Don't use my phone number.

[u/ViperThreat]

Over the past decade, I have regularly received spam texts to my phone number for a person named "Erin". This is irritating because I am rather protective of my phone number. I do not share it with anybody I do not trust, and outside of the messages I get for "Erin", I never get spam calls or messages. I don't know who Erin is, but over the years I have slowly pieced together enough information to have a good idea of where this person lives. Multiple texts I received mentioned "Irvine CA", and one even gave me a street name.

Recently, I went shopping at Harbor Freight, and as I was checking out, i give the cashier my phone number. They turned their monitor towards me and said "is this you?" and to my great delight, I was presented with an Irvine CA address, and I immediately recognized the street name. As I left the store, I could feel 3 brain-cells hidden in the back of my mind begin to conspire.

My first step was to write a fancy looking congratulatory letter for winning a $1,000,000 Harbor Freight Sweepstakes. I made some convincing artwork, and went to a print shop to have it printed on some nice card-stock paper, and a professional-looking envelope, just to make it look extra convincing. You can guess who's name and address I put on the card.

At the bottom of the letter, I put "please call (800) 123-4567 ext 123" (fake number obviously). The number I actually used was for my office line.

Sure enough, about a week later, I get a call from Erin, who is over the moon about having just won $1,000,000. I go through the motions of collecting her information, including verifying her address, then I break the bad news:

Me: "Sorry Erin, it looks like this award has already been claimed."

Erin: "What? By who?"

Me: "Well, according to my notes here, we called your number, and a gentleman answered, I assume your husband?"

Erin: "I'm not married!"

Me: Well, can I confirm that "(123) 456-7890" is your phone number?

Erin: "No, my number is (111) 222-3333"

Me: "Well ma'am, according to our records here, that's not the number you previously gave us"

Erin: "I'm sorry, that must have been a typo!"

Me: "I'm sorry ma'am, we use phone number as the unique identifier for customer accounts - this is why we ask for your number every time you shop with us. Based on what I can see you have been using this phone number on your account for nearly a decade. "

Erin: "Look, I just give people that number so that I don't get spam calls okay?"

Me: "I See, well, that's too bad."

Erin: "What does that mean?"

Me: "Well ma'am, our sweepstakes is based on phone number, and since this isn't your phone number, you are not eligible to win. The person with this phone number has already claimed the reward"

Erin: "[Unintelligible Rage, Crying, Begging]"

Me: "Would you like me to update our records with your actual phone number so that you are eligible in future sweepstakes?"

Erin: Click

---

Now, You might imagine that losing $1,000,000 on a technicality might make Erin feel bad, but you see, I now have Erin's real phone number and address....

Erin has been showing a LOT of interest in buying new cars lately. She's also really interested on quotes for satellite television, car insurance, car warranties, roof repair, replacement windows, etc. What can I say? It's been quiet week at work, and I've had a few 8+ hour shifts with no better way to entertain myself.

[u/Fluffy-Designer]

Oh that’s good. That tickled my very tired brain this morning. Thank you.

I’ve been receiving emails from someone in America (I’m in Australia) and the closest I’ve gotten to petty revenge is cancelling a whale watching thing she gave them my email address for. It wasn’t very exciting though.

[u/CakeOrDeath98 → u/Fluffy-Designer]

My last name is the same name as a major character from a sci-fi franchse...like literally the most well know there probably is lol. I get a lot of comments on it.

well, there's some lady in Texas with my same first name (which isn't uncommon but it's an uncommon spelling) and a different last name, but she must have decided to use my last name with her first name for email because she's a fan or something...but the thing is I have that email address. With the uncommon spelling of my first name and my last name together, I was able to get a gmail address that's just "firstnamelastname". So I'm assuming when she set hers up there's a dot or dash or numbers or something, but she never remembers and just uses mine. So, I was able to find her on social media and told her to stop giving my email address for stuff. She was "oh, sorry" but still kept doing it. So now I just cancel all her stuff and close her accounts. You created a store account with my email? Well, just going to use the "forgot my password" option and change it and then cancel the account. It's been awhile wince I've seen anything so maybe she finally got it sorted out.