Just had an interesting little experience...

We had a voice message at home last night, along the lines of, "This message is for ", plus a garbled name, plus "This is not a sales call. We are calling about an appointment you missed with CCS. We need to talk about your missed appointment. Do not disregard this message. We are trying to work with you. My name is (such-and-such). Call me at 800-xxx-xxxx extension 9 to talk to myself or my assistant." The message itself sounded like a recording.

So, being a suspicious SOB, I said to myself, self, this sounds like a scam. I called the number today and of course got a recording that said I was calling after hours, but if I knew the four-digit extension, to please dial it. What was funny was that the extension the caller left was only one digit. What was also funny was that their recording said "CCS," not what CCS was.

At which point I of course Googled it, and lo and behold one of the many CCSs out there is a collection agency, which showed up on a scam-reporting site.

Of course I have no clue what the call was about (for all I know, it was a wrong number), but my overactive imagination tells me that it could be a pretty cool scam. I'll be interested to see if they call back.

Anyone here ever heard of CCS?

I've gotten a bunch of calls like this. My assumption is that if you call back you'll unknowingly be charged some outrageous amount of money per minute for the call. I don't know for sure though.

Might be the Carbon Capture and Storage police. Everyone must go for a check up to make sure they are not breathing too much and any excess over the allocated amount must put in a sack and stored. If you missed your appointment you are in big trouble.

I get a call every morning from the same 800 number and as soon as I pick up the line goes dead. It is a scam line of some sort...too common these days.

The CCS collection agency would have to give you a mini-Maranda if they call you, they are based out of Dedham, MA if you want to look up their business number and give them a call.

Well, thanks to Caller ID, I got their number (in Cedar City, UT)... which of course didn't lead to anything in a search by phone number on SuperPages. The same number has shown up several times on my Caller ID, but this was the first time they left a message.

If it's really a scam, I'm kinda hoping they catch me at home next week. Should be fun to play with them a bit.

It could be a variation of the Credit Card Services scam. That begins with a recorded message, "This is (woman's name) from Credit Card Services. There is nothing currently wrong with your account,...ect." You are asked to press 1 to get information about lowering your credit card rate. When you do, the scammer asks for your bank and credit card number and you kiss your money goodbye.

I get these pretty regularly. I usually hang up as soon as I hear the familiar recording, but in the past I've messed with them a little. Once I gave them a phony name and account number. One time I actually engaged the guy in a conversation about his criminal activity. In what sounded to these American ears like a Jamaican accent, he told be bluntly, "You got to make your nut, I got to make mine."

We've gotten that one a number of times, generally on the answering machine.

The one I like starts off by saying, "This message is for such-and-such. By continuing to listen, you are verifying that you are such-and-such..." Cute.

That is definately a collection agency.

Randwill,

working for a bank I can tell you NO LEGITIMATE BANK will ever call you about lowering your APR. Their are people who for a fee will negotiate on your behalf...but it's nothing you couldn't do yourfself

I'm sure I know I have had the same type of calls when I had my home phone. I've even had a few since I only use a cell phone now.

The one that really did almost get me to call back however was from a law firm. Said there was an investigation taking place and I was involved. I didn't know why I would be involved however. I checked out the name I of the firm and attorney I was to call back. Come to find out the number was a number in Canada. It was actually some attorney and there had been reports that he was scamming people. Nothing had been done to him up to that point however to stop him. I don't know if he was ever actually caught. But I refused to contact him and never did hear back. So that shows it was a scam regardless.

The worst callers are the ones that can transfer you to a premium rate line with a press of single button.