223: Cold Call Questioning Necessities

<p>Suddenly my phone rang and the number was clearly from overseas, because of the country code. It was not a number I recognised.  The crackly voice at the other end of the line was unknown to me and they shot out their name very quickly. I couldn’t catch it.  The company name was unfamiliar too.  Silently, I wondered, “Who is this and why are they calling me?”.  Now, our business is global, so there is always the faint possibility it could be a potential HR Director client from overseas calling to seek training for their team in Japan. Naturally, it is better to be patient and treat the call as possible new business, until proven otherwise. No abrupt hanging up on these callers is allowed, until you know better.</p> <p> </p> <p>Gradually it became clear he was an Englishmen from Hong Kong calling me to broker the purchase of shares in a Chinese electric car company called Nio.  He gave me his firm’s URL, so while we were talking, I could pull up information about his firm.  This was a good move on his part for building credibility and I thought “well done”. I asked for his name again, but I couldn’t see any reference to it on the website.  Uh oh! This was now looking extremely doubtful and I thought, “am I being lured into an international investment scam here?”.</p> <p> </p> <p>I let him speak, asked for his name again and questioned him on why his name didn’t appear anywhere on the website.  Interestingly, he didn’t know where his own name was located on his own website, to guide me where to look. That would be a very basic requirement I would have thought, in his line of business. It turned out I had misheard his name and once corrected, I found out he was a real person working for this company.  He was rabbiting on about the 60% to 70% returns on the share price I could enjoy, if I got into the market now, held the shares and then exited in three months.  All I had to do was produce $5000 to get started.</p> <p> </p> <p>We probably had a ten minute conversation on the phone.  We ended the conversation with