[Frank4d]

Another post with a similar name made me think to post this. I have a nephew who is in prison for arson and burglary who is calling my house on average 1-3 times per week. Now I don't really have a problem talking with him, but he always calls collect. I have told him to pay for his own calls... but that never sinks in.

What I am looking for is probably a modem with caller ID capability that will block my phone from ringing if it sees calls from area code "323" if if the caller is "Prison". Anything like that out there?

[wacor]

I don't think so. You probably would have to use a service provided by the phone company. around my neck of the woods it is called privacy manager I believer. You program in the numbers of people you want to take calls from. their call will ring thru. the others get a message telling them to provide their name and then you can determine whether to accept the call or not. they never know if you refused the call or were not home.

[PEBKACRTM]

Is this a regular landline or a VOIP? If it's a landline you can have the phone company block collect calls automatically. If it's VOIP, it's not quite as simple but still doable. Check with your service provider. One option you can consider is telling him you changed your number and then give him a grandcentral number (www.grandcentral.com). Then, just enter the prisons number into the grandcentral address book and you can have it play "this number is no longer in service" if you like. You can also choose to put a special outgoing message just for that number that says something like "This number is not able to receive collect calls" or something along those lines. You can also have just the prison's number go directly to voicemail if you like without having to block the whole area code.

[AcaCandy]

Call your phone company and have them block collect calls.

Easy.

[wacor]

Originally Posted by AcaCandy

Call your phone company and have them block collect calls.

Easy.

That may not be the best option. You never know when somebody you care about has an emergency and needs to contact you via collect call. It would be a rarity but tis an opportunity that can not be revisited once it is over.

[AcaCandy]

I agree to a certain point. You can always lift it once the PROBLEM caller gets the "clue"

Been there, done that

[Frank4d]

I think I will go with the option to ask the phone company to block collect calls. I was not aware you could do this, but my phone company does offer it. Problem solved.

[Zeppfan]

FYI

If your nephew is in prison, they will not allow the incarcerated to pay for phone calls. If this were allowed, prisoners would whack each other with rolls of quarters.

How about asking him to limit his calls.

I hope you understand that by stopping any collect calls, you will be inadvertantly preventing your nephew from calling you until he is released.

[Frank4d]

Originally Posted by Zeppfan

I hope you understand that by stopping any collect calls, you will be inadvertantly preventing your nephew from calling you until he is released.

That's OK. He usually calls and asks questions about how to hack administrator passwords and drive permissions (on the prison computers). Nothing I want to discuss with him anyway.

[gurutech]

How about just not accepting the call? You should have an option to "Accept" or "Decline" the call. So this way you can "Decline" calls from 'Prisoner 007', but still accept if it's someone you want to talk to.