For The Connexion, the excellent monthly newspaper for English speakers in France, I wrote on a subject close to our ears ...
Before France succumbed to brisker eating habits, lunchtime was signalled by sumptuous smells wafting from the kitchen and cries of à table or à la soupe.
These days, even in households where the aromas and announcements survive, there is less welcome evidence that food is about to be served. The phone rings.
If you are unwise enough to answer, it may be the start of a conversation the caller hopes to turn to profit.
Cold-calling is not so much an industry as a virulent pest, its spread as relentless as the corporate nuisance of automated switchboards, with their endless options, delays and muzac.
Since my time is split between France and the UK, I can say that while the problem also exists in Britain, it seems less of a scourge. While the British government promises tougher penalties and a lower threshold for what constitutes abuse, France’s voluntary Pacitel initiative, people listing numbers on which they should not be bothered, is limited and tame.
The calls have a pattern. Someone does his or her best to sound unsalesmanlike before trying, inevitably, to sell something. It may be something to do with utilities, your electricity supply perhaps, or a foolproof solution for insulation problems or wood-eating bugs.
Doing without a landline won’t spare you. The phenomenon affects mobiles, too, often enough your own provider badgering you to upgrade your monthly plan. As an existing customer, you cannot even turn to Pacitel for help.
The calls are not restricted to mealtimes but occur at intervals all day long. But you can be sure they the callers know exactly when you plan to eat. I tend to gabble my unwillingness to speak; my wife is blunter. “Send me a letter and I’ll discuss it tranquillement with my husband,” she’ll say. “Au revoir.”
Worse still is out-and-out telephone fraud. With emails, everyone has now worked out that if they haven’t entered a lottery, they are unlikely to have won. Nor does the fisc use out-of-the-blue emails to offer tax rebates and no genuine Nigerian banker pays out millions of unsolicited dollars.
But what about the voicemail or SMS from a health clinic to change an appointment? It is novel enough to arouse no suspicion, even if you don’t remember having an appointment, and the temptation to call back may be strong.
That is what happened in the Drôme. Unsuspecting patients of an ophthalmology clinic in Romans-sur-Isère received such messages and dialled the number. After lengthy delays, a female voice disclosed that it was a premium-rated call but would be dealt with soon. Then silence, followed eventually by a nasty surprise in the phone bill, 1,35 € for each call and 34 centimes for each of those minutes.
In Rennes , people were notified about undelivered parcels and given a number to arrange collection. Variations of the scam happen daily, and I have seen references to far steeper charges.
Experts offer self-evident advice: never divulge bank or credit card details to unknown callers, just let the phone ring if inconnu appears on the screen.
But if a call is left unanswered and unreturned, there can still be that nagging doubt it may be genuine. For a while, my solution, time-consuming but dependable if calls from a harmless-looking number persisted, was to search the 10 digits on the internet. True enough, the number would be listed as dodgy. Sometimes, victims had posted cautionary comments.
Yet even that response has pitfalls. I tried it again the other day. The site I checked first certainly offered to test the number; it also invited me to pay for the service.
ends
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