God dammit! This stupid fax machine keeps calling our house and waking everyone up at 2AM in the morning usually. It stopped doing it for months and then starts doing it again, at one point it did it every night for a week. Is there any way to figure out what the hell is going on? It's been on again and off again for about 3 years. The caller ID says OUT OF AREA and all I hear when I answer is beeps, kind of like modem noise.
Hook up a computer/laptop and let it receive the faxes. That should at least give you the sending phone number so that you can complain appropriately.
Unfortunatly I have no modems or laptops to hook up to it but thats a good idea... But here's the thing, it just called again but there was no beeping, and after 30 seconds it hung up. I tried *69 and I just get a busy tone. It's freaking me out. =(
On our caller ID, it just says Out Of Area in both the name and number field, and *69 just gives me a busy tone; is there some kind of magical filter the phone company could put on? And also, I found my old laptop does have a modem port; next time this happens, how do I get it to recieve the fax under say win xp or 98? I do want this stopped, it freaks me the fuck out to get wierd ass calls at 3AM. How the hell does a fax machine or whatever end up with our number anyhow?
For faxing in XP, you need to install the "Fax Services" component (Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs > Add/Remove Windows Components). After that, you will need to set up the "Fax Console" (Start > Programs > Accessories > Communication > Fax) to receive faxes. You'll have to look at the program help for specifics. In the worst case, turn off hibernation, leave the Fax Console open and be ready to manually "receive fax" when you get woken up.
I actually did find out wtf it is, I googled our phone number on google maps and it seems a place on my street has a fax number that is THE SAME AS MY NUMBER. I'm going to try to call them this weekend about it, but if they've had the number for longer don't they have the right to keep it? like wouldn't it interfere with there business?
Or, someone mistyped the number. The phone companies (supposedly) have a lot of checks in place to make sure that no two active accounts have the same phone number. Do the area codes match too?
Yeah, area codes match too. I called the number for the so called company and got some old guys answering machine that said "this is not the old car shop" (place was listed as vintage ford shop"). apparently it doesn't exist anymore. My mom says it could be fax spam and there sending it to a number on there list.
Ok, it sounds like you ended up with a decomissioned fax number that some place is trying to spam. Just so you know, it is illegal for a company to use a fax machine for advertising purposes. Too many people just let it go or don't complain because they have a working relationship with the spamming company. You should definitely see if you can intercept one of the faxes and complain to the phone company and the state attorney general to get the company in trouble.
