Beware of calls from people purporting to be from Statistics Canada or the Census Office and wanting to check your details or invite you to a focus group. It's an identity theft scam and it's widespread at the moment (doesn't appear all that new, though).

I wasn't aware of it but a call we had last night prompted me to do some digging. I then rang Stats Canada. The guy confirmed the scam and was more than a little pleased I'd used *69.

It turns my MIL got called a few days ago. She didn't fall for it either. Some people will. The focus group version comes with an offer of payment.

Cheers Souv - a lot of people would fall for this thinking "its just another one of those things they do differently over here" I probably would have done for fear of upsetting someone at a higher level

Thanks for that!

Have only been here 5 weeks and am terrified of doing the wrong thing by not being aware of the laws of the land enought yet.

BTW, what is #69 ???

Apologies for my ignorance what is *69?

Regards
Ali

*69 is the North American equivalent of our 1471.

I think it basically allows you to call back the person who last called you.

yup its the way to find out who called you last. (pretty easy to remember)

also pretty sure its *67 to hide your number too but never used it

*69 is a function on your phone that tells you the number of your last incoming call (unless the number has been blocked). It may be called different things in different bits of Canada. I don't use it often because it isn't free but I felt the urge last night because of a major smell of rat. Because of that, I was able to give a phone number to Stats Canada. How easy it is to trace to a person/location, I do not know but at least it's something for the cops (or whatever) to dig into.

This is valuable info at the moment too - because CIC are actually in the process of doing surveys at the moment. It would be easy to get confused!

Several of us received letters about a month or two ago - asking if we would be willing to take part in an Immigration Survey. I said yes, and am still anticipating a phone call (don't know if anyone else has heard back yet). I suspect I might have prattled on for a few mins before realising it wasn't the correct people.

I think the key to this is to ask yourself: "shouldn't these people already know this information?"

Yes, absolutely. I'm generally pretty good and on my guard - but I can imagine them just catching me at a dozy moment

There is a census going on here in Calgary, we were out when the census taker came to our house and they left a card with phone number to call and re arrange the visit...................haven't done it as yet

we had that and all they ask is one question. How many over 18's in your household. She knocked on the door and had ID.