Call received from Indian Call Centre on behalf of BT Openreach

[#1]

Last night and early this morning my broadband was down to around 5mbps and even lower it was surging during testing and generally all over the place.Reconnecting made no difference, then I fiddled with the aerials on the wifi card (300mbps) in my pc and it seemed to sort itself out and has been around 35mbps for the rest of the day.so I assumed I had disturbed the wireless wifi card aerials plugging in a usb stick and that was the cause

About half an hour ago I got a call from a gentlemen in an Indian call centre called Smith, He said he was ringing because he understood that I had a problem because the company (BT Openreach he claimed) had asked him to call as they thought I had a problem with my router (Plusnet standard router sent out about 3 weeks ago when I upgraded to fibre). He didn't seem to know what to do when I said it was working ok. so rang off and said he would ring back 

 I did have problems when I started but they were resolved when I upgraded my pc and the wifi card from 56mbps to 300mbps and the speed doubled  so assumed that was the cause rather than anything else as the router light was solid blue.

Not sure of what to make of it can anyone shed any light.at first I thought it was an attempt at phishing like the microsoft calls but doesn't seem likely.

[#2]

@Boxedin Welcome to the forums. In a nutshell, that was spam. BTOR never  ring customers direct, nor can you call them. All communication is via your ISP - Plusnet, in this case.

Did the caller even mention your ISP by name?

[#3]

Thanks John

No he didn't.say anything about Plusnet   I didn't say who I was with  for that reason to try to draw him out into saying something to give the game away. 

But I did wonder how they knew that I had been having problems, it made me consider if  they could access my router software and disrupt it in some way

Or, as I had been on ookla and btwholesale speed testing last night, maybe they  they could tap into that then they would have a telephone number to ring and someone who had a slow speed but then they would have also  known I was with Plusnet probably.

But he didn't give me any spiel about we can fix it for you if you give me your bank account details  or for a fee. (Perhaps it was just a training call and they are working on it!) He just said they would ring back.

[#4]

Pure coincidence, @Boxedin . They just use a computer to ring a long list of sequential numbers, and eventually someone like you, who has had a recent problem will pick up, and hopefully treat them with the disdain they deserve.

Don't worry, no they can't access your router - unless you were daft enough to allow them, and your other theories are also unfounded.

As I post on here at times, and regularly on the spam phone reports forum I follow - if you don't know the number calling you, or you are not expecting a call from a number you don't know - leave it to go to voicemail, if someone needs to get in touch, they will (or should) leave a message.

[#5]

@Boxedin  The scammer didn't have your number or know anything about your broadband they just call random numbers, I had a some of these calls a few weeks ago, I usually just hang up but sometimes give a more (censored) response.😀

[#6]

@Boxedin Just adding support to what the other two respondents have said.

Scammers pretend to be calling or emailing from Amazon, BT, Openreach, eBay, Microsoft etc simply because those firms have such a large customer base.

"There's a problem with your broadband" is a popular opening gambit, as so many broadband customers are convinced that it should be better, and will innocently fall for a scammer.

I generally regard people I meet as trustworthy until proven otherwise, but with phone calls it has to be the other way round.

[#7]

Thanks Real AleMadrid and Dont Panic 

Just checked the number 01556612857 on callchecker and someone has reported it, they try and get you to download Team viewer the number they use changes all the time. Don't know how they can call from india and disguise it as a Castle Douglas number.