Dear Liz: I am receiving many unsolicited credit card offers in the mail and am worried about identity theft. Do you know of a phone number or Web address whereby I can opt out of these offers?
Answer: You can call 1-888-5OPTOUT or visit www.optoutprescreen.com to remove your name from marketing lists that the three credit bureaus sell to credit card issuers. Opting out won’t keep every card solicitation out of your mailbox, but it should decrease substantially the number of offers you receive. You can opt out for five years or permanently, but you need to be prepared to give your Social Security number, since that’s one of the key ways the bureaus identify you in their records.
Hi Liz, on a similar topic, I was recently required to sign my business up with Dunn and Bradstreet in order to compete for government contracts. I’m now getting a ton of mail and phone calls asking us to change our service providers for the business and just tons of catalogs. How can I opt out? I already called DnB and they said they most certainly did not sell my companies name and mailing or phone information but I can with 100% certainty tell you that it’s the ONLY company we’ve registered with and they’re saying there’s nothing to “unsubscribe” from. Thanks!!
I use CatalogChoice.com with pretty good results. There are some businesses that ignore your requests to stop (I’m looking at you, Harry & David), but most are smart enough to know they’re wasting precious time and resources sending their stuff to people who don’t want it.
Regarding the phone calls, listing your number with the Do Not Call registry might help, but since it’s a business telemarketers can continue to call you legally. And scam artists don’t care who’s on the do not call list. Unfortunately.
Thanks very much!