Blackilist 10-digit numbers

[jonathanc]

Hope this isn't a silly question, but is there a way of blacklisting all incoming calls with numbers 10 digits long? I've noticed a lot of nuisance calls have 10-digit numbers.

 

[briankayser]

You could create an inbound rule with a mask, but...
What country are you in?
I'm in the US and I know if I did that it would pretty much block all of my calls, since they all come in as 10 digits.

 

[jonathanc]

Many thanks, briankayser

I'm in the UK, where most 'ordinary' national numbers consist on 10 digits plus an initial 0 (so 3CX sees 11 incoming digits).

I noticed that a high proportion of recent nuisance calls had a total of only 10 digits.

However, further research has revealed that there are still 43 areas in the country which still have some numbers totalling 10 digits: so unless I want to block calls from parts of Blackburn, Lancaster and Worcester I'm just going to have to keep adding individual numbers to the blacklist.

The list of 43 areas has been reduced dramatically over the years, though - so your kind advice will come in handy when it reaches 0!

Thanks again.

 

[nb]

You cannot block numbers based on the length. It is also unwise.
Try and see if you can find a pattern.

 

[jonathanc]

Many thanks, nickybrg - sound advice, though unfortunately nuisance callers seem to be getting more sophisticated nowadays and calling from an unpredictable variety of geographical numbers.

What I've done now is block recorded-message cold calls by passing calls to the affected line through a digital receptionist. That's got rid of most of the nuisance calls.

Thanks again for your help.

 

[nb]

1 way is as follows :

Lets say you have absolutely no business calls from the republic of Togo (+228).

You can do the following:
Make an inbound rule (DID by CID) that states all calls starting with 00228* (where * indicates a wildcard to match any number that starts with 00228) send to End call. Call will be sent to nothing immediately.

Then you can experiment with these blocks closing suspicious areas of entry.

 

[jonathanc]

Thanks again, nickybrg.

Unfortunately, the calls come from UK numbers relating to areas where we DO have customers - London, York, Nottingham ... probably bought from some VoIP provider.

So although your suggestion is of course a good one, it could lose us business in our case.

I once got really shirty with a cold caller, quizzing him quite severely like a journalist for some time. Eventually, he said: 'Is there an adult I can speak to there, sir?'

I couldn't help laughing, complimented him on his ingenuity, and thanked him for his time.

 

[nb]

Do not spend a lot of time on the phone with them because they might implement reverse charging. Which means that you pay for the bill even though the call is incoming.
Do not spend time with these calls. If you see it is going in the wrong direction, ignore the formalities manners or good samaritan etiquette and just hang up. You might need to inform your team. These guys call you with no respect whatsoever and some call you with negative intent. You should reciprocate. They are also trained to engage with you in a conversation to trigger ticks on time..

 

[jonathanc]

Ah, yes - hadn't thought of the possible reverse-charging factor, in particular.

As you point out, it's not a time for courtesy! Sad, but true.

I'll warn the rest of the team now.

Thanks again for your wise advice.

Jonathan

 

[leejor]

Nicky

What is Reverse-Charging, I'm not familiar with the term? In which countries is it used?

I'm familiar with "Collect Calls", where you are asked to accept the charges at the beginning of the call (mostly automated now-a-days) and you respond with DTMF), and of course where you are paying a per minute rate for all calls(incoming too) on your trunks, but who bills you for a reverse charge call and how would that sort of thing even be allowed?

 

[nb]

Normally in a phone call when someone calls you, you do not pay but the caller pays.

Reverse charging is when someone or something calls you, you see an incoming call and the moment you pick up, you start coughing up the bill. (It does not mean that you are still connected to the caller directly - the call might call you and reroute you to another high toll automata that auto answers). You or your employees might not even notice as it is done in a very subtle way.

This is not something that is used in a specific country or telco. Re-routing of calls can be done everywhere.