Ready to get the police involved.

[ShayeS]

I have been receiving harassing phones calls for a year now from an unknown number. I am ready to get the police involved to have public mobile pull the phone records and trace the number(s) that have been harasssing me.  I have never had to deal with these issues prior to being a customer with public mobile so I am unsure as to who specifically I should have the police contact at public mobile or how they could/should contact them as I doubt they will come to this forum.  

Please provide me with the appropriate contact information in these matters as I will need that information to provide to the authorities as soon as the judge signs off on this so I can expedite this situation into a resolution and the correct parties charged with harassment, amongst other things.  Thank you.

P.S. Dear Public Mobile, please create a service option that either allows all blocked/private calls to be blocked from contacting us ever, OR allows us to deny phones calls (ie forcing the user to record their name if from an unknown number and allowing us to accept or deny the call).. I also get robocalls and am sick of it, as my service provider you guys should provide more options to assist your customers in battling harassment, it’s crazy to think you guys that I pay for my phone line do not offer assistance with this.  I am tired of paying for a service that turns me into a victim, HELP US!!!

There was a service offered on landlines where a person has to state their name and you could accept of deny the call (as I mentioned above), this would be useful.. I do not want to just deny a call and allow it to go to voicemail to fill up my mailbox.. there has to be a way to combat this consistent nuisance and all phone companies should be assisting us consumers.  What about a #number to use after a robocall that would notify the company that this is a robocall/harassing caller and after you guys investigate you block the number from the system?  Is there no way to stop the madness, there has to be a solution.  Thank you for your time.

[srlawren]

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@ShayeS wrote:

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I don’t have a google pixel, yet again though, why should your phone choice dictate your services or lack there of when all the phone companies are the ones you pay a service fee to.  

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@ShayeS here's the problem:  you've chosen a 3rd-tier, no-frills provider in Public Mobile.  PM is always among the very last to get any new features.  If you're looking for something from the service provider, you're going to want to migrate your phone number to one of the top tiers (Telus, Bell, or Rogers) as they get new featuers much, much quicker.

However, as @NDesai mentioned, the Google Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL (https://store.google.com/ca/product/pixel_3) come with a value-added feature that allows you to screen your calls without talking to the caller.  You can see it in action in a couple of demo videos on YouTube here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivpYnzG_Eaw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0yDExXCpyA

You're right that there's no reason the mobile providers couldn't buid and offer something like this but PM doesn't and I wouldn't expect them to any time soon.  They still don't offer features that have been around for ages at the various 1st (Telus/Bell/Rogers) and 2nd (Koodo/Virgin/Fido) tiers such as Voice over LTE (VoLTE), Voice over Wi-Fi (VoWiFi), visual voicemail, and others.

[dna2016]

@ShayeS sorry to hear you're getting these calls, but it might be difficult to block if they are coming in as unknown.  You could try blocking any calls that come in as unknown through your phone settings, but I'm not too sure about that.  Only other thing I can think of is just ignoring the calls.

Regarding the police, unfortunately I have a feeling you won't get very far there either.  A co-worker of mine was getting harassed by those fake CRA people, and they were even threatening to abduct her if she didn't pay up.  So when she went to the police they said they can't do anything if you don't have a number to work with (the calls were unknown numbers).  They said they can only do something if something actually happens.  

Hopefully you'll have better luck, but you may just need to change your phone number or just ignore the calls.  Good luck.

[stonechucker]

Robs all’s are generally.on a dealer system that wither has a call list that is automatically processed by a business from a contact list, OR it simply an auto bulk dialed where the area code and/or area code and local exchange are dialed sequentially through a process, trying every number.

Changing your number may help with the preselected auto dealers, but any brute force sequential system will still get to you.

unfortunately, it seems you’re stuck, unless the Moderator Team can provide you with more information... or having the Police call Telus for this information.

[Psygineer]

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@ShayeS wrote:

That sounds awesome 👏🏻, any chance you have the dry cleaners name or number, I will go there and ask the owner myself what they did, this is how determined I am.  I am using an iPhone but I don’t see the option on my phone, will be upgrading again soon, but this also might be a determining factor then if it is more of a cellphone setting rather than something the phone company offers as an add-on.

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I've been looking into it for you. While I can't verify for certain if it is a Samsung UI or Android in general option, there appears to be a number of screening apps available on the Google Play store that seem to be decently rated (and free) that will do that feature for you if the option isn't on the phone. I would think that the iTunes store likely has similar apps (might be paid there though) that can do it too.

[ShayeS]

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@mimmo wrote:

@ShayeS you might want to check out koodo fido etc.. and see if they have a feature you are looking for. If they do it might be worth switching providers.

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How do you know PM doesn’t have something like this that is just not advertised?  Or are working on something like this already that is not yet out?  I just don’t even know the official name for this type of service.  This company keeps growing.

[mimmo]

@ShayeS you might want to check out koodo fido etc.. and see if they have a feature you are looking for. If they do it might be worth switching providers.

[ShayeS]

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@ute1978 wrote:

I'm afraid you will not get the solution you want from Public Mobile. I am using an iPhone and I'm blocking callers constantly. It is done by just two clicks.

Police will also tell you to change your number.

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Actually when I contacted the police a few months after this started they told me the process to get the information, but because PM doesn’t have a contact phone number I was not sure how this may differ.  I do know what you mean because a friend of mine was being harassed on a level that was way more extreme than I have been harassed and the police didn’t give her any options other than that, and during the beginning of my conversation with the police they told me the same, but at some point I must have said the right thing to the officer because he started devuldging some options for tracking down the number of my stalker and advice on dealing with the phone calls, and at this point my situation can warrant retrieval of my phone records to track my blocked number stalker.

but as I said previously in regards to robocallers, blocking tthem doesn’t do much, they switch the number about every 3 days, although this last week they’ve gotten sloppy, I got a few calls with a last name and one showing a number from Armenia that I will be giving to the authorities (once I figure out who exactly is in charge of investigating this) , as for the harassing phone call I keep receiving from the blocked number, I need that traced but that’s for the judge to decide and then pm needs to work with the police to collect the phone records.. if pm has/had the services though that I also previously mentioned this all could potentially be avoided because denying a call would be easy and avoid your voicemail from being filled by robocallers and blocked callers would have to announce themselves which would discourage this behaviour since it doesn’t even allow them to hear you answer the phone spoiling all their fun (officer told me stalkers get off on even just listening to you talk).  I know for landlines there was once a *57 or something number that would send the phone number to the police if you dialed that after they called, but that was for a landline and was in existence a long long time ago, not sure if it’s still an active option (there was a $5 charge for it I believe) and also unsure if that works on a cellphone.

This situation obviously won’t be solved in a minute, but if there are thing that will assist in ending these calls, the phone companies in my opinion are the best bet, as they could offer add-ons if they don’t already that allows you to screen calls.  Random apps are not reliable, and with the “privacy act” it’s  not easy to pull your records anymore, but possible to do so if you are as motivated as I am at this point and have had this go on as consistently as I have for as long as it has.  Anyway on my phone I am not able to block private or blocked numbers, but as I said before, even if I could, they could still fill up my voicemail box.  There has to be a better solution, or something to trick the robocaller computer into dropping’s your number from their list..  so if anyone knows of anything other than what’s already been posted let me know.  

[ShayeS]

I have asked you several times to stop harassing me, you unlike everyone else that has posted are not assisting me, I do not want your help, stop contacting me.  Do you really have nothing better to do with your life!  You are not an authority on anything I’m talking about, I already know how to block peoples numbers, sending me old article links if useless.   I have zero interest in your fake assistance, and I’ve already reported you to the moderator.  You may as well be a robocaller or a stalker at this point.  STOP CONTACTING ME!  You obviously have no respect for yourself or anyone else if this is what you choose to do with your time.  I DO NOT WANT YOUR ASSISTANCE and yet you refuse to even comprehend that.  You want to help me, then get off of this post and allow other people answer me and leave me in peace.

[ute1978]

I'm afraid you will not get the solution you want from Public Mobile. I am using an iPhone and I'm blocking callers constantly. It is done by just two clicks.

Police will also tell you to change your number.

[Anonymous]

You have a curious definition of harassment. You asked for help. I provided it. Others have  provided other excellent workarounds. You make excellent points of what this service could have. The people you would send a message to just might have a way to do blocks like landlines do. Send the message. See what happens.

[ShayeS]

Stop harassing me.

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@Anonymous wrote:

The support model here is that the forum can try to help you until you need some kind of account or internal technical issue resolved.

I've already given you the method to communicate with those that can do those deeper functions.

They don't necessarily keep track of all that is going on here in the forum. So it's up to you to reach out to them. That's just how it works here.

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[Anonymous]

The support model here is that the forum can try to help you until you need some kind of account or internal technical issue resolved.

I've already given you the method to communicate with those that can do those deeper functions.

They don't necessarily keep track of all that is going on here in the forum. So it's up to you to reach out to them. That's just how it works here.

[ShayeS]

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@NDesai wrote:

You are blaming Public Mobile for receiving spam calls, but the fact is people get spam calls on all carriers including Bell and Rogers. Your number might be spoiled to them and that's why you are getting those calls. If you have a Google phone such as Pixel, they have a better spam blocker built into their dialer app.

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I am not blaming public mobile for receiving harassing calls, that is ridiculous.  ALL of the phone companies should offer their customers these options, it’s almost 2019, it’s not like the technology doesn’t exist or is so hard to set up, it does exist, and yet it’s not an option as far as I know, hence why I’m on here trying to get any information I possibly can to resolve my issue.  But as a paying customer, regardless of the company there should be something like this available to us all to help curb unwanted harassing calls.  

I don’t have a google pixel, yet again though, why should your phone choice dictate your services or lack there of when all the phone companies are the ones you pay a service fee to.  I know there was something for home phones at some point that forced blocked caller and 800#s to announce themselves (much like a collect call name recording) and you could deny or accept the call.  Much better than just answering, because apparently when you just answer a call from a robocaller the computer acknowledges that a human answered and then the fake phones calls from the revenue agency and other “companies” begin callin in an attempt to gather information, scam you out of money or steal your identity.  This option, if it does exist for cellphones and pm has it or something similar is what I am seeking, as well as of course and information a PM representative has to offer! Hint hint.. PM reps if you are reading this please reply or dm me.

[Anonymous]

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@ShayeS wrote:

Now this is just harassment. I have no interest in further conversing with you, go troll somebody else.

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Oh look. I googled "iphone block number" and found this. Whadyaknow.

[Anonymous]

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@ShayeS wrote:

Now this is just harassment. I have no interest in further conversing with you, go troll somebody else.

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My goodness. Have a pleasant and happy life. Sounds like you need it.

[ShayeS]

Now this is just harassment. I have no interest in further conversing with you, go troll somebody else.

[ShayeS]

That sounds awesome 👏🏻, any chance you have the dry cleaners name or number, I will go there and ask the owner myself what they did, this is how determined I am.  I am using an iPhone but I don’t see the option on my phone, will be upgrading again soon, but this also might be a determining factor then if it is more of a cellphone setting rather than something the phone company offers as an add-on.

[NDesai]

You are blaming Public Mobile for receiving spam calls, but the fact is people get spam calls on all carriers including Bell and Rogers. Your number might be spoiled to them and that's why you are getting those calls. If you have a Google phone such as Pixel, they have a better spam blocker built into their dialer app.

[Anonymous]

Here:

Jeez. Don't use a low budget phone service for business. A doctor?!

Send ONE (1) private message to them here and include your phone number and PIN to minimize back and forth identity verification delays.
Forget your PIN? Then you'll need 3 of either of these pieces of information you used when you signed up: full address, birthdate, last 4 digits of CC you might have used, email address on the account, alternative phone number you might've entered when you signed up. Or, in addition, either of these to get to 3: last payment amount and date, last add-on bought and date.
And of course your question/problem.
Then hopefully they will get back to you as soon as they can between M-F 9-9 (ET) and Sat-Sun 9-7:30 (ET). But it could be up to a couple days.
Depending on your notification settings, you would get an email notifying you of a reply. Get back here and see a red blob over the little envelope in the upper right of your screen and click on it to see the message.

[ShayeS]

All of my patients have this number, I am not going to just change it.  And realistically how did a robocaller get it in the first place?  It takes one company you’re associated with to get all their customer data stolen and then I have to change my number over and over again?  

It’s great that you think you’re helping by stating the obvious, perhaps your expectations in general are low, but when the people doing the harassment have MORE options than all the customers of the all the phone companies that pay for their services, that’s a problem.  You are not offering anything NEW, I am interested in hearing from a PM representative or someone who has an actual solution or new options, or someone who’s actually dealt with this and found a resolution.  You’re hostility is useless in assisting me.  You do not have a solution for me and your negativity is in no way helpful or appreciated.   Have a great night 👍🏻

[Psygineer]

While this first part is not a solution at all, it's something I encountered. Recently I purchased an S8+ used (to replace my lovely 5-year-old LG) and I called the dry cleaners to check to see when they closed as I had an order to pick up (and to test the phone with my SIM). The phone auto-told me they could not accept anonymous calls. The owner of the S8+ had disabled outgoing caller ID on the phone as she had been using it for customer service callbacks for a website she worked for and didn't want customers seeing her personal cell number. I know for a fact the dry cleaner also uses a cell phone for their business so the feature may even be available on PM to block incoming calls that are from unknown/unidentified numbers. Finding it, assuming if it does exist, is the trouble. It was a bit of a hassle to try to get it to extend the amount of time before the voicemail picks up. The menu system is a bit confusing and the dial-in codes are hard to locate on the forums for some of the other options.

Possible solution:

On the S8+ I mentioned in the previous part, it has an option buried in the block numbers menu to autoblock unknown calls and messages. It seems to only block people who do not have their number/name display when calling. I tested it with #31# and it wouldn't let me call my S8+ with that command. I have no idea what phone you are using, but a similar option might be in your menu too. Pretty sure this is an Android option and not just a Samsung UI option. I'd check on my old iPhone but I gave it away recently.

Edit: Found a link describing it

https://www.samsung.com/uk/support/mobile-devices/how-do-i-block-unknown-or-hidden-numbers-from-call...

[Anonymous]

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@ShayeS wrote:

I’m NOT changing my number, even if I do you think they won’t get the new one?  I block the robocalls but they just get a new number a couple days later so it doesn’t actually solve anything, and anyways when you block someone they just get your voicemail anyway which means I still get voicemails, blocking should just disconnect the call or do one of those lovey “your call can not be completed as dialed setups” especially since the robocallers have that.. ever tried to call those “companies back” because that’s the message I get if I try to, so why am I not afforded the same option since I’m the one paying for my phoneline?  

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Obviously I don't know the nature of these calls but if you change it and only those that you care to have it know it and that you DO NOT publish it anywhere in some social networking site then how would that same person (assuming) get to know your new number?

As for your emphatic NOT...suit yourself. It's an easy solutuon.

Robocalls: Yup. I have 38 numbers in my block number contact. New one comes through...I answer it...it's junk...into the block number.

[ShayeS]

I’m NOT changing my number, even if I do you think they won’t get the new one?  I block the robocalls but they just get a new number a couple days later so it doesn’t actually solve anything, and anyways when you block someone they just get your voicemail anyway which means I still get voicemails, blocking should just disconnect the call or do one of those lovely “your call can not be completed as dialed setups” especially since the robocallers have that.. ever tried to call those “companies back” because that’s the message I get if I try to, so why am I not afforded the same option since I’m the one paying for my phoneline?  

Is there a way to forward specific calls?  Like a way to setup that when I get a call I do not want I can forward it.. preferably to a fax machine phone number?

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@Anonymous wrote:

 @ShayeS:

Just use the change number feature in the self-serve.

Problem solved.

I get calls of recordings allegedly from banks and collectors and whatnot of banks I have no business with and I'm certainly not indebted to.

I put those numbers into a contact of block numbers which I set up notifications to do nothing. It appears on the phone but doesn't ring or vibe. It appears as activity. I have extended absence greeting so no message is left.

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[jp2]

Your right I don't think the police will want to come on the forum and wait 3 days for mods to respond 

I think they could just contact Telus (parent company) for this sort of thing. If Telus wants them to talk to a PM rep they will transfer the call 

[Anonymous]

 @ShayeS:

Just use the change number feature in the self-serve.

Problem solved.

I get calls of recordings allegedly from banks and collectors and whatnot of banks I have no business with and I'm certainly not indebted to.

I put those numbers into a contact of block numbers which I set up notifications to do nothing. It appears on the phone but doesn't ring or vibe. It appears as activity. I have extended absence greeting so no message is left.