Top 10 calls that shouldn’t have been made to 9-1-1 in 2016

What were people thinking? Why would someone call the emergency number 9-1-1 to ask for help opening a broken gym locker? Or because their electric shaver wouldn’t turn off?

And while waiting in traffic is definitely a pain in Metro Vancouver, it’s not a good enough reason to call a phone number meant to save lives.

In an end-of-the-year appeal to the public, E-Comm is asking people to cut the crap on nuisance calls. While they might make for a humorous news story, they have an impact by clogging-up emergency phone lines.

Call-takers Jim Beland and Chris Faris had what E-Comm described as the two top nuisance calls of the year: the broken gym locker and someone looking for job opportunities with police.

“I’d like to be able to say that calls such as the ones on our top ten list are rare, but unfortunately this isn’t the case,” Beland said. “As call-takers our job is to treat each call like an emergency until we can determine otherwise, and this takes time. We want our time reserved for people who ... have a legitimate emergency.”

Faris concurred, saying that too many call 9-1-1 thinking of it as a kind of information hotline. It is not.

“We get a lot of calls that start off with ‘This is not an emergency but …’ and that’s a concern when we know there are other people out there who need our help,” Faris said.

E-Comm’s 9-1-1 receives about 1.35 million calls a year. E-Comm says anytime a 9-1-1 line is taken up for a reason that doesn’t require immediate action, lives could be at risk.

Here are E-Comm’s top 10 David-Letterman-style reasons not to call 9-1-1 from 2016:

10. “Can you tell me what time it is?”

9. Reporting a teenager in the household who refused to do chores.

8. Complaining about not being able to get into a nightclub.

7. “There’s a spider in the bathroom.” 6. Tired about waiting in traffic. 5. What’s the best way to get a drone down from a tree?

4. Asking for a ladder to get a soccer ball down from the roof.

3. Freaking out because an electric razor wouldn’t turn off.

2. Asking about jobs in the police force — for a family member.

1. Wanting help to open a broken gym locker.