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Woman calls police over 'not enough' cheese on her pizza

'We advised the individual they just needed to speak with the manager of the company and not the police,' say Royal Newfoundland Constabulary ​

Tuesday 21 June 2016 15:28 BST
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(Getty Images)

A woman was so outraged by what she deemed to be a lack of cheese on her pizza that she phoned the police to complain.

Geoff Higdon, of Canada's Royal Newfoundland Constabulary, revealed details of the woman's call as an example of innappropriate uses of the emergency 911 number.

"The individual had an issue with the company she bought the pizza from, and there wasn't enough cheese, and had approached the company and didn't like whatever response they had given," he said.

"I'm not sure if by calling us they assumed there was some sort of action we could take, or what the situation was, but of course we advised the individual they just needed to speak with the manager of the company and not the police,” Const Higdon told the CBC.

The call handler who received the complaint described it as “the call”.

They added it was “that one call that will always stick with you as completely bizarre."

The force, like many others around the world, has had its fair share of inappropriate queries.

But Const Higdon added that people also phoned up the non-emergency lines with irrelevant questions.

He continued: "People call our communications centre to complain about stuff they hear about on the radio that has nothing to do with police or justice or law or anything.

“They call us to give an opinion. That one's common. There are radio open line shows and sometimes people call us instead of there.

"I think when people have a problem and they're just completely stumped at who to call, they'll call us.”

Elsewhere in Canada, British Columbia’s largest 911 call centre, E-Comm911, issued a list of the top 10 useless reasons people have called the emergency line.

The top three were someone complaining a car was parked too close to theirs; reporting that a child wouldn't put his seatbelt on and telling police about a coffee shop that refused to give a refill.

Also making the list was asking if it's ok to park on the street, reporting someone had used a roommate's toothbrush and asking the non-emergency line for help getting a basketball out of a tree.

Other meagre issues included requesting the number for a local tyre dealership; reporting an issue with a vending machine; and complaining about lost sleep due to a building's noisy air-conditioning system.

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