Exclusive:Samaritans Scotland volunteers say 'not a shift goes by' without men performing lewd acts over phone

A Samaritans volunteer has spoken out after “around 10 per cent” of phone calls she received while volunteering were from men while they engaged in solo sexual acts.

Jen, 27, from Lanarkshire says she was only 19-years-old when she started volunteering at Samaritans and, on her first day of the job, had to take a call while a man masturbated on the other end of the line.

Posting about her experience on social media, hundreds of other volunteers from organisations across the UK - including Childline and rape crisis call centres - have said they also face similar calls while they try to do their jobs.

Before volunteering, Jen says she felt a pull to volunteer for Samaritans while she was doing her undergraduate degree and studying social sciences, sociology, and psychology.

The intensive volunteer training took six months and, as part of it, trainees received walkie-talkies and would go through different scenarios typical to happen on an average day.

’Regulars’ call into charity helplines while performing solo sex acts

From the start, Jen was told that it was usual for men to call into the charity support helpline, and, instead of looking for help with their mental health, they would instead keep calling to find the voice of a young female volunteer then masturbate while on the phone.

“I don’t think a shift went by where you didn’t get a call like that,” Jen said, speaking exclusively to The Scotsman.

“You know to expect it.

“I'm fairly certain [on my first day] it was a man who would call quite regularly and he would say that he wanted to show you his genitals. He probably called a few times that day.

“My shift partner, who got the call first, was able to explain it to me so I knew to expect the call, knew I could hang up on them, and knew I could talk about it with my shift partners afterwards.

“There would be regulars who would call and you’d recognise their voice and know to expect them.”

Volunteers created ‘procedures’ due to repeated malicious calls

The number of calls were so frequent that Jen had ‘her own procedure’ on how to deal with them.

She said: ”If they asked for my name, I had a little fake name in my back pocket ready and I’d say that I was called Rebecca.

“The kind of stuff people might say is: ‘oh, my girlfriend is really mad at me because of what she found under the bed’.

“They want you to ask what’s under the bed but you don’t ask what’s under the bed, you want to talk about their worries, about their relationship, and if that person is a social support for them and, if they’re mad at them, then is that isolating? You always divert it back to: ‘you’re feeling distressed, and how can we help you with your distress?’

“People call Samaritans for emotional support, and not to tell you what’s under their bed - so you can tell when it’s an appropriate call and when they’re calling for the wrong reasons.”

She added that at the end of every shift, Samaritans was “great” for supporting volunteers as they would be made to call another Samaritan and talk through their entire work day.

Callers wait to ‘get a voice they like’

“A lot of the time, you’d be able to tell someone has called around all the branches until they got a voice they liked because of who they were hanging up on regularly,” Jen added.

“Because you tend to work the same shift every week, I wouldn’t be surprised if people were learning the patterns of certain volunteers they like the voice of.”

Jen added that 10 per cent of calls she received were of men masturbating while on the phone. In most cases, the caller would initially be put through to one of Jen’s shift partners - a man and woman in their seventies - but the caller would quickly hang up and dial again in the hopes of getting a young female voice.

She said: “With my experience volunteering at Samaritans as a young woman with a young voice, I think people my age with my kind of voice would say the statistic of these calls we receive is around 10 per cent.”

In a TikTok posted by Jen, that has since received over 500,000 views, hundreds of others from across different organisations - including Samaritans and Childline - said they received the same calls.

Sharing Jen’s experience, another former Samaritans volunteer commented on her post: “100% had the same experience.

“It didn't matter what time of day it was, you'd get at least one and I agree the worst ones were when they lied and pretended to have a real problem just to keep you on the phone longer so they could, well so they could finish.”

One user commented: “I worked for Childline for a year and can confirm that we would get at least 5-6 calls like this a night from men. We actually had protocols in place when it happened.”

Another user said: “I volunteered for Childline for 6 years and I’d say about 10% was male adult callers doing the exact same thing.”

Scale of the problem ‘very harrowing’

“I think the fact people are calling things like Childline and support hotlines for people who have experienced sexual assault - that’s very harrowing to hear,” Jen said.

“Especially when there are designated phone lines for people who want that kind of service.

“I think, when you think about it further, the reason they don’t go to those other services is because the lack of consent from people who they’re speaking to is part of it for them.”

In the event of one of these calls, a Samaritans spokesperson said: “Our volunteers are here to help and to make sure they can do this, we cannot tolerate: threatening calls, sexually abusive/manipulative calls, and targeted, personally abusive calls.

“Anyone making these types of calls will hear a recorded message: ‘Samaritans is not taking calls from this number for a period of 90 days because concerns have been raised about the content of the calls within a 30 day period. If, after 90 days further reports of inappropriate content are made, the service will be withdrawn from this number for a period of 12 months.’”

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Jen left her volunteering role at the Samaritans when she was 23-years-old since she had less time to commit to volunteering as she was starting medical school.

“Volunteering at Samaritans is something I’d love to go back to,” she added.

“Everyone says that Samaritans is a suicide prevention helpline.

“Samaritans isn’t strictly just for suicide prevention - anyone who needs emotional support, is in crisis, or distressed can call Samaritans.

“If you need someone to talk to in a confidential anonymous non-judgemental way, that’s what Samaritans is for.”

You can contact a Samaritans volunteer anytime, day or night, by calling its free helpline at 116 123 or by emailing [email protected].

If you have had a similar experience and would like to share your story for further coverage, email [email protected].