Every so often, you can receive a telephone call from your bank, wanting to discuss something such as a recent large deposit, withdrawal or (particularly in the case of credit card providers) a transaction.

These could well be perfectly legitimate – in some cases, the bank will need to verify that a transaction is legitimate, in order to protect your interests. However, it appears that not all calls come from the bank; in some cases a call centre is being used.

This raises an important point about how much information you should give them – and they should give you. For example, if the caller says they are from your bank and “just need you to confirm your PIN number” you can guarantee that the call is fraudulent, because a bank or credit card provider will never ask for that information.

On the other hand, if your bank does call you, they will need to confirm your identity in order to ensure that they are talking to the right person and not giving your son or daughter (for example) information that is personal to you! The problem is that, with inwards calls, you never really know who the caller is – especially as banks are so faceless, these days. So the information they ask for when calling you could be part of a process that will eventually result in identity theft, once sufficient pieces of data have been parcelled together.

What can you do?
There is no simple answer to this issue. After all, banks do need to protect your interests if they think something may be wrong. But how far should you go in responding to confirmation requests? There is no simple answer except to refuse to give any information at all, ask for a name and department and then say that you will call back. There is little point in asking for a telephone number as this could be that of a criminal gang; on the other hand, giving this to you would mean that they are traceable, which many inward calls are not, because of the ‘number withheld’ facility.

Some call centres will say that they are unable to accept inwards calls, which is not unusual. In this case, you may prefer to terminate the conversation because if they are your bank, they must allow you to call them.

Should they be doing this at all
This does, however, raise a broader issue and that is the question of inwards calls after a large amount has been deposited in your account – this can also happen when you go into the bank to undertake a routine transaction. What the bank is seeking to do – whatever it may say about giving impartial information – is to sit you in front of one of their sales people (they may call them advisers, but they can usually only sell the bank’s products and are targeted on product sales, not quality of advice).

There must be questions over the confidentiality of your data, if one part of the bank is able to approach you about something done within another part of it.

“Silent calls”
Another aspect of telephone calls from banks is that these are often so-called “silent”; in other words, you answer the telephone, but nobody is there. There can be several reasons for this – one of which is crooks telephoning to see if anyone is in the house before burgling it. But the most common is that it is a call centre using an automated dialling system. The machine dials a number and then, when it is answered, the call is transferred to the next available agent. If none is free at the time, there is a long pause before the call is terminated.

Perhaps the facility to withhold the caller’s number is one that should be withdrawn completely. Unfortunately, overseas calls come into this category (as do calls from internet telephone systems such as Skype).

You should take individual professional advice before making any decision relating to your personal finances.

NOTHING CONTAINED IN THE ARTICLE SHOULD BE CONSIDERED AS GIVING INDIVIDUAL FINANCIAL ADVICE. PLEASE NOTE THAT THERE MAY BE VARIATIONS FOR THOSE LIVING IN SCOTLAND AND NORTHERN IRELAND.