7 ms·

For the past 3 years I've adapted to the point where I just don't answer numbers I don't have in my address book (unless I'm expecting a call). If I don't know

• ghayes 10y ago
  Best rule to follow, only answer if it's in your area code. Most spammers don't bother to match area codes, but your co-workers do.
  • 542458 10y ago
    Actually, I get a lot of robocalls from my area code - sometimes even from my own phone number! I assume these are spoofed though. Edit: Oh neat! Apparently it's illegal in the US, but legal in Canada (where I am currently located). So it's not the robocall not bothering, it's it being flat-out illegal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caller_ID_spoofing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caller_ID_spoofing
    • jnbiche 10y ago
      I'm in the US and get an increasing number of robocalls from my area code, as well as robocalls from my own number. I still answer most calls from my area code, but if I suspect it's a robocall I just pick up without saying hello. If it's a robocall, there's generally a lengthy pause and then you can here someone connect (at which point I hang up).
  • post_break 10y ago
    That's fine advice unless you live in a major city with over 2 million people.
  • jwagenet 10y ago
    These days, with everyone using a cell number they got where they lived 5-15 years ago an area code is only about as useful as IDing friend from far away places.
  • yannyu 10y ago
    I don't think any of my coworkers have cell phone area codes from the city where we work. Area codes in my age group (25-40 years old) are usually a prestige indicator of where you're from, rather than where you currently live.
    • sukilot 10y ago
      If it's a prestige indicator, people should move their numbers to better zip codes.
    • OberstKrueger 10y ago
      How much of it is prestige versus the convenience of not having to change numbers? I have the same cell number from an area code that I moved away from over a decade ago. It's nice knowing that anyone who calls(not counting spam calls) either is meaning to get me or is the rare misdial.
• chadaustin 10y ago
  I followed that rule religiously until my father's boss called saying he'd collapsed on a business trip and nobody would answer their phones. Now I just put up with the junk calls. :/ (He ended up surviving ventricular fibrillation with no organ or brain damage because they got an AED on him within a minute.)
  • billmalarky 10y ago
    The solution in that scenario is to text message if possible. People will read texts from unknown numbers.
    • icebraining 10y ago
      Isn't the solution to that to call the emergency number?
      • DanBC 10y ago
        But once you've called the emergency number, and are in an Ambo on your way to hospital, or are in the hospital, you want to let people know that you're not dead in a ditch. Some hospitals are stricter about cell phones than others.
    • nthj 10y ago
      When asked for an emergency contact, I always supply "[wife's name] [wife's #] (please text)", knowing there's basically no chance of her picking up a call from an unknown number.
    • curried_haskell 10y ago
      Honestly. Or leave a goddamned voicemail. Nobody leaves voicemails, so if you leave one, I'll listen.
  • baddox 10y ago
    That sounds awful, but wouldn't he have left a voicemail?
• billh 10y ago
  I take the same approach. If the number isn't in my address book it goes straight to voice mail and my voice mail message explains to the caller that I don't listen the messages and directs them to text or email. If it's important enough that someone needs to get a hold of me they should be having a human calling that can follow through with that simple request.
  • ericabiz 10y ago
    It's not that simple when it's a business calling, though. Easy example: I run a repair shop. If you drop off a computer or game console, we ask for your phone number and call you when it's done. We get a LOT of people who do something similar to you, or just leave their voicemail box full, or don't bother to set up voicemail at all. Then they get angry at us: "Why didn't you call me to let me know my system was finished?" "We did, and you didn't answer." "Oh, I don't pick up calls from random numbers." Well, I don't know what to tell you, then... I can't text you, because we don't have a business cell phone to text with. Yes, I suppose I could set up some fancy integrated-with-our-POS system to text you from some number that we could then read replies to, but that both would cost time and money to develop, and would open up yet another vector for us to be contacted by (we already have a phone number, Yelp messages, Facebook messages, and email as it is.) We can (and do) email customers, but email presents its own issues: People like to reply to them and we don't always have time to respond quickly, and people don't check their email often, or it goes into a spam filter... It's not just us. It's your doctor, your pet groomer, anyone who has a local business. My suggestion here is to pick up calls from your local area code, and/or program into your phone the businesses you do business with.
    • city41 10y ago
      I honestly don't even know what my local area code is. My cell number is from two moves ago, and phone calls have become so infrequent that learning my local area code just doesn't realistically happen anymore.
    • officialchicken 10y ago
      My suggestion is you bite the bullet and realize that advertisers have basically ruined the medium of unknown voice calls. Text messaging with or without email is easy to access online[0] and no longer required an ancient "business line" - you don't need to "integrate" it into your p.o.s. POS either. If you have fb, then there's surely no reason other than will that you can't use SMS. [0] for example, https://www.twilio.com/ https://www.twilio.com/
• MicroBerto 10y ago
  This plus I have a Google Voice number for things that I know I'll never want to answer. I give out my actual cell to as few parties as possible. I really only communicate via phone if it's scheduled in the calendar.
• NicoJuicy 10y ago
  I do the same thing with a little variant. - Don't answer private numbers ( where i don't see the number) - Don't answer unknown numbers on landlines ( except Android lookup a business name and says which one -- then i handle it depending the bussiness) - Pick up depending a mobile or landline. If it's a landline with our city code in front. I pick up. If it's not ( or from a big city), i don't pick up. If it's a mobile phone, chances are to big it's someone who referenced me. Had no junk calls, except one. Where a telemarketeer seemed to use a mobile number... Which was akward
  • TeMPOraL 10y ago
    I follow a similar strategy. RE your last point, I think where I live I have about equal amount of telemarketers calling from landline numbers and mobile numbers. I don't know what makes them pick one over the other.
  • deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
• maxerickson 10y ago
  In my experience, each round of scam calls will stop calling once you have answered their call and said no/hung up after a few seconds of listening. Which isn't really useful beyond getting them to only call once every few months instead of once every few days or whatever. Everything but political crap and surveys seems to go like this, answering a call and saying no firmly ends that stream of calls. For the surveys I answer and ask how much they are paying people to take the survey. Then when they say they aren't paying I say I'm not interested and hang up. My hope is that this is superficially annoying for the person doing the survey. Not antagonistic, just enough to remind them exactly what it is they are doing.
  • jimhefferon 10y ago
    > In my experience, each round of scam calls will stop calling once you have answered their call and said no/hung up after a few seconds of listening. I believe you but I can only say that your experience is different than mine. Very different. My experience is that it seems to encourage them to call more often.
    • colejohnson66 10y ago
      Back a few years ago when spam involved adding you to shady mailing lists, it seems clicking the "unsubscribe" button told the spammers that not only does that email address exist, it's being used. Then they just add you to more shoddy mailing lists.
    • hackney 10y ago
      Both the sony z3 and now my current galaxy s5 have the ability to add any # to a built-in Auto Reject list. The z3 even had a built-in answering machine and at one point I told att to disable voicemail. I love it when I get those calls as I then just block them. Problem solved. And of course there are free aps which can do the same.
      • DrScump 10y ago
        <galaxy s5 (has) the ability to add any # to a built-in Auto Reject list.> Until you hit 200, anyway.
• wmeredith 10y ago
  I do the exact same thing. If it's important, have a real.person call me and leave a message. Otherwise eff off.
• dave2000 10y ago
  It's very unlikely that that missed mystery call was important. There'll be times when you'll be waiting for the results of a hospital test or when a loved one is ill. But generally, all my communication is on opt-in systems like Facebook, WhatsApp etc. My Android phone doesn't let me block numbers, which is a little annoying but adding persistent nuisances such as desperate recruitment composites to my contacts as "ignore me #4" does the trick. The phone company is delivering these calls so it's their job to sort it out. I don't want any number withheld calls, ever. I expect phone companies to work together like email companies do and blacklist people who abuse the system. I want an easy way to report abuse so phone companies have no excuse.