Scam

Everyone knows that there are hundreds of different scams going on around us and it can be through emails, mail, phone calls or the knock on the door.

Recently we had someone knock on our door and try and sell us something. Of course, we are both very cautious about people knocking on our door especially in the evenings. On a Friday evening we received a knock on our door at around 10 pm so that was a sign of something different. As we live in an apartment building I was able to do the entire conversation through the locked door and was looking through our peep hole at the person.

Now the person on the other side of the door let me know that they were with a major internet provider and asked if we had internet in our home. I asked why he was asking and he then said that this provider had a wonderful offer on internet service for our area and he could give me a good deal. Well if the personal had of been with the provider that was knocking on our door he would have had a list of the units that he didn’t need to knock on. I reminded him that there is a no solicitation notice in our building and he would have to leave and I was going to call someone on him. He did walk away from our door but continued to knock on the doors around us. Yes, this is 10 pm and a lot of people will either be getting ready for bed and some will already be in bed for the night.

The person did have the correct colour shirt on for this internet provider but there was still something that bothered me about the knock on the door, so I decided to call the internet provider to see if they did door to door campaigns. The support and customer service is open until midnight so that meant that I would be able to talk with someone to see if this was a scam or not.

The lady that I ended up talking to with the internet provider was very friendly and was immediately unhappy when I let her know about the knock on the door that we received. Once I explained the situation she put me on hold for a couple of minutes as she wanted to speak with her manager to check to see if door to door campaigns were something that were done and especially at that late a time. When she came back she let me know that they do not do door to door campaigns and especially not at that time of the evening. I thanks her and she did let me know that there were going to note this so that if people from our building called in later that they would be away of the issue being raised right away.

I had a feeling that this was a scam because this internet provider has done a table in our lobby offering the internet service but they haven’t come door to door before. I am thinking that this may be one of the individuals that we get flyers from where they say we can get internet through them at a reasonable price but they have the major internet providers logo on them. I think next time I get one of those flyers I am also going to call in just to see if they really are a reseller for the provider.

People are trying to get smarter and smarter in the ways that they do the scams but we just have to remember to always be cautious when dealing with people. For us, if we want to investigate new services we will either walk into a store front for the store or we will do the reaching out either through the website or phone the company. Knowing that we have done the initial contact gives us a better feeling because then we know it should be the actual company we are talking to and not something just trying to get our information.

When you get that email, phone call or knock on the door remember to use caution when dealing with them. It might be the real company but there will be a lot of times that it isn’t and it is someone just trying to steal your identity.