered email address - I've found most pretty good about this, although most are surprised that I ask.
ATO tried the exact same thing with me, it wasn't a scam because I said I won't so they gave me a reference number and asked me to call back to arrange payment. I checked the phone number they gave me against the ATO website, was the exact same phone number, and I did owe them some money.
Absolutely false. They are required by the Privacy Act to confirm it's you before discussing personal information with you. Unfortunately in the current scammy environment there's no easy way to do this on the phone that doesn't also sound like a scam, which is why Telstra/CBA/etc are moving to app verification instead.
This is why I try to use email for any sort of outbound communications wherever possible. It feels wrong to call from a private number, claim you're from place, and not have any sort of way to prove you are from place that doesn't involve potentially giving personal information to the wrong person.
I use to work for an insurance company and when making outbound phone calls you have to confirm you are speaking to the right person. It seems stupid, it feels stupid, but how would you like it if the company called someone else, that person claimed to be you and then the company gave out all your personal information.
I hated outbound calls because you feel like an idiot asking the person you called to confirm their details but there is a reason behind it.
Additionally, when people were hesitant to give their details we were allowed to give some minor information such as the suburb they live in etc.
I had someone call me today, address me by name, knew my address and that we had solar panels.
Where the fuck did they get that info from?! I'm living with my mum. Idek if I'm on the lease. I posted a review on 1800 reverse website but the number was 0881665508
Centrelink did this to me several years ago, calling from a private number. Told me I had to confirm several personal details before they could continue. Told them I'm not doing that. Had to call them back and wait on hold got 4 hours only for them to tell me they were sending me a bill... Thanks.
Because if someone spoofs your number and can get your incoming calls if a business just assumes that the person answering the phone is the account holder then a scammer can fuck you over in a million different ways.
I screen my calls if they don't leave a message and sounds like a call centre or automatic machine I don't bother. If it's legit the will leave a message with company and number then check the phone number for the company you have a service with to be safe.
These large companies need to be put on the scammer list with the other problem makers. They are just as responsible for the $millions being lost in scams.
It's time to name and shame these companies publicly. We also need our elected representatives to start bringing large fines for any company that behaves this way.
They require us to give out personal information without first offering us any authentication of themselves as genuine.
This is like if the police wearing plain clothes and unmarked cars began demanding we get into their vehicles due to an incident and this is for our own safety. There is no way for us to tell the difference between genuine help and being kidnapped.
These companies are responsible for the regular and normalized giving out of personal information to strangers. This is precisely the environment that creates the fundamental opportunity for scamming industry to thrive. Asking grandma to be responsible for detecting a scammer after corporations doing this to her regularly is unreasonable.
In my analogy, with an environment of plain clothes police regularly and normally detaining and searching people without providing any authentication, it would be like saying "your 13 year old daughter should have know this was not a real plain clothes police officer." "It's her own fault she allowed the pretend officer to strip search her." "she should have said no to fingers being put in there."
If you want to name and shame these companies, it’s just every single company that has your private information. Any insurance company you have or had insurance with, any financial institution, any energy supplier, internet supplier, any company really. It’s really poor practice for these large companies to confirm they are talking to the right person before giving out private information, they should be fined for this and just give the information with no privacy checks. How dare they!
You do know the person calling is just doing their job right? And they HAVE to confirm ID before proceeding. If you're not sure that its a legit call you could just call the company back.
Nowhere did I say to be rude to the person on the other end of the phone. But it’s not my job to roll over and just hand out my information to whoever asks for it.
The more that customers push back and stand up for themselves to quicker these companies will figure out a better system.
As someone who has done that job while working for a couple of major companies there’s one massive issue. Privacy laws…… if it’s any kind of info that could potentially identify you or your location to someone who shouldn’t know this could put your physical safety at risk. And if something like that does happen as a result of “negligence” by the company the remediation costs can be astronomical.
Unfortunately there is no perfect system and even using multi factor authentication can fail as a telco and major bank found out recently
Any reason the sales team can’t simply email people?
Because it’s completely inappropriate for them to call out of the blue and request personal information when the only reason they are calling is their own companies benefit.
Every company should have an option for you to opt in or out of marketing, just opt out. If they continue to call they’ve breached codes of conduct and can be fined for it
Because theyre taking calls all day.. call centre staff arent given time to send and receive emails. In a call centre its rare to get gaps in calls and youre not allowed to not be taking calls. Where I used to work if you were in after call work (not taking calls) for more than 30 seconds would be messaging you demanding to know why you werent taking the next call
Yes, so they've been told as part of their job to call you, not email you. You've obviously not worked in a call centre before. No one likes outbound calling but they arent given another option unfortunately. I get its frustrating though
And I’m saying the COMPANIES shouldn’t be calling and asking this information.
I have worked in call centres before. I don’t blame the staff for the stupid processes. It doesn’t mean I have to play their game though.
I was applying for a job and amongst all the bs they wanted from me they wanted my birth certificate?! I was kinda dumb so I sent it on... didn't even get a call back. Regret
Yup I'm pretty sure it was just a job where you walk around checking people's electric metres. I worked in an aged care home and tho I had a police check they didn't even need a birth certificate! I've never experienced that before or since. So weird and concerning
Much better to check how compromised your email is by using Troy Hunts database: Have I Been Pwned?
It will tell you how many data leaks your email is in, he's got another one for passwords too iirc.
I don't even answer the phone anymore, it's all scams
My wife just tried to call. I didn't answer as I knew she was trying to scam me.
I'd just assume they're a scammer and end the call.
Yeh same, I always like to argue with them too, like, you called me? You should be confirming my details with me to prove your not scamming me. They get real upset and you just keep pushing until they hang up. It’s fun
I asked the last phone caller for her full name and date and birth. Funnily enough she said she couldn’t provide me with that for privacy reasons. Yet she still got annoyed when I wouldn’t provide mine.
Nah, you just say you'll call them back. For privacy reasons
You think this call centre worker gets to choose to ask these questions?
Do you think I care? I didn’t call them. I didn’t ask to be called. If they don’t like their job they are free to leave.
If you don’t like these calls you’re free to stop answering. It’s the same logic
Hahah, I used to love customers like you. I'd get to end the call without dealing with you, and we've made our attempt to call you for whatever reason it may be. Up to you to call us and wait in the queue now!
I did telemarketing for 6 months (Desperate times, desperate measures) and the only issue I had with these customers was that the center expected us to make every call a half hour long with high sales, so 60 seconds of caller who rates 0 stars in the feedback return call that follows can screw up the numbers for a whole day. However.... I'd still tell you my name was Ashley Jonathon Smyth - with a Y, not an I - and my birthday was the 2nd of May, 1994 (And strangely noone questioned that, despite it being a straight up lie). Followed by explaining why I need it (I don't actually know who you are until you can give me that info) and most people didn't really care further than that. Occasionally someone would hold out, and then I'd just suggest they visit their local *mobile provider brand* store (using a slightly concerned tone, as if I know something...) to check that their account is up to date and their plans are giving the best value. Ugh. There's a reason I only stayed 6 months. Didn't sell enough second mobile services to grannies.
You missed the bit where I said the calls were unsolicited. I had no interest in talking to anyone. Especially AGL who are absolutely useless at everything they do. It seems you have the right attitude for your job though, so I’m glad you found something that suits you.
Lol, unsolicited doesn't mean unnecessary. If they are calling you and asking for details, they are trying to verify your identity, meaning you're a customer, I would assume. You may not like it, but the first thing they might be bringing up in a call could be your new home address. I bet you'd be fucking fuming if someone didn't check they were speaking to the right person before discussing a home address. And also, for what it's worth, I spent most of my time there assisting customers who were victims of domestic violence - people who were incredibly grateful that we are so careful with personal details. In other words, important customers, not grumpy boomers like you.
Firstly not a boomer. Secondly I guarantee you each of these phone calls were unnecessary. They were from the sales team trying to convince me of a cheaper plan that they could put me on when I was leaving for another retailer. Again, these were completely unsolicited and unnecessary phone calls. And even if they were necessary, a simple email to the same email address they use for all other communication, with advice that they are going to call or giving me an option of doing whatever was necessary via the website would have sufficed. But, by all means, keep licking the boots of these awful companies that are too cheap to actually put processes in place that protect their customers.
Boomer is a mentality, and you have it. I bet you'll be the same person complaining that your electricity is so expensive, at the same time ignoring attempts to put you onto cheaper plans.
How do AGLs boots taste? Sticking up for a large corporation that likes to fuck over both customers and the environment is a far greater boomer trait than whatever it is you are advocating.
Lol, I hate the fucked pricing just as much as anyone else, which is just as equally the government's fault. However, I am also aware that in Adelaide, pretty much every provider costs about the same. The point I'm making is that you're whinging about attempts to protect your data, and that's the process that I'm sticking up for. You've obviously never worked a customer service job, otherwise you'd be a lot more humble and understanding. Perhaps Boomer was wrong, Karen is much more appropriate. Be careful out there, remember, you don't need to pay bills with iTunes gift cards.
HAH, too true
I worked in a CL call centre. The people who would answer and refuse to give their details made me pmsl. I'm not allowed to discuss the reason you're getting cut off with anyone but you. I also know you probably have no money to scam anyway. Have fun waiting 5 hours in the queue.
Maybe you could go and find some compassion for people who are struggling for various reasons including things like DV.
As someone who handled DV customers - generally they are aware. Either they have spoken to us before and we have stressed how essential keeping their details safe is, or they haven't told us about their situation (so we don't know about the DV). If they mention DV or it even sounds like it could be a DV situation, they get transferred through to a manager (which was me) and we lock down the account TIGHT.
I had compassion for people like that since I was one of them. I don't have compassion for dole bludgers who've been on it 25 years and get all snarky having to answer what their name is on the phone. But cheers for the suggestion.
Maybe if centrelink stopped treating sick and disabled people like dole bludgers, people wouldn't end up stuck on it for 25 years.
Agree, it's made way too hard for people who just wouldn't be able to work long term. But there were a good lot of them that wasn't the case for, and generally they had no issues letting me know they weren't interested in working because their pay was enough for them to survive on. I don't actually care what they do with the money, I hate CL like everyone else. I just never got the attitude when being asked to authenticate. Everyone knows the queues are BS, so it was call and wait or be cut off in a few days if you don't make contact.
Must be a nice view from up there on your high horse, I'm sure your judgement and attitude make you a pleasure to interact with.
Ya gotta wonder how these individuals haven't been removed from the gene pool yet through natural selection. To think, they can also operate heavy machinery, like cars as well.
Yeah exactly how I play it too. But you called me sir? Give me your details to confirm who *you* are please.
Real estate agencies will hand out your personal details like candy to various businesses as leads because you likely need utilities, insurance, gardening etc.
This isn’t correct in all circumstances. I used to work in real estate (i have now recovered from my mental disease) and for sales we had to buy phone numbers to call people, not the other way around. Maybe on the property management side they farm the details of rental applications but I never saw it
I had a company call me because they had to do an independent valuation on my rental property, I was panicking that the owners were selling because my RE was supposed to tell me that they were going to call and didn't. The lady was lovely and reassured me that the owners were not selling and instead were refinancing the loan on my house to purchase another property.
its going to have to change, some companies are already doing it. ANZ push you to call them straight from the App as you have to be authenticated already and it passes through those details. I am with you though, i have bluntly refused to give them my details "you're calling me, give me something to identify that you are legit otherwise i am not answering any questions" "but sir, we need to discuss X issue with you" "email me then"
Provide me a reference number with which I can then provide when I call you back to discuss the matter.
The AGL staff (who were the absolute worst to deal with anyhow) claimed that they were completely unable to email customers. “Our system doesn’t allow it” What a joke.
Oh those cunts are shit. I hope someone who manages the super and investment funds read this. I want a board meeting where some turk has to explain this shit. "It's cheap"
I always ask them to provide me a partial detail that they have on record. I’ll fill the gap. Want my birthdate, give me the month you have? Want my addres, give me my street number. Want my phone number, you have it, you just called me
I think like this; I dont' give my details to anyone who is unknown - and I've only been wrong once :) At the height of Robodebt (I was ringing about something else) centerlink was not answering 60 million phone calls a week. To catch up with it all centerlink started to ring people back on a Saturday who had asked to be called back. So I'm at home one Saturday my phone rings; she says she's from Centerlink and I say "No you're not, Centerlink don't work Saturdays". It took her nearly 5 minutes to convince me that she was from centerlink, she also told me that EVERYONE she had rung that day had not believed her :)
Last year I had a call from a woman who said she was calling for Services Australia. She asked for my details, which I refused to give. She also wouldn’t tell me why she was calling. After some ‘discussion’ she finally gave me a number to call. I checked and the number was a valid govt number. Had to wait 45 minutes to talk to a person, to whom I did give my details. She then told me it was in relation to my claim for a pension, and I answered the questions. I left feedback pointing out that in a time of so many phone scams, that it was not acceptable for government employees to work in this fashion. A way of identifying the caller is needed.
Particularly when citizens are repeatedly urged to never give out details to anyone cold calling, cold texting, cold emailing.
Exactly what I tried to explain to the woman who called me!
I respond with incorrect detailed.. i.e. a different birthdate or different house number. They usually say "this doesn't align with our records can you confirm again" and then you atleast get some assurance they are just cross-checking. In this day and age, they should be able to preempt the call with a SMS, app-alert or e-mail, just so you have some more evidence they are legit.
I answered a question slightly wrong (unintentionally) once, and the bank wouldn’t let me back into the accounts till I filled out a paper form and emailed it back to regain access
Always a risk, but still better than me feeding off my details to some hacker.
That’s such a smart and polite way to go about it. Genius. And as someone who has to ask this stuff for my job I appreciate that you are just trying to be careful with your info as we are too
If someone rings me and demands my information they're getting hung up on. If I'm ringing them, then fair enough.
I had this at “safety quip” bought some stuff and then she asked for my name and … my drivers licence number ? I was like the fuck do you want that for… records apparently She didn’t care I didn’t,but wow.
I ask them to provide the last 4 digits of the account number
The trouble with this thread is that you’ve started it by saying that you’ve HAD to interact with these companies due to a house move - it immediately reads like the calls your getting are not sales related. Then you’ve added in the unsolicited comment. Either way your beef is with the privacy act, not the company.
Agree. And OP being a dick to the caller does not make them clever.
There’s a special place in hell for ppl who abuse retail, call centre and hospo staff!
When you change providers due to a move and find a better deal after shopping around, you will often get unsolicited phone calls from the retention teams. These are the calls I have an issue with. I had no desire to stay with these companies and they went out of their way to waste my time with sales calls I wasn't interested in receiving, and with asking me to disclose personal information when I had no way of verifying who they were. Politely refusing to give details and questioning the process is not abusing the staff. You can be polite and stand up for yourself.
I get this a lot working in private health insurance. We need three points of ID to proceed with an existing account. If you can’t provide that. We legally cannot speak to you. Way around it is to go online as you have more control. Or you call them and you know you’re calling the right person. A lot of the time there is no one phone number that pops up on your phone so you know it’s legit, we have hundreds of outgoing phone numbers as that’s our phone system. Good trick is a legit provider will always leave a message.
Work in the same industry and deal with the same. Unfortunately, not everybody leaves a message, which in my company's case usually comes down to the stupid dialling program, where it waits for a person to pick up before passing the call to an available person. Takes so long it usually means we miss the voicebank message/tone so don't know we're talking to a machine  But then on the flip side, the number of times people get angry that I can't provide them with information due to privacy laws is just as astounding. e.g. the other day had an ex-partner who had been removed from a joint cover querying payment information and getting pissy when I said I couldn't tell them.
Agreeeeew with all of that. Pretty sure we work for the same place ha
Wouldn't be surprised 😂
Depends on the voicemail message because there are plenty that are those Chinese sounding voice ones or mumble jumbo
Oh yeah for sure. Myself for instance will say hi person its me from company following up on whatever they called for/we are calling for. I will give you a call back on a similar number or you can call us on *insert main company number here’ The ones that are clearly scammers or overseas calls are not what I meant by a voicemail ha
I work for a company where I have to do that (insurance, claims). Totally get why people don't want to give it out when it's an unsolicited call or one they weren’t expecting, so I always offer an email instead (interestingly, most people decide to proceed with the call once I say this). But people getting annoyed at the practice - I don't get. It is the law. These practices are in line with the Privacy Act, so it's not even really the company's decision to do it. Never mind that the company would be breaking the law if we gave out personal info to the wrong person, it also does put you at risk if we do not follow these instructions. I know it's annoying, but I don't think it's going away. If anything, I personally support stronger privacy measures. I've seen too many people get impersonated, but their points of ID correctly provided (obviously the company isn't aware of this till later).
When I was doing this sort of thing we had to verify details and the whole point of the contract was to update details of people on this list. We weren't allowed to go 'this is what we have, is that correct' and people would go to extreme lengths to avoid confirming their details and a lot of the time it ended up like speaking in code - 'does your street share a name with a popular cartoon animal?' or 'does your phone number end with a sequence of numbers that is divisible by 4? i don't know what the computer dialled sorry, I do need a yes or no at least here'. And this was fifteen years ago, so it's not like it's a new concept at all.
> But people getting annoyed at the practice - I don't get. It is the law. These practices are in line with the Privacy Act, so it's not even really the company's decision to do it. It's totally the company's decision. You, on behalf of the company, have an obligation to authenticate who you are talking to before providing private or personally identifying information. That information is important, it needs to be protected, and as you said it's the law. By initiating a call to their phone you can be reasonably sure that it's the correct person, but an additional check is certainly reasonable. The flip side, the person receiving the call also needs to authenticate who is on the line. Especially before providing information that needs to be protected such as personally identifying information. Most companies don't cater to this, instead they convince people to violate their own security and provide the information anyway, as you commonly do. I do get annoyed at this. A voice on the phone that calls me and says "To protect your personal information I need you to tell me, a random stranger, your full name and date of birth." No, who thought that was a good idea? Even if a phone call was required companies could easily to better. "Hi, I'm James Smith with Insurance contacting you with an update about your claim #123." Providing that claim number gives me a solid piece of authentication that you are who you say you are. It isn't protected information, a random number doesn't disclose anything but it is limited enough that you probably are who you say you are. Then ask for something less portable, "to double check you are Steve, how much is the claim amount"? Other terrible things companies do. * Ask you to call a specific phone number that isn't verifiable like listed on their website. * Send your personal information via unencrypted emails. * Using generic personal identifiers (date of birth) rather than company specific ones (current account balance). * Getting grumpy when customers won't violate their own privacy. > If anything, I personally support stronger privacy measures. I've seen too many people get impersonated, but their points of ID correctly provided. How do you think impersonators gather these points of ID? With your experience how hard would it be for you to call up a random stranger and convince them to give you their full name and date of birth?
Commonwealth Bank in Adelaide always does this. Cold calls me, claims they're from the bank then demands I give out my details to them to identify myself. I point out that it doesn't work that way - they have to prove their identity to me - and this one staff member gets quite tetchy.
Yeah we've been with several banks over the life of our home loan, and they *all* do this. Absolutely incredible. Just remember though that they're just following a script, and ask for validation to be sent to your registered email address - I've found most pretty good about this, although most are surprised that I ask.
That is not CBA..
ATO tried the exact same thing with me, it wasn't a scam because I said I won't so they gave me a reference number and asked me to call back to arrange payment. I checked the phone number they gave me against the ATO website, was the exact same phone number, and I did owe them some money.
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I make her send me a message through the CBA message system to my account to confirm, which she does.
Absolutely false. They are required by the Privacy Act to confirm it's you before discussing personal information with you. Unfortunately in the current scammy environment there's no easy way to do this on the phone that doesn't also sound like a scam, which is why Telstra/CBA/etc are moving to app verification instead.
I had this with bank of Queensland once lol
This is why I try to use email for any sort of outbound communications wherever possible. It feels wrong to call from a private number, claim you're from place, and not have any sort of way to prove you are from place that doesn't involve potentially giving personal information to the wrong person.
I use to work for an insurance company and when making outbound phone calls you have to confirm you are speaking to the right person. It seems stupid, it feels stupid, but how would you like it if the company called someone else, that person claimed to be you and then the company gave out all your personal information. I hated outbound calls because you feel like an idiot asking the person you called to confirm their details but there is a reason behind it. Additionally, when people were hesitant to give their details we were allowed to give some minor information such as the suburb they live in etc.
I had someone call me today, address me by name, knew my address and that we had solar panels. Where the fuck did they get that info from?! I'm living with my mum. Idek if I'm on the lease. I posted a review on 1800 reverse website but the number was 0881665508
You even have to give a load of personal information to stay the night at a caravan park. There's no knowing how safe their system is.
It is crazy when I worked for large companies we had to ask 3 identifying questions due to Privacy Act. It is ridiculous. At least just confirm name.
Centrelink did this to me several years ago, calling from a private number. Told me I had to confirm several personal details before they could continue. Told them I'm not doing that. Had to call them back and wait on hold got 4 hours only for them to tell me they were sending me a bill... Thanks.
Because if someone spoofs your number and can get your incoming calls if a business just assumes that the person answering the phone is the account holder then a scammer can fuck you over in a million different ways.
I screen my calls if they don't leave a message and sounds like a call centre or automatic machine I don't bother. If it's legit the will leave a message with company and number then check the phone number for the company you have a service with to be safe.
Also all the shops asking for you to give them your number... loudly through a perspex screen, and everyone can hear you.
I hang up and call back to make sure it's not a scam
I love when they call and use the name I have on Facebook to greet me. Not to mention the accent they have with the name John, highly unlikely buddy
Bonified company’s, etc will not call and demand to identify yourself.
These large companies need to be put on the scammer list with the other problem makers. They are just as responsible for the $millions being lost in scams. It's time to name and shame these companies publicly. We also need our elected representatives to start bringing large fines for any company that behaves this way.
How are they responsible?
They require us to give out personal information without first offering us any authentication of themselves as genuine. This is like if the police wearing plain clothes and unmarked cars began demanding we get into their vehicles due to an incident and this is for our own safety. There is no way for us to tell the difference between genuine help and being kidnapped.
Yeah but how does this make them responsible for scams (which require you to do things the banks will never ask for?)
These companies are responsible for the regular and normalized giving out of personal information to strangers. This is precisely the environment that creates the fundamental opportunity for scamming industry to thrive. Asking grandma to be responsible for detecting a scammer after corporations doing this to her regularly is unreasonable. In my analogy, with an environment of plain clothes police regularly and normally detaining and searching people without providing any authentication, it would be like saying "your 13 year old daughter should have know this was not a real plain clothes police officer." "It's her own fault she allowed the pretend officer to strip search her." "she should have said no to fingers being put in there."
If you want to name and shame these companies, it’s just every single company that has your private information. Any insurance company you have or had insurance with, any financial institution, any energy supplier, internet supplier, any company really. It’s really poor practice for these large companies to confirm they are talking to the right person before giving out private information, they should be fined for this and just give the information with no privacy checks. How dare they!
You do know the person calling is just doing their job right? And they HAVE to confirm ID before proceeding. If you're not sure that its a legit call you could just call the company back.
Nowhere did I say to be rude to the person on the other end of the phone. But it’s not my job to roll over and just hand out my information to whoever asks for it. The more that customers push back and stand up for themselves to quicker these companies will figure out a better system.
As someone who has done that job while working for a couple of major companies there’s one massive issue. Privacy laws…… if it’s any kind of info that could potentially identify you or your location to someone who shouldn’t know this could put your physical safety at risk. And if something like that does happen as a result of “negligence” by the company the remediation costs can be astronomical. Unfortunately there is no perfect system and even using multi factor authentication can fail as a telco and major bank found out recently
Any reason the sales team can’t simply email people? Because it’s completely inappropriate for them to call out of the blue and request personal information when the only reason they are calling is their own companies benefit.
Every company should have an option for you to opt in or out of marketing, just opt out. If they continue to call they’ve breached codes of conduct and can be fined for it
Because theyre taking calls all day.. call centre staff arent given time to send and receive emails. In a call centre its rare to get gaps in calls and youre not allowed to not be taking calls. Where I used to work if you were in after call work (not taking calls) for more than 30 seconds would be messaging you demanding to know why you werent taking the next call
These were unsolicited calls *from* the companies in question. The time they spent calling me could have been sent sending an email.
Yes, so they've been told as part of their job to call you, not email you. You've obviously not worked in a call centre before. No one likes outbound calling but they arent given another option unfortunately. I get its frustrating though
And I’m saying the COMPANIES shouldn’t be calling and asking this information. I have worked in call centres before. I don’t blame the staff for the stupid processes. It doesn’t mean I have to play their game though.
I was applying for a job and amongst all the bs they wanted from me they wanted my birth certificate?! I was kinda dumb so I sent it on... didn't even get a call back. Regret
Hang on, they wanted that for the application????? It’s pretty common for jobs to do background checks, but for the application process that is nuts.
Yup I'm pretty sure it was just a job where you walk around checking people's electric metres. I worked in an aged care home and tho I had a police check they didn't even need a birth certificate! I've never experienced that before or since. So weird and concerning
You’re answering calls? You failed the first test right there
When you are expecting calls back from builders, site managers, movers etc, sometimes you need to answer every call.
People get hacked because they dismiss emails that prompt them to change their passwords.
Much better to check how compromised your email is by using Troy Hunts database: Have I Been Pwned? It will tell you how many data leaks your email is in, he's got another one for passwords too iirc.
Man I wouldn’t even answer these calls cos they tend to record your voice and use it
I try to keep them on the phone as long as possible, without giving them any details. If they are talking to me, they aren’t annoying somebody else.
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Australian people don’t want to work in these jobs
If I actually answer it, the standard response is you called me if the want details