do you have caller ID blocking ... guess what?

[welshTerrier2]

one of the nice features phone companies offer to help you protect your privacy is caller ID blocking ... by activating this feature (usually no charge), people you call cannot see your phone number ...

well, guess what? the blocking does NOT work when you call an 800 number ... when i called my phone company, Verizon, and asked to activate caller ID blocking (on my land line), they never mentioned to me that companies I called using their 800 number could see my phone number ... i found out this was happening because someone i called read my phone number back to me to verify the number ...

so i called Verizon to ask them why caller ID blocking didn't work ... they explained to me that it's a service they provide only on non-800 calls ... i told them i especially wanted privacy on non-800 calls ... "nope, can't have it ... the 800 number is provided for your convenience and you have to give up your privacy if you want to take advantage of it" ...

sounds like we need a change in the law to protect consumer privacy ... if i don't want someone to have my phone number, the decision should be totally mine ... period !!! this is yet another example of favoring corporations over the individual ...

[democracyindanger]

1. 800 is like calling somebody collect

Free call for you, but not for the company. If somebody was calling me collect, I'd expect to be able to know the number.

[welshTerrier2]

4. it benefits the company too ...

i totally disagree ... companies have 800 numbers because they are more likely to generate business by providing them ... it may be a free call to the customer but the companies provide the 800 number to encourage the customer to call ...

that does not mean i should have to sacrifice my privacy ...

[democracyindanger]

6. I dunno. Doesn't seem like

that big a deal to me--and that's not diminishing your concerns, I just don't see it as an unfair invasion of my privacy. I would be pissed at the phone company, though, for not letting you know up front that ID blocking doesn't apply to 800 numbers.

[Billy Ruffian]

8. 800 caller id

has been around since 800 numbers came into being. It's not exactly a secret.

Here's an article from 1996

Caller ID

[Billy Ruffian]

7. Yes it does. They are paying for you to use the resource n/t

[Trillo]

2. In the U.S. most businesses that have an 800 number

also have a local number you can call instead.

[caligirl]

3. I do , thanks for the heads up. eom

[Billy Ruffian]

5. The identification from toll free numbers is different

I'd have to dig to find the name of the process, but it is NOT caller ID.

The owner of the toll free number is paying for your call. That owner has paid for the right to know who is calling.

If you want to have your number blocked, find the regular toll number, and call that.

[likesmountains 52]

9. If you have "call blocking" is it on all the time or can you just activate

it for certain calls? Just curious about some calls I get. Thanks

[Lugnut]

10. My number is always block unless

I punch in a code to unblock it. Some of my friends with caller ID won't accept calls from blocked numbers. On caller ID my call shows up as "private" or something like that because my number is unlisted.