Haven't seen this scam before

[dryheat]

- they can't spell Customs-

[Johnny P]

I wondered what the Direct TV scam was, and found it on the internet.

"The DirecTV Scam is an advanced, complex scam that has been going around in the United States. Scammers send deceptive SMS texts to AT&T subscribers to advertise a non-existent AT&T deal. Victims who want to get on the good deal give up their account details unknowinly to a fake agent, and makes payment to the agent over the phone via gift cards."

[Dragonsdad]

Mention of gift cards should set off the warning lights.

I kind of miss messing with the Amazon scammers.
The idea was to see how long I could string them along before they'd hang up on me. I'm afraid I blew it when I finally blurted out "That's ******** (self edit) and you're a scammer". 'click'

I haven't heard from them since.
If I'd intended to make them stop calling I'd be proud of myself.
Truth is, I thought they'd never stop and I was starting to have fun with it.

[Allen]

Mention of gift cards should set off the warning lights.

I kind of miss messing with the Amazon scammers.
The idea was to see how long I could string them along before they'd hang up on me. I'm afraid I blew it when I finally blurted out "That's ******** (self edit) and you're a scammer". 'click'

I haven't heard from them since.
If I'd intended to make them stop calling I'd be proud of myself.
Truth is, I thought they'd never stop and I was starting to have fun with it.

I used to have a co-worker that liked to do that. He would edge them on as long as possible, then say "That sounds good to me, let me go get my CC", then never return or he would say (after a lengthy conversation), "you know, I think I've changed my mind".

I always wanted to blast an air horn into the phone as soon as I found they were telemarketers but didn't because it would upset the others in my home. Now days you usually don't get the chance---it's all recorded messages with no human on the other end.

[Dragonsdad]

Co-worker of mine used to start yelling obscenities into the phone.
While understandable, seemed like a good way to get on even more call lists. Turns out, our numbers get sold as part of a package. Even if I just let the answering machine deal with it, that doesn't slow down the autodialers. There is no honor among thieves, only sales. Live / known good, numbers sell for one rate. Untested numbers go for slightly less. If they can couple an address or other information to said number, that's another price rate. I'm sure some numbers get tossed into the pile to pad out the package simply because it can be done.

To really get the caller's attention, convince them you're currently being scammed by somebody else and you thought it was the other outfit calling. I enjoyed thanking them for confirming my purchase and trying to get the caller to sell me two more of whatever it was while they're still in stock, telling the caller that a company rep should be able to do that. Some scammers would just ignore my request and carry on with their script, some hung up at that point.

Always... always, I'd get a call on the same or the very next day. That's why I was surprised when the Amazon scammers stopped calling. Evidently, someone took the trouble to delete my number from whatever list they were using, probably not because I swore at them. More than likely it was because I called him out as a liar.

I may never know for sure.
Like I said, they quit calling.