U.S. consumers and businesses were inundated by an estimated 2.2 billion robocalls in February of this year. This equates to 78.9 million robocalls per day or 914 robocalls for every second of the month!

Complaining to the FCC and listing your phone numbers with the FTC’s national Do Not Call registry are becoming the least effective ways of dealing with this growing problem. Although these measures may stop law-abiding callers, they do not stop scammers.  The reason – advances in Caller ID technology permit fraudsters to easily generate calls from anywhere in the world and spoof their telephone numbers to cover their tracks.

 

Government Efforts May Not Be Enough

New FCC rules would give a little more power to phone companies and let them block obviously phony numbers, such as those that are not in use or ones with non-existent area codes. These steps promise to cut down on the number of robocalls, but they will not completely stop them.

For those who want a foolproof solution that does not rely on government action or telephone company efforts, there are free and paid services available that do an effective job for all your VoIP landlines.

One approach uses “Simultaneous Ring” provided by the carrier.  When simultaneous ring is enabled, your phone will ring on more than one number at the same time. The first device to pick it up gets the call and the other phones stop ringing.

 

The Virtual Receptionist

To screen incoming calls, a virtual receptionist is the first to pick up on the first ring. If the call is legitimate, the service allows it to go through.  If the call is determined to be an illegal robocall, it is hung up for you. Your phone will ring once, letting you know that it has been answered and stopped.

These virtual receptionist services use a database of known illegal robo-callers that have been compiled with the help of the FTC, user reports, and other sources. If a call gets a match in this database, the virtual receptionist grabs the call.  If there’s no match, the call is permitted to go through.

Obviously, not all robocalls come from scammers. There are legal robocalls like school closing announcements, community emergency broadcasts, and prescription reminders. These are allowed through.  Even political robocalls are legal and are allowed through.

Robocall blocking solutions are catching on, helping businesses and consumers save time and money. They are shaping up to become a fast-growing market in 2017, with carriers and third-party providers expanding their offerings beyond VoIP lines to include mobile services as well.  If you’re bothered by robocalls, effective solutions are finally at hand.

 

Contact ACC Telecom to Learn More

ACC Telecom provides voice communication solutions tailored to your business. We take care of all the implementation details for you, from installation and programming, to training, upgrades and ongoing support.

We have been helping build the future of communications for business all across America with our cloud and VoIP communications and security solutions.  Local, on-site installation and support is available throughout Maryland, Washington DC, and Northern VA.

Contact ACC Telecom to discuss your phone system needs.