As the owner of a small business I am often telephoned by companies who want to sell me their services, products, or to put me on their mailing list. I have no problem with that. However, I am inundated with phone calls from companies representing charities who want the company to advertise on their wall chart, year planner, diary or other ephemeral publication. The style of these phone calls varies and most (over 90% in my experience) are scams. I highlight below the various types of phone call:

1. The "Hello, I’m Fred from CharityX / PublisherY.." phone call. This is usually a genuine phone call. The caller will explain that they are producing a publication in your area and are selling advertising space. The next phone call will be a form of Call 4.
2. The "Hello, can I ask you a few questions.." phone call. This is a scam phone call. The caller asks questions about the business and would you like to ‘put your name down’ for advertising in a publication. If you do, then you are likely to then get your next phone call from the same company in the form of Call 4.
3. The "Hello, can I speak to the person that deals with your advertising.." phone call. This is usually a scam phone call. It’s a variant of Call 2. I usually state that we don’t advertise. That easily ends the call.
4. The "Hello , thank you for contributing to Charity X.." phone call. This is a scam phone call. Most of the calls you will get will be all friendly, with the exception of those callers who are poorly trained in the technique. The idea behind this one is to make you believe that you previously agreed to advertise or contribute, that’s why they know you, ask you how your weekend was etc. When questioned, callers will say that they phoned a few months ago – long enough for most people to forget whether they did or did not advertise. If you are not careful, by the end of the phone call you will have agreed to advertise. Some callers of Call 4 always assume their information is correct. The best way to deal with this is to deny it. Repeatedly.
5. The "Hello , thank you for contributing to CharityX. I’m not asking for any more money.." phone call. This is a scam phone call. It’s a variant of Call 4.

The purpose of all of these phone calls is for you to agree to advertise or contribute. Most of the calls come from publishers rather than charities, and in my experience checking with charities is a waste of time. None of my checks have ever led to a response from the given charity, including some well known charities. If you agree to advertise, the caller will ask you not to renege on the agreement because it increases their overheads. Furthermore, to get the "ahh" factor, all the charities involved are related in one way or another to work with children. I’ve never had someone phone up regarding a bowel cancer wallchart.

The result of all of this is that I now keep my own "scam log" for such phone calls. I’ve found I get between 2 and 4 a month, and the caller can flounder when you let them know that you log all charity calls.

So, how does this affect me and my view of charities? The bottom line is whilst I once contributed occasionally to charities, I will no longer have anything to do with any of them. Genuine or not. Whether in this form or through traditional campaigning. It’s not easy to tell which telephone approaches are genuine and if the charities themselves don’t respond then they’re not exactly helping matters.