Dear LPG,

I received a telephone call from what sounded like a young gentleman who seamlessly introduced himself and mentioned the name of the company he was calling from so quickly that I missed it.    He then went on to explain the reasons that I qualified before informing me that I was entitled to have some work done to improve my home’s energy efficiency free of charge and that he would be able to find a company who could do the work for me.

It all sounded a bit too good to be true and, as you can imagine I did not want to miss out on an opportunity if he was telling the truth.  I put the phone down that day but then found out that one of my friends had been helped by a similar company and I will never be sure if I could have benefited too.

So, my question is’ “How can I tell if people on the other end of the phone are really who they say they are?”

IJ, Blackheath.

The simple answer to the question is there is no real way of telling who is phoning you, but we do have some advice.

There are different ways of achieving your goal but, given this scenario, one of the best ways to be sure who is calling you is to tell them that you will call them back.  In order to do this, you are going to need to write down the name of the company and it will also be good to take the name of the person who says that they are calling you.   When you ask for this information most fake callers are likely to hang up quite quickly.    If that does not happen, take their telephone number, but whatever else you do don’t use the number they gave you to call them back.

You would now have to do a little research.   If you can, use the internet, or get someone who can to, google the company name that they have given to see if it exists and, if it does, it should offer you a telephone number that you can compare with the one you were given.  Then use that number to call the company back.  

In this case we would also recommend that you check with the council that there is such a scheme in place.  They should be able to tell you about any schemes, or at least where you would be able to find that information.

This way you will be able to find out if you really qualify.

Remember the basic rule: -  You are always surer of who you are calling then anyone who calls you!