Beware Premium rate phonecards

This week I have just received my phone bill, to my astonishment a normal £23/month bill had transformed itself into a £200 bill for the month (with unbilled calls I suspect being another £100 !).

From further investigation of the bill I have found a premium rate number which has been dialled, unwittingly I may add, by my aupair. She had rang the number thinking that this was a prepaid card ( actually it was left by a previous aupair). The card boasts cheap international calls with 200, 400, even 900 mins free. On the reverse are the instructions of how to use it to receive your free minutes. The long and the short of the instructions are that after 10 mins (£15 cost) you will be told a freephone number and pin, you are then supposed to hang up and redial using this freephone number and pin- beware if you do not you will be continually charged at £1.50/min.

To someone with english as their first language the instructions are not 100% clear and confusing, to a visitor to a country, here to learn english these are nigh on impossible to fathom out.

I would advise anyone not to use these 09 numbered cards unless they are sure of the consequences.

Two for one offer!

I do not know whether it is a lack of training or bad cashup systems, but every now and then I get conned into picking up a two for one offer or buy two for £2.50 type offer at my local Tesco express to find when I get home the offer has not gone through.

Is there a special button to press prior to taking your money that not all cashiers press? Are they trained not to press said button unless asked to in the hope that you do not notice?

Advice and note to self - prompt cashier to calculate discounts prior to leaving the shop.

Unsolicited sales calls

Gorden Bennett, I had another one of those stupid sales calls last night, you know the ones, they phone you up and clarify who they are speaking to and try and sell you something like you are their best mate !

After a couple of seconds of his 'matey' behaviour talking about loans and the interest rate, I said ' If you are trying to sell me something I am not interested'.

To which I got the reply, 'Oh no sir I am not trying to sell anything, it is money I am offering you'.

I told him that he was trying to sell me a loan, so therefore trying to sell me something, but he persisted with the 'No sir I am not selling anything' so I hung up.

These people must think we were born yesterday.

There has to be better ways of making a living than making a complete nuisance of yourself to people.

Although there is a service to try and prevent these calls, telephone preference service (register here http://www.tpsonline.org.uk/tps/), of which I have registered, it does not prevent all calls and god knows how, but the calls still slip through.

Spanish Lottery Win - NOT

Recently I have received an increased number of emails regarding winning the Spanish Lottery, I ignored these and relegated them to the trash bin.

After a few of these emails I received a letter in the post from the same company, telling me of my Spanish Lottery win ( 1.6million euros or there abouts). All I had to do was fill out the accompanying form and send it off , which of course included my name, address and bank details.

Bin it!

I know this sounds obvious but there are a lot of unsuspecting people out there that may be reeled in by the promise of a large windfall - come on be honest we have all thought twice about something like this.