Telecom Trends

One of the advantages (and disadvantages) of having multiple phone lines in the house is that I can anticipate telemarketing calls before they arrive on the second line. In this way, I am better equipped to try to find out who is behind those annoying recorded messages.

I recently received a call from a mythical Orlando phone number (407.000.9821) that told me I won a Florida or Bahamas vacation and I just had to press 9 for more information. I did just that and reached a human who must have accidentally hung up on me when I asked to be placed on their do not call list.

A few minutes later, the same caller ID showed up on another line and I reached a different agent. I decided to play along a little longer, so that I could ask the name of the group behind this promotion - Cancun Travel Unlimited. Once armed with a call-back number, I asked this agent to remove my phone number from their list. Again, a hang up.

As it turns out, the phone number I was given didn't belong to Cancun Travel, a company that has a number of reports on a rip-off website. The folks at Hilton Timeshare were happy to add me to their own do not call list, but they were unaware of a campaign.

When we have a Florida / Mexican company making calls, with no presence in this country, it makes me wonder how enforcement of our Do Not Call legislation is going to provide the kind of relief expected by Canadians.

Is the DNCL going to be another gun registry?

Technorati Tags:
DNCL