BUSINESSES and residents are being urged to be on their guard against unsolicited telephone calls and e-mails.

The warning follows separate complaints, one involving a call promoting business directories, and the other identity fraud.

In the first incident, a businessman in Hartlepool received a demand for almost £200 for apparently agreeing to have his business featured in a directory - even though no such agreement existed.

Hartlepool Borough Council trading standards officer Neil Harrison said: "Typically, a business will be contacted by telephone and told that they owe a fee in return for having apparently agreed during a previous telephone conversation to have their business included in a directory.

"The business will often have no recollection of agreeing to this, and sometimes no agreement will have been made. When businesses refuse to make payments they are often told the initial telephone conversation was recorded and proves an agreement was made. As a result, some businesses pay up."

The second incident involved a call to a Hartlepool resident from a man falsely claiming to be from the security and fraud department of a credit card company.

The caller gave his name and badge number and claimed to be verifying an unusual purchase pattern on the resident's credit card.

Following a series of questions, the caller finally asked for the three-digit security number on the back of the card. Once in possession of this number, fraudsters can shop on the Internet at their victims' expense.