News

‘There’s no fried chicken’: Ridiculous reasons people called UK emergency line

Dec 21, 2018

The UK police released a list of ridiculous phone calls received over the past year. Source: Getty

The Metropolitan Police Service has released some of the most outrageous calls made to its emergency service line during the past year – and it’s hard to believe they are actually real.

From fretting about fast food store KFC running out of chicken to complaints that breakfast wasn’t served fast enough, the department in the UK has certainly had its fair share of bizarre “emergencies” over the past 12 months.

In fact, out of more than two million calls made to the 999 number – the equivalent of 000 – between January and November this year, a shocking 21,733 were recorded as hoax calls.

While some just wanted to send a sweet message and wish the police a happy new year, others thought it would be suitable to call the cops when a pub in London failed to serve up their food as fast as they would have liked.

Earlier in the year a man even decided to call to make a report about a bus driver who had apparently shut the door in his face, when in fact the bus had just broken down and no one was allowed on board.

Another, who obviously likes to travel in silence, was so distraught about her journey on public transport that she thought it was necessary to call the police to report her bus driver for whistling whilst driving.

Just last month a man even called police to tell them that he had been having an argument with a female driver about who had the right of way. While in March a woman treated the police as more of a taxi service, calling to demand a female taxi driver come and pick her up.

Although some of the calls may give you a bit of a chuckle, the Met warned “emergencies” such as these are a waste of police time and could potentially put other lives in danger.

Chief Superintendent David Jackson, who is in charge of call handling for the Met, said it could mean the difference between life and death for some people, if they cannot get through to the emergency centre.

“Whilst some people will find these calls funny, they take away police resources at a time that police numbers and funding are stretched, and we must continue to make savings across the service,” he said in a statement released this week.

“During the time that our call handlers are dealing with these time-wasting calls, a member of the public could be in real danger or have built up the confidence to call with an important piece of information that could take a dangerous person off the streets.

“Imagine if one of your friends or loved ones was in need of the police as quickly as possible and it turned out we could not help because we were having to deal with one of these hoax calls – I’m sure that you, like us, would be devastated and extremely annoyed.”