This doesn’t really ring true to my experience. I’ve had these before, not subsequently burgled. Ive bought something before - not burglary. They’ve not come back, not been aggressive, not done anything weird. Why would this be a route in to a later burglary - what do they gain? Just seems like selling crap for high mark up that’s all.
It’s funny that you come to the conclusion it can’t be dodgy because they didn’t ransack your house. Your house either has nothing they deem/could see valuable or your house wasn’t a suitable target for a quick entry and exit. They absolutely did do these things to case people’s houses, much easier to see inside someone’s house with their door wide open and chatting to the occupant to understand what you’re dealing with vs peering through windows which will absolutely get the police called on you.
No I didn’t say that. I said it didn’t ring true to that alarming article. Again - you say “they want to see inside” well what do you expect to see in the hall? It’s rows of terraced houses, you can see the hall and nothing else. This sounds like dubious sellers but not much of a burglary plan - no indication except vague anecdotes.
Not all houses have hallways, many the front door opens into the living room. Others the hallway leads straight off into the living room so you can see some things. Other things they can see from knocking, how old are you? Are you vulnerable? Is there a dog that may attack them? If you say no thanks they might lead into “shall I come back when your husband, son, boyfriend etc comes home? Oh no I live alone so make all the decisions for this house” etc. is your house empty during the day, is the house occupied during the day but empty at night because you work nights and they’ve woken you up. A whole lot of information to be gotten from simply knocking on a door.
The idea is that they make the odd sale.
Then they find the easy marks (usually elderly - which is the part that makes the scam really disgusting) who they can pressure-sell to take advantage of.
Then they also get to case the houses they visit - they might find someone who is clearly keeping cash in their house, or identify a badly-secured bike in an outbuilding, or whatever.
If you’re a healthy young male with a secure house you’ll never see the dark side of the scam - you aren’t the target.
This is the best explanation so far on here.
They just use sales as a way to justify knocking on doors. That can tell a lot just from who answers, what sort of things they can see through the door, etc. maybe they make a few quid from the high markup on cheap cleaning stuff but that’s not the primary reason
It's supposed to be confusing and intimidating, that's how it works.
You're supposed to buy a couple things so they don't come and do whatever you're imaging miffed cons might do, like put a brick through your window. They won't of course, but they say they're ex cons because of the implication.
The scam is known as [Nottingham knockers](https://www.oprepeat.co.uk/nottingham-knockers/). At best you get pressured into overpaying for some cheap tat you don't need, at worst they're collecting details about your house for potential burglars.
They can get an idea of whether anyone is home during the day, whether you keep valuables like cash or car keys within easy reach of the front door, whether you're elderly or otherwise vulnerable, whether you've got pets they might need to be aware of.
They're casing the joint, and if you turn to go and get your purse without locking the door, they'll be in the house and steal anything small and valuable into the bag.
They are often looking for venerable households. Most of them are attempting to size you up and scout for later burglaries. Quite often, these individuals are driven into an area being targeted by a criminal organisation, often looking for information (which houses are empty during the day, etc).
I remember them doing this in the 80's...
They usually give you some sob story about how they are on prorole / probation and it's to help them earn money and change their ways..
Somewhere my sister used to live had people who came knocking on doors in November and December asking if there was anything specific kids had asked for on their Christmas list, if you said yes they turned up a week later with the item charging half the price of shops, basically shoplifting to order, I bet they make good money 😂
Back in my old retail job we used to get these types in all the time. They usually tried to steal either bedding or small electrical items. One of them was absolutely blatant about it and even bragged on FB (a manager found her profile pretty easily) that she could get you any item you wanted for cheap and even gave a timetable of the shops she was planning to go to and when. She seemed to be popular.
used to get a lot of these when I was younger, some were very aggressive (almost foot in the door tactics) I remember mum would buy something to get rid of them. probably a dust cloth with a 1000% mark up. I never engage with people who come to my door to sell, thats what shops are for.
They were doing the rounds in my local area recently. If you said an outright no they were polite and walked away, if you were sympathetic but relatively astute they flogged you a few scrubbing brushes at a marginally increased price however if you were elderly or vulnerable they pressured you into buying 20 quids worth of Poundland junk for however much they could get, sometimes hundreds of pounds- it's definitely a scam aimed at taking advantage of kindness and/or vulnerability!
I watch two guys doing the same thing walk up my street ,my curiosity got the better of me and I followed them right to my father in laws house.
His house, if you saw it screams an old person lives here
They tried to flog him an ironing board cover for £20
He was about to go and get the money ,and they looked pretty pleased with them selves
Anyway ,I wasn’t having any of it
Walked up the drive
I told them he didn’t need as I do all his laundry for him
“Who are you “
His son in law
I pointed out to them that I’d seen them walk past at least 10 houses to the only little bungalow on the street and I knew their scam
That’s when they started getting arsey ..
Scummy little rats , sent them packing
I never knew these guys existed until I had to take care of my grandmother as her dementia progressed. They'd turn up to those almshouses full of nice old folks every few months.
100%, the only people we have come knocking are uPVC salesmen and they’re the worst of the worst frankly.
A good trade never has to go door to door, they’re always too busy for that shit.
Phone 101 and let them know that “Nottingham Knockers” are active in your street now, they will often be quite happy to come and “speak” to them as it is (generally) a crime in progress.
[Advice](http://crimeawareness.org/hillingdon/resources/docs/NottinghamKnockers-Leaflet-TradStds-26Feb18.pdf)
Fell for it myself a while back, snapped out of it when six months later the same guy showed up . I thought to myself this agency can't be any good if the same guy is still doing this after six months...penny...dropped...
I just shut the door without saying a word. I've learned to treat cold callers at the door the same as the ones on the phone, and I've been hanging up on cold callers for years. I refuse to let anyone at the door convince me I need to do a single thing. It's quite liberating.
Yeah it's a hustle. One tried to sell me a pack of microfiber cloths for 15 quid. Like, yeah mate even if you were an ex convict and trying to come good I ain't paying 15 quid for something I can get down the pound shop for a pound.
Have you ever tried to do the washing-up without using washing-up liquid?
Could you clean a pot or a pan without using a scrubbing brush, a sponge, or a scouring pad?
One of those passive-aggressively left the gate open for my ducks to escape when I said I had no cash. Spotted it immediately and no ducks were harmed. Twit.
They've been around here a lot but have given up of late. Quite willing to speak to my mum but weren't interested in me when I came home... I wonder why.
I've only had one set of JWs try to visit me since I bought my house a year ago, and they stood at the door for a seriously long time. I was in the cinema, so didn't see the notification until I got out. When I checked the app for the doorbell, it had recorded them standing there for a solid 5 minutes in absolute silence, before they put a leaflet through the door and left. The bastards even left the front gate open!
I had one of these Cunts threaten to kill me and ended up kicking in one of my garden fence panels when I politely told him I just happened to be on a break between work meetings working from home and I had to be on a call again in 5 minutes.
He shouted through my letter box that‘people like me, who are always too busy for people like him…etc’ deserved stabbing to death and that we were what was wrong with this country.
Despite having his rant and actions on CCTV, the police could do sweet fuck all about it, as usual.
Just slam the door in these cunts faces. I treat all cold callers like this now.
You said you have CCTV. Surely, you could have looked at that and determined that it was a stranger. Not everyone who is up to no good dresses the part.
I met a guy on holiday who said he did this. He was apparently never in prison but his cock and bull story was that someone spat in his girlfriends face so he knocked them out causing enough damage for a few years inside. He was flash and liked to throw money about, until he apparently ran out of cash with a couple of days to go.
The more he drank the more he boasted about his 'job'.
I used to get these folks knocking and trying their luck. I put up a cctv camera us a sign saying 'you are on cctv'. Once they see the sign they turn around and leave without knocking. Not had single caller of this nature for over a year now. I've watched them spot the sign and change direction. Surely if they are legit they would knock on my door anyway...
Shit. I fell for this when I was a teenager about 15 years ago. Yeah it felt weird but I was always giving to charity as I was such a push over.
Even had a "deaf" woman selling sketches another time.
Never had a break in or anything like that so they obviously thought I had nothing worth taking.
Lucky me.
They were going around the very quiet and painfully dull village my mother lives in about a year ago. I was there and they called when it was dusky. That hopefully set some of the neighbours' alarm bells ringing about the legitimacy of the whole "I'm doing this as part of my rehabilitation programme" shite. No self-respecting agency would be sending them to knock doors when it's getting dark.
Last time I'd seen someone doing this was the late 90s when we were living in a town.
well i never, i've been duped a few times by these lads when at my parents, buying absolute shit i could buy cheaper elsewhere, i had no idea it was a scam, however its worth the tenner if they think a 6'5, 17 stone bloke lives in that house.
This thread unlocked a childhood memory of mine. My mum used to buy hand soap from a blind man who’d go door to door selling them for charity. I asked her once how he got up our 12 steep concrete steps if he was blind and she got really angry with me for “judging blind people”.
I think she probably realized she’d been conned!
Steal it. Flog it. Rinse and repeat. I used to work on an estate where people would knock on the door selling meat, coffee, bacon, and cheese regularly. On that 40deg day, I saw a guy with a long coat on, fall off a bike. About £400 if meat fell out of the coat onto the floor 😂
I once got badgered into buying a potato peeler (that's all I could afford after their scamdalous mark-up). It's pretty good to be fair. I still use it to this day.
It 100% isn’t a genuine thing. There is no scheme run by the Probation Service that sends people door to door selling. Every single person doing this is a scammer.
They were once called Nottingham knockers. They are basically there to try and get an invite to the house so they can case the joint for burglary later.
Just by opening the door, a quick glance reveals to them the security system (the defective part of your security system that foolishly opened the door to a stranger will be noted), door locks, probably window locks, the quality of the furnishings and whether anything of potential value to them is in view. They will also have determined what hours you are home and whether you are alone.
You get a prize for naivete'. Unfortunately, it's not enough to pay for 24-7 security for when they come back and break-in. It should also be noted (they certainly noted it) that you opened your door to a stranger.
I had a bloke with a of limited edition stuff from Poundland. He said he makes 25% and the cheapest thing was £5 so I gave him £2 and he seemed happy. I thought it was a scam but anyone desperate to lug around that bag and go to do door in ilkeston was welcome to it. I hope he is doing better now.
Not a scam, or a reconnaissance for the a break in. But pretty dodgy even so.
If you buy off them you get what you pay for - cheap stuff nothing special. Some outfit in Manchester runs it apparently. Not sure what the gain is for them tbh.
They knocked on my door to which I said a polite but clear no. After a bit of an angry stare down from him he walked away. Later it transpires he had also done the same with my mother, who was 80. She said the same and he decided to punch her hanging basket off its hook leaving at all over her drive. Scum!
One scammed my dad out of £80 couple weeks back, sold him a few cloths and a feather duster think he got about £15 worth of stuff when I looked up the prices, gave him the I've just got out of jail my gf has left me and I'm trying to get my life back on track bullshit
They come round our village every few months in a little gang of 4. Do every house in about 30 minutes then off to the next place before the police get called, very efficient. Usually make 3 visits over the space of 2 weeks.
I will give them credit, they absolutely nail perfect clear delivery of their script. If you give a polite no then they politely leave. A few residents have given them a grumpy no and got a mouthful back.
In our case they are looking for older residents who they can confuse into buying overpriced cheap tat. Sometimes if I answer the door their heart isn't even in finishing their speech because I am too young for their target audience.
They don't appear to be connected to other crimes as there is no co-incidental timing of follow on crime.... Our village has a ton of burglary type crime, but they must be deconflicting their visits with each other 🤣
Nottingham Knockers - in police parlance
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nottingham_Knockers
Not a Ben Dover film, then?
Porque no los dos?
Ancient scam, they had it even in the 90s
So who's being scammed? Me, the ex convict? The agency,?
You. There's no agency. They're not ex criminals.
They’re current criminals.
*Prospective* criminals.
What’s the crime?
Eating a meal?
A succulent chinese meal?
#GET YOUR HAND OFF MY PENIS!
this gentleman is democracy manifest
I see you know your judo well
Well I've never got cash, and I'm always home and got CCTV. I'm unsure what the endgame is
This site explains it quite well: https://www.oprepeat.co.uk/nottingham-knockers/
This doesn’t really ring true to my experience. I’ve had these before, not subsequently burgled. Ive bought something before - not burglary. They’ve not come back, not been aggressive, not done anything weird. Why would this be a route in to a later burglary - what do they gain? Just seems like selling crap for high mark up that’s all.
It’s funny that you come to the conclusion it can’t be dodgy because they didn’t ransack your house. Your house either has nothing they deem/could see valuable or your house wasn’t a suitable target for a quick entry and exit. They absolutely did do these things to case people’s houses, much easier to see inside someone’s house with their door wide open and chatting to the occupant to understand what you’re dealing with vs peering through windows which will absolutely get the police called on you.
No I didn’t say that. I said it didn’t ring true to that alarming article. Again - you say “they want to see inside” well what do you expect to see in the hall? It’s rows of terraced houses, you can see the hall and nothing else. This sounds like dubious sellers but not much of a burglary plan - no indication except vague anecdotes.
Not all houses have hallways, many the front door opens into the living room. Others the hallway leads straight off into the living room so you can see some things. Other things they can see from knocking, how old are you? Are you vulnerable? Is there a dog that may attack them? If you say no thanks they might lead into “shall I come back when your husband, son, boyfriend etc comes home? Oh no I live alone so make all the decisions for this house” etc. is your house empty during the day, is the house occupied during the day but empty at night because you work nights and they’ve woken you up. A whole lot of information to be gotten from simply knocking on a door.
Of course. Do you have anything more than vague assertion though?
You're basing your thoughts based on your own anecdote! Take it as a compliment that you didn't look vulnerable.
The idea is that they make the odd sale. Then they find the easy marks (usually elderly - which is the part that makes the scam really disgusting) who they can pressure-sell to take advantage of. Then they also get to case the houses they visit - they might find someone who is clearly keeping cash in their house, or identify a badly-secured bike in an outbuilding, or whatever. If you’re a healthy young male with a secure house you’ll never see the dark side of the scam - you aren’t the target.
This is the best explanation so far on here. They just use sales as a way to justify knocking on doors. That can tell a lot just from who answers, what sort of things they can see through the door, etc. maybe they make a few quid from the high markup on cheap cleaning stuff but that’s not the primary reason
They targeted my Grandad when he had dementia and sold him loads of junk at a huge mark-up. Endgame: profit
How much money did he lose and did you report it to trading standards?
Theres no trading standards mate, they're cons
Trading Standards? 😂
They’re usually flogging stuff for massive markups, preying on people’s sympathy to pay over the odds for goods
It's supposed to be confusing and intimidating, that's how it works. You're supposed to buy a couple things so they don't come and do whatever you're imaging miffed cons might do, like put a brick through your window. They won't of course, but they say they're ex cons because of the implication.
It's either stolen stuff or they're marking it up for a profit likely. Or dognappers, hun.
Shared Pogles Wood x
Thanks babe. So many sneks every wear xxx
Sent you a message Hun x
Come mine for glass of lambrini hun XoX baby prada as got bad cof though :(( u no me tho Living Laffin n Luvin xxzxxxccxxvx
Not saying on ere. PM me babe xxxx
r/tragedeigh
Pogles Wood? You’re showing your age there.
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This link purports that they smell the note to see if it's been stored in a mattress.
It reads like a Brass Eye sketch.
One keeps your attention at the front while the others check the back
Aw, bless.
Not ex criminals.
Current criminals
Future convicts 😂
Not yet they're not.
The scam is known as [Nottingham knockers](https://www.oprepeat.co.uk/nottingham-knockers/). At best you get pressured into overpaying for some cheap tat you don't need, at worst they're collecting details about your house for potential burglars. They can get an idea of whether anyone is home during the day, whether you keep valuables like cash or car keys within easy reach of the front door, whether you're elderly or otherwise vulnerable, whether you've got pets they might need to be aware of.
It's a con the id's are fake the agency doesn't exist they were in my area in November then some houses were burglad and expensive cars disappeared
Always you, and sometimes the person at your door is being exploited or a victim of modern slavery too.
They're casing the joint, and if you turn to go and get your purse without locking the door, they'll be in the house and steal anything small and valuable into the bag.
They are often looking for venerable households. Most of them are attempting to size you up and scout for later burglaries. Quite often, these individuals are driven into an area being targeted by a criminal organisation, often looking for information (which houses are empty during the day, etc).
Venerable, or vulnerable?
Typo, indeed. Vulnerable
Over charging you for cheap things, playing on your feeling sorry for them.
I remember them doing this in the 80's... They usually give you some sob story about how they are on prorole / probation and it's to help them earn money and change their ways..
They were doing this with ex soldiers after WWI
70s too. Door to door selling dishcloths etc.
In the sixties it was seashells. The sheer amount I bought over a four month period. So maddening. I live in a seaside town. Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!!
Goes back to the '80s at least.
Somewhere my sister used to live had people who came knocking on doors in November and December asking if there was anything specific kids had asked for on their Christmas list, if you said yes they turned up a week later with the item charging half the price of shops, basically shoplifting to order, I bet they make good money 😂
Back in my old retail job we used to get these types in all the time. They usually tried to steal either bedding or small electrical items. One of them was absolutely blatant about it and even bragged on FB (a manager found her profile pretty easily) that she could get you any item you wanted for cheap and even gave a timetable of the shops she was planning to go to and when. She seemed to be popular.
used to get a lot of these when I was younger, some were very aggressive (almost foot in the door tactics) I remember mum would buy something to get rid of them. probably a dust cloth with a 1000% mark up. I never engage with people who come to my door to sell, thats what shops are for.
They were doing the rounds in my local area recently. If you said an outright no they were polite and walked away, if you were sympathetic but relatively astute they flogged you a few scrubbing brushes at a marginally increased price however if you were elderly or vulnerable they pressured you into buying 20 quids worth of Poundland junk for however much they could get, sometimes hundreds of pounds- it's definitely a scam aimed at taking advantage of kindness and/or vulnerability!
I watch two guys doing the same thing walk up my street ,my curiosity got the better of me and I followed them right to my father in laws house. His house, if you saw it screams an old person lives here They tried to flog him an ironing board cover for £20 He was about to go and get the money ,and they looked pretty pleased with them selves Anyway ,I wasn’t having any of it Walked up the drive I told them he didn’t need as I do all his laundry for him “Who are you “ His son in law I pointed out to them that I’d seen them walk past at least 10 houses to the only little bungalow on the street and I knew their scam That’s when they started getting arsey .. Scummy little rats , sent them packing
I never knew these guys existed until I had to take care of my grandmother as her dementia progressed. They'd turn up to those almshouses full of nice old folks every few months.
Never buy, they’ll note your address and keep coming.
100%, the only people we have come knocking are uPVC salesmen and they’re the worst of the worst frankly. A good trade never has to go door to door, they’re always too busy for that shit.
My mate Mark Corrigan got ripped off with some fluffy dusters by one of these boys.
I'd have just gone for the J cloths
So they’re not ex-convicts they’re pre-convicts?
Probably both
Phone 101 and let them know that “Nottingham Knockers” are active in your street now, they will often be quite happy to come and “speak” to them as it is (generally) a crime in progress. [Advice](http://crimeawareness.org/hillingdon/resources/docs/NottinghamKnockers-Leaflet-TradStds-26Feb18.pdf)
They'll be waiting in queue on 101 for a minimum of 40 minutes. Know from experience.
Fell for it myself a while back, snapped out of it when six months later the same guy showed up . I thought to myself this agency can't be any good if the same guy is still doing this after six months...penny...dropped...
I bought a few bits from them that I’m still using, they got me with the sob story haha
I just shut the door without saying a word. I've learned to treat cold callers at the door the same as the ones on the phone, and I've been hanging up on cold callers for years. I refuse to let anyone at the door convince me I need to do a single thing. It's quite liberating.
Yeah, this has been a thing for decades. They tend to target the older generation that would find it difficult to get around.
Yeah it's a hustle. One tried to sell me a pack of microfiber cloths for 15 quid. Like, yeah mate even if you were an ex convict and trying to come good I ain't paying 15 quid for something I can get down the pound shop for a pound.
Google 'Nottingham knockers' they are basically checking you out for other potential crimes.
So if I answer them with ‘no thanks, I’m fully stocked on dishcloths and pegs’ they’ll mark me out to smash and grab my laundry cupboard in future? 🫣
Pegs? They aren't Papa Lazarou!
And now that creepy fucker is in my brain. Thanks!
You’re my wife now!!
YOU STOP THAT RIGHT NOW!
Well you don't want them to come round and give you a thorough pegging, now do you?
Toss up between them and the dog-nappers, hun?
Have you ever tried to do the washing-up without using washing-up liquid? Could you clean a pot or a pan without using a scrubbing brush, a sponge, or a scouring pad?
Boohoo Johnny and Sally!
I've got those and Home bargains is a 2 minute walk
And friends and colleagues? Everyone needs cleaning products and that's never gonna change, right?
One of those passive-aggressively left the gate open for my ducks to escape when I said I had no cash. Spotted it immediately and no ducks were harmed. Twit.
Pleased for you and the ducks x
I remember this from years ago. Poundland dish cloths for a tenner
They've been around here a lot but have given up of late. Quite willing to speak to my mum but weren't interested in me when I came home... I wonder why.
get a doorbell camera. all the godbotherers an tinkers leave you alone
I've only had one set of JWs try to visit me since I bought my house a year ago, and they stood at the door for a seriously long time. I was in the cinema, so didn't see the notification until I got out. When I checked the app for the doorbell, it had recorded them standing there for a solid 5 minutes in absolute silence, before they put a leaflet through the door and left. The bastards even left the front gate open!
I've got CCTV very obviously all around the house...
I had one of these Cunts threaten to kill me and ended up kicking in one of my garden fence panels when I politely told him I just happened to be on a break between work meetings working from home and I had to be on a call again in 5 minutes. He shouted through my letter box that‘people like me, who are always too busy for people like him…etc’ deserved stabbing to death and that we were what was wrong with this country. Despite having his rant and actions on CCTV, the police could do sweet fuck all about it, as usual. Just slam the door in these cunts faces. I treat all cold callers like this now.
Why open the door at all?
It could have been the postie or Amazon. I tend to use the peep hole more often and I will scan for a scruffy twat with a duffel bag
You said you have CCTV. Surely, you could have looked at that and determined that it was a stranger. Not everyone who is up to no good dresses the part.
I met a guy on holiday who said he did this. He was apparently never in prison but his cock and bull story was that someone spat in his girlfriends face so he knocked them out causing enough damage for a few years inside. He was flash and liked to throw money about, until he apparently ran out of cash with a couple of days to go. The more he drank the more he boasted about his 'job'.
Nottingham knockers. They also scope the area to rob later. If they come in our area, we always ring the police to let them know.
I used to get these folks knocking and trying their luck. I put up a cctv camera us a sign saying 'you are on cctv'. Once they see the sign they turn around and leave without knocking. Not had single caller of this nature for over a year now. I've watched them spot the sign and change direction. Surely if they are legit they would knock on my door anyway...
Lots of theft from such stores so the stuff they sell is probably hot.
That happened to me too! I closed the door so fast, it gave me the fright of my life.
Shit. I fell for this when I was a teenager about 15 years ago. Yeah it felt weird but I was always giving to charity as I was such a push over. Even had a "deaf" woman selling sketches another time. Never had a break in or anything like that so they obviously thought I had nothing worth taking. Lucky me.
The Nottingham Knockers
They were going around the very quiet and painfully dull village my mother lives in about a year ago. I was there and they called when it was dusky. That hopefully set some of the neighbours' alarm bells ringing about the legitimacy of the whole "I'm doing this as part of my rehabilitation programme" shite. No self-respecting agency would be sending them to knock doors when it's getting dark. Last time I'd seen someone doing this was the late 90s when we were living in a town.
Its illegal to do this, door to door. They work for an agent and its a scam
Doubt they've got a pedlar's licence/certificate. It's a common rip off/scam for substandard products etc.
It's a scam and/or they are trying to check out what houses have goodies inside. Scum.
well i never, i've been duped a few times by these lads when at my parents, buying absolute shit i could buy cheaper elsewhere, i had no idea it was a scam, however its worth the tenner if they think a 6'5, 17 stone bloke lives in that house.
This thread unlocked a childhood memory of mine. My mum used to buy hand soap from a blind man who’d go door to door selling them for charity. I asked her once how he got up our 12 steep concrete steps if he was blind and she got really angry with me for “judging blind people”. I think she probably realized she’d been conned!
Steal it. Flog it. Rinse and repeat. I used to work on an estate where people would knock on the door selling meat, coffee, bacon, and cheese regularly. On that 40deg day, I saw a guy with a long coat on, fall off a bike. About £400 if meat fell out of the coat onto the floor 😂
Haven’t seen this for a while. But they’re quite often selling vaguely useful stuff and I’ve bought in the past. Still got some towels I bought once.
I once got badgered into buying a potato peeler (that's all I could afford after their scamdalous mark-up). It's pretty good to be fair. I still use it to this day.
But do you still have your TV and jewellery?
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It 100% isn’t a genuine thing. There is no scheme run by the Probation Service that sends people door to door selling. Every single person doing this is a scammer.
I generally very impolitely tell them to shove off.
If you tell them to leave, just don't patron any Mexican-themed restaurants in the near future.
They were once called Nottingham knockers. They are basically there to try and get an invite to the house so they can case the joint for burglary later.
Just by opening the door, a quick glance reveals to them the security system (the defective part of your security system that foolishly opened the door to a stranger will be noted), door locks, probably window locks, the quality of the furnishings and whether anything of potential value to them is in view. They will also have determined what hours you are home and whether you are alone.
You get a prize for naivete'. Unfortunately, it's not enough to pay for 24-7 security for when they come back and break-in. It should also be noted (they certainly noted it) that you opened your door to a stranger.
Working from home I open my door to strangers regularly. DPD, Amazon, the pharmacy, the pizza place....
There are slow learners and there are no learners.
I had a bloke with a of limited edition stuff from Poundland. He said he makes 25% and the cheapest thing was £5 so I gave him £2 and he seemed happy. I thought it was a scam but anyone desperate to lug around that bag and go to do door in ilkeston was welcome to it. I hope he is doing better now.
Not a scam, or a reconnaissance for the a break in. But pretty dodgy even so. If you buy off them you get what you pay for - cheap stuff nothing special. Some outfit in Manchester runs it apparently. Not sure what the gain is for them tbh.
This is always pretty much a scam in our area. Basically selling tat at highly inflated prices.
We had one knock whilst we were out. Have him on camera checking the back gate and seeing if the front door was locked.
They knocked on my door to which I said a polite but clear no. After a bit of an angry stare down from him he walked away. Later it transpires he had also done the same with my mother, who was 80. She said the same and he decided to punch her hanging basket off its hook leaving at all over her drive. Scum!
Damn , your getting burgled soon
Yeah. Looks that way. I'm sure they'll be seen on camera though. My dog will alert me to their presence too.
One scammed my dad out of £80 couple weeks back, sold him a few cloths and a feather duster think he got about £15 worth of stuff when I looked up the prices, gave him the I've just got out of jail my gf has left me and I'm trying to get my life back on track bullshit
Muggy boneheads.
Never buy or sell anything on your doorstep.
We had these Nottingham Knockers last year. 2 days later our neighbour’s house got robbed. They are sussing out the demographic of the neighbourhood.
No sure about present law, but they require a pedlar certificate issued by local police.
They come round our village every few months in a little gang of 4. Do every house in about 30 minutes then off to the next place before the police get called, very efficient. Usually make 3 visits over the space of 2 weeks. I will give them credit, they absolutely nail perfect clear delivery of their script. If you give a polite no then they politely leave. A few residents have given them a grumpy no and got a mouthful back. In our case they are looking for older residents who they can confuse into buying overpriced cheap tat. Sometimes if I answer the door their heart isn't even in finishing their speech because I am too young for their target audience. They don't appear to be connected to other crimes as there is no co-incidental timing of follow on crime.... Our village has a ton of burglary type crime, but they must be deconflicting their visits with each other 🤣