What are Delaware County Area Codes?
Only one area code covers Delaware County. This is area code 765. An area code is a three-digit designation for a numbering plan area (NPA). First introduced in 1947 with the creation of the North American Numbering Plan (NANP), area codes and NPAs made call routing and switching more efficient across North America phone networks. An area code is represented by the first three digits in a 10-digit phone number issued in the United States. In addition to making long-distance calls easier to route, the code can also help identify the origins of phone calls placed with that number. Each area code is tied to a specific geographic area represented by an NPA.
Area Code 765
Area code 765 was created in 1997 when area code 317 was split to accommodate more phone users. The split assigned the entirety of the central part of Indiana to area code 765 except for the Indianapolis area which retained area code 317. Area code 765 serves 20 counties in Indiana including Delaware County. Communities in the county covered by this area code include Muncie, Eaton, Gaston, and Albany.
What are the Best Cell Phone Plans in Delaware County?
Most of the residents of Indiana and Delaware County have shifted from landline phones to wireless phones. This conclusion is supported by a 2018 wireless substitution survey conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics. The results of that survey showed that 63.3% of the adults in Indiana indicated they solely used wireless phones for telecommunication while a paltry 4% of the demographic reported using landline phones exclusively. The wide divide between wireless-only and landline-only subscriber numbers was also recorded among minors in the state. About 68.9% of residents under the age of 18 reported using wireless phone services exclusively. In contrast, a tiny 0.5% of this population indicated they still used landline phones exclusively.
All of the major national carriers offer cell phone services and plans in Indiana and Delaware County. AT&T has the most extensive phone network in the state and boasts a 100% coverage of Indiana. Verizon is a close second with 98.9% coverage while T-Mobile covers 96.5% of the state. Besides these major network operators, residents of Delaware County can also sign up for phone plans offered by regional carriers. Most of these are mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) that lease network services from major carriers. They buy network services in bulk and pass on some of the savings to their subscribers. While MVNOs usually offer cheaper phone plans, national carriers deliver better network services.
VoIP phone services are also available in Delaware County. These are provided by VoIP service providers bundling internet and phone plans together for the subscribers. VoIP, or Voice over Internet Protocol, is a networking technology that enables voice communication by transmitting audio signals over the internet as data packets. VoIP phone services require fast internet access and are easy to set up for Delaware County residents and businesses with broadband internet access. VoIP phone plans are also more affordable for subscribers making lots of long-distance calls or relying on them for teleconferencing.
What are Delaware County Phone Scams?
These are telephone frauds targeting residents of Delaware County. Scammers use phone tools and services to find targets for their cons and to trick them into parting with money and confidential information. In addition to regular calls and text messages, they may also deploy sophisticated phone tools such as robocalls, spam calls, caller ID spoofing, and voice phishing.
Delaware County residents can protect themselves from phone scams by being wary of strange callers and using anti-scam phone tools and services. These include call blocking and reverse phone number lookup. Learning about commonly reported scams in their communities can also help residents avoid these telephone frauds. The Consumer Protection Division of the Office of the Attorney General of the State of Indiana lists some of the most common phone scams in the state. These include advance fee scams, vacation scams, credit repair scams, and COVID-19 scams.
What are Delaware County Advance Fee Scams?
Advance fee frauds involve scammers asking their victims for smaller upfront payments to cash in on windfalls. These scams exploit the greed of their victims by promising them huge amounts of money in the near future if only they send in some money to process the payments, pay for taxes on the amounts, or bribe officials responsible for disbursing the money. Scammers call their victims and make outlandish claims about large amounts of money. They may claim their victims just came into huge inheritances from distant relatives or that they require their victims’ bank accounts to transfer their wealths from other countries.
Regardless of the tactic employed by an advance fee scammer, their aim is to defraud the target. Do not send money to a stranger promising future riches. If contacted by an unknown caller making such claims, ask them to identify themselves and confirm their identities with a free reverse phone lookup. This search can also confirm the location of the caller and help determine whether they are indeed in the foreign country they claim to be. Report such callers to law enforcement.
What are Delaware County Vacation Scams?
Vacation scams range from outright scams where fraudsters run away with their victims’ money and offer no travel package as promised to fraudulent travel deals that do not provide promised conveniences. The latter type is more common. It involves dubious travel agents and agencies selling low-cost vacations and showing prospective vacationers pictures of beautiful destinations to get them to sign up. Only after paying will victims of this scam learn that their cheap vacation deals only provide shabby accommodation, no return flights, or no guided tours as promised or assumed.
Residents of Delaware should be wary of free and cheap vacation offers. These usually skip on features tourists expect to be standard. To avoid vacation scams, take the time to read the fine prints of discounted vacation offers and travel deals. Make sure the caller offering the deal is an authorized agent by confirming their identity with phone number lookup. Call the travel agency offering the plan to ask about details and confirm the caller’s identity. Research the travel agency itself online to read testimonials and reviews from vacationers that have used their services.
What are Delaware County Credit Repair Scams?
Credit repair scams target residents with bad credits who are unable to get credit cards and loans. Fraudsters targeting such people contact them and promise to help with improving their credit score. These scammers charge their victims for the service they intend to provide and then stop communicating with them or be of very little help. Credit repair services are usually scams and dubious businesses. What they promise is usually impossible or illegal. Repairing a bad credit requires repaying outstanding debt and maintaining financial discipline. It will take time for a poor credit score to improve.
Scammers claiming to be capable of repairing bad credit may ask their victims to change their identities or obtain new Social Security numbers from shady characters. Delaware County residents should know that these steps are illegal. Before agreeing to any advice given by strangers promising credit repair, confirm with a lawyer or financial advisor that such steps are legitimate and effective. To avoid credit repair scams, confirm the identity of the caller offering this service with reverse cell phone lookup. Search online for real testimonials from people who have used their services.
What are Delaware County COVID-19 Scams?
These frauds exploit gaps in residents’ knowledge about government policies and assistance with regards to the current coronavirus pandemic. Scammers usually impersonate government officials and charity fundraisers when contacting their victims for these scams. They may try to sell bogus COVID-19 test kits, treatments, and vaccines to unsuspecting residents. Alternatively, they may ask for charity donations for victims of the virus. Some COVID-19 scammers attempt to steal their victims’ identities by asking for confidential personal information rather than money. They claim to require such pieces of information to update government records, send relief checks, or make COVID-19 vaccine appointments.
Do not send money or release sensitive information to strangers claiming to be involved in government and charity efforts to fight the COVID-19 pandemic. Ask callers to identify themselves and then confirm their identities with reverse phone lookups and by calling the agencies they claim to represent.
What are Robocalls and Spam Calls?
Robocalls are unsolicited phone calls placed by auto-dialers and delivering pre-recorded messages. When they were first introduced, robocalls were cost-effective mass communication tools mostly used by political groups and telemarketers. They were also used to deliver public service announcements. Once set up, a robocall campaign requires minimal effort to keep going. These desirable features are responsible for the wide popularity of robocalls among telemarketers and scammers.
Spam calls are also commonly used by telemarketers and scammers. These are also unsolicited phone calls placed in bulk. However, they are likely to be placed by actual humans delivering messages according to prepared scripts. Every year, Americans receive an increasingly large amount of robocalls and spam calls. To address this scourge of unwanted and unsolicited calls, lawmakers and consumer protection agencies have tasked carriers to implement better caller authentication systems. While these solutions are getting implemented, residents of Delaware County can deal with robocalls and spam calls by following these steps:
- Do not assume your phone’s caller ID function will correctly identify unknown callers. Be wary when talking to strangers on the phone
- Do not answer calls from unknown numbers. Let these go to voicemail where you can review them at your convenience and decide which ones to return
- Do not follow instructions provided during a robocall or spam calls on steps to take to stop receiving further calls. Following such prompts only lead to more unwanted calls
- Hang up a call as soon as you realize it is a robocall or spam call
- Block calls from unknown numbers or blacklisted numbers using the call filtering function of your smartphones. Alternatively, ask your carrier if they offer call blocking services or install a well-reviewed call-blocking app from your phone’s app store
- Use reverse phone number lookup tools to identify unknown callers. These will help determine whether those callers are scammers, spammers, stalkers, or genuine callers. Include the information gathered in reports submitted to law enforcement
- Register your phone number on the National Do Not Call Registry to stop receiving unwanted calls from telemarketers. Indiana also has a Do Not Call List. Residents of Delaware County can register their phone numbers on this list online or by calling 1-(888)-834-9969. Note that joining the national and state registries does not stop calls from dishonest telemarketers and scammers who do not obey the rules of the DNC Registry and the Indiana Do Not Call List. However, you can report illegal robocalls and spam calls received after 31 days of joining the National Registry or the end of the quarter when you joined the state registry
How to Spot and Report Delaware County Phone Scams
While there are a lot of phone scams, they retain certain aspects that make them easy to spot for discerning targets. Residents hoping to avoid telephone frauds must first learn how these scams work and then know the red flags to look out for when speaking with strangers on the phone. Look out for the following signs of phone scams when on the phone with unknown persons:
- Rude callers issuing threats - scammers impersonating authority figures are quick to threaten their targets to scare them into compliance. Whether they are pretending to be law enforcement officers, government officials, or IRS agents, scammers can threaten their victims with immediate arrest, prosecution, deportation, loss of homes, and revocation of driver’s license
- Request for payment by unofficial channels - scammers ask their victims to send payments directly to them. Only a scammer will ask you to pay owed taxes, outstanding utility bills, court fines, or dues in cash or by wire transfer, prepaid debit card, gift cards, mobile app transfer, or cryptocurrency
- Aggressive sales tactics - fraudsters running consumer scams and selling bogus investments want to close their deals quickly. They push their victims to sign up and send money immediately in order to give them little time to think about their offers. They may offer overly attractive terms such as even steeper discounts for those signing up immediately or inspire a fear of missing out by claiming their unbelievable offers will expire very soon
- Refusal to provide written documentation backing their claims and establishing their identities - scammers do not want a paper trail linking them to their fraudulent schemes. When asked to provide supporting documents, they sidestep the request and keep putting forward fake and paid testimonials from celebrities and strangers
If one or more of these signs make you suspicious of a stranger on the phone, report them immediately to law enforcement. Use suspicious phone number lookup to dig deeper into the caller’s identity and see if they have been previously flagged for past scams. Scam reports help law enforcement agencies find and prosecute fraudsters. They are also useful for determining the prevalence of phone scams and increasing public awareness of telephone fraud schemes. Residents of Delaware County can report phone scams to the following agencies:
- The Consumer Protection Division of the Office of the Attorney General of the State of Indiana - as the chief consumer protection agency in Indiana, the CPD handles consumer complaints about scams and violations of the state’s Do Not Call List. Visit the agency’s complaint page to find the right link to file a phone scam complaint
- The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) - as the federal consumer protection agency, the FTC is protecting American consumers from unfair and deceitful business practices. Its duties include receiving reports of consumer scams and investigating such consumer complaints. Residents of Delaware County can report consumer scams to the FTC online or by calling (877) 382-4357
- The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) - as the national regulator of the communication tools, services, and service providers, the FCC investigates reports of misuse of telecommunication tools and scams perpetrated using such tools. The FCC also maintains the National Do Not Call Registry. Delaware County residents can report illegal robocalls, spam calls, caller ID spoofing, and phishing as well as frauds committed using these tools to the FCC’s Consumer Complaint Center
- The Delaware County Sheriff’s Office and local police departments - these local law enforcement agencies can also take reports of phone scams. Report scams involving impostors pretending to be law enforcement officials to these agencies