They appear in work clothes at the doors of residents of the Clermont-Ferrand metropolis and try to extract money from them: watch out for fake garbage collectors who sell calendars. The practice is not official and the metropolis recommends remaining vigilant.
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If a garbage collector comes to your home in the Clermont-Ferrand metropolis and tries to sell you a calendar, be careful. There is nothing authorized about the practice. These fake municipal agents have been rampant for many years, and some residents fall into the trap. Michel Valente, director of waste management for the metropolis, notes: “This is something that is quite recurrent in the metropolitan area. We have users who contact us by telephone or even by mail to ask us if it is normal to have garbage collectors who bring calendars and ask for remuneration behind them.”
Unscrupulous fake agents who do not hesitate to try to abuse the trust of distrustful residents: “These people who go door to door, who come knocking to distribute calendars, that’s a bit of a challenge. Some people are fooled in the sense that they give something for the calendar. When they talk about it to their neighbors, it's the neighbors who alert them. Others are very suspicious. They report these actions to us.”
Michel Valente has been working in the metropolis since 2002. He has encountered this type of situation since the start of his career, but according to him, fake municipal agents are becoming more and more confident: “Now it’s happening earlier and earlier. Before, it really happened at the end of the year.” According to him, the amounts given to these scammers are equivalent to those given to firefighters “or what we could give to La Poste at the time. They don't dare tell us, I think. As they feel like they’re being tricked, they prefer not to talk about it.”
He warns: scammers do not target their victims, all residents can fall into the trap. “They knock on every door, crossing their fingers. This happened to me personally. They knocked on the door of the village where I lived, they went through the whole village.” Work jackets without a Clermont Auvergne Métropole logo, calendars that don't have a logo either… Certain signs should alert you.
Even if these signs are not present, Michel Valente has an unstoppable technique: give nothing because, in reality, even real garbage collectors do not have the right to sell calendars. “It is strictly prohibited at our level. These are practices from another century, it is clearly prohibited within the framework of our managerial practices. This is prohibited in the contracts we have with the private service providers who work for us. If someone shows up saying that they are a garbage collector and that they are coming for the calendars, even if they are a garbage collector, we recommend not giving anything.”
- a Métropole agent necessarily wears an outfit on which we can see the “Clermont Auvergne Métropole” logo,
- a Metropolis agent has a professional card that he or she must be able to present at the user's request,
- the Metropolis never sells calendars.
If in doubt, do not hesitate to contact the Waste Management Department at this number: 04 63 669 669.
