FARMINGTON – Franklin County Sheriff Dennis Pike is warning people in the region about a phone scam that could strike businesses.

If someone receives a call and the caller claims he or she is a telephone company employee technician and is checking the line, beware, Pike said. If that person asks you to push 9-0-# sign before hanging up the receiver, don’t do it. It automatically opens the line to unlimited phone calls being made at subscribers’ expense, he said.

If a person complies with the callers request to either dial 9-0-# or transfer him or her to an outside line before hanging up, they are enabling the caller to place calls that are billed to your telephone.

Telephone company employees checking for technical and other types of telephone service or billing problems would not call and ask a subscriber to dial a specific series of numbers before hanging up the telephone receiver, according to the Web site. They also wouldn’t request subscribers to connect the caller to an outside line before hanging up.

the receiver.

These types of calls are made to trick subscribers into taking actions that will enable the caller to place fraudulent calls, the site states.

The scam only works if your telephone is served by a private branch exchange or private automatic branch exchange. A private branch exchange allows convenient access from the exchange from a phone outside the business via an 800 number or special access number, so that an authorized person can bill long distance calls to the company’s private branch exchange.

The commission’s Web site recommends that if a company uses a private branch exchange or private automatic branch exchange, it should educate employees about the scam and to notify local law enforcement agencies, if they receive such a call.

dperry@sunjournal.com