Prank Callers

One of the things we do in the Stolen and Stray Pet Recovery office is provide the owner of a missing pet with a poster.  For a number of reasons we advice them to use our telephone number.

If a member of the public has information that could get themselves in trouble, have potentially sad news, or are worried they will give the owner of a missing pet false hope, they can be much less likely to call an owner directly.

One of the other reasons we suggest using our office number is to avoid the heartache of prank calls.

It seems bewildering that people find at best making a nuisance call and at worse a thoroughly malicious one, a source of entertainment.

Many of the calls are random and just ridiculous, but there are always those that are totally vindictive and malicious.

It is bad enough listening to these calls ourselves, often late at night, when the phones are on out-of-hours transfer, so unimaginable for the owner of a much loved and stray pet to have to listen to.

The people who make these calls seem to be oblivious to the fact that they are dealing with real people, who may have other very tragic things happening in their lives, as well as trying to find a missing pet.

Having listened to many of these calls I am at a loss to explain why taunting people who are clearly vulnerable and already extremely upset is considered appropriate, let alone a source of pleasure.