Vietnamese mobile phone users going ape over spam text messages, cold calls
Vietnamese mobile phone users going ape over spam text messages, cold calls
Spam text messages and annoying telesales phone calls are causing more headaches than ever for millions of mobile subscribers in Vietnam, who find it impossible to get rid of such irksome interruptions.
Those trying to sell services in the fields of insurance, real estate, credit cards and consumer loans are the largest sources of spam SMS messages and uninvited telemarketing calls.
Loan, who lives in Phu Nhuan District, Ho Chi Minh City, said she had received 11 unwanted text messages and five cold calls on December 10 alone.
“The total number of unsolicited SMS messages since the beginning of this month has been as many as 73, mostly inviting me to buy insurance, luxury apartments and cars,” she told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper.
Most victims of the spammers do not know why such companies have their phone numbers, or why the telesales callers ignore their request to stop calling them.
“I’ve told them a million times I do not want to buy an insurance plan, but another caller will reach me another day for the same purpose,” said Dao Ba Doan, who works for a fashion company.
For the telemarketers, the ultimate goal is to persuade customers to buy their products, so they do not care if the recipients pick up their phone when they are sleeping, driving or eating.
The emergence of free-of-charge, Internet-based texting and calling apps such as Viber, Zalo, or Facebook Messenger have only created more channels for SMS spammers and telemarketers to get in customers’ hair.
N.M.S., director of a local bank branch, said he had written a letter of complaint to a Japanese insurance firm for bombarding him with “hundreds of telesales calls” on an annual basis.
“I do not know how good your brand and products are, but I do know the marketing approach you deploy is vexing me,” he wrote.
The insurer ended up apologizing to S. and has indeed stopped calling him, but the banker is still annoyed by phone calls from other realty firms, he admitted.
Many telesales employees told Tuoi Tre that they must call dozens of customers a day and are pressured to meet high targets.
“We sometimes have to ignore the rule not to call during nap time, as we may fail to meet targets otherwise,” said Thanh, a former telesales employee.
The director of a local bank also revealed that many lenders are building strong teams of telemarketing employees to boost credit card sales or consumer loans.
“A telesales person has to phone 60 customers a day and is required to have least 50 percent of those calls connected,” he said.
“Then he has to arrange at least five appointments with potential customers, and eventually have two loan applications.”
