parliamentary yearbook cold calling

[Alan Clarke]

Just had a cold call from someone from Blake Publishing, describing the section on renewable energy they were publishing in their parliamentary yearbook, making it sound like it was a parliamentary publication.  Then, some way into the script, the fee of around £5k came up for my "editorial".  
ie this is actually a (deleted) to collect advertising fees for some unofficial publication sent to MPs who's sectretarys presumably dump it in the bin, and today they seem to be working through the AECB membership list.

(note from moderator, a complaint about the wording in this post has been received from Blakes (March 2010) and the offending word has been removed. They were concerned that the wording implied that their methods were illegal which they are not.

[David OLIVIER]

Yes I got it too and they wasted 10 mins before asking for dosh.

D

[Andy Simmonds]

I got a lot of these sort of things about 18 months ago, all linked in some way to 'government departments' or 'initiatives '. After 4 or so , I recognised the signs and asked if it would cost me after the first 10 seconds, and ended the call within 15. Very annoying it was, quite high pressure sales technique. Don't get any now.