Peel police share call where someone misused 911 to complain about their Tim Hortons order

A Peel Regional Police badge is seen here in this undated photo.

Peel police are reminding residents when to call their emergency line after someone called police over a Tim Hortons order.

On Monday afternoon, police shared an audio recording of the 911 call to social media. 

In the audio, after the operator asked the caller what the emergency is – the caller asked for police – the individual can be heard talking about the coffee chain.

“So basically I bought a Iced Capp from Tim Hortons,” they started.

The operator interjected, asking if it is a “life or death emergency” that they are in.

“No, it’s like, I bought one but, they are not giving me a replacement,” the caller said.

After the dispatcher replied that they would give them the non-emergency phone number, the caller said, “I think I’m good.”

"This is not a 'one off incident' but rather a daily occurrence and multiple times per day unfortunately," Const. Tyler Bell-Morena told CTV News Toronto in an emailed statement, adding this particular call is from a couple of months ago.

"The caller, for whatever reason, dialed 911 due to their issue with their iced capp, there was no other issue reported."

Police acknowledged on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, that while “coffee mishaps are brutal,” they do not constitute an emergency call.

“Nor were nearly 125,000 misuse calls & 180,000 hang-ups last year,” the tweet reads.

Coffee mishaps are brutal, but NOT a 911 emergency! Nor were nearly 125,000 misuse calls & 180,000 hang-ups last year. Our 911 Centre takes a call every 45 seconds. Meanwhile, a person with a real emergency may be waiting on the line and unable to get through. #911AwarenessPeel pic.twitter.com/EthsIpgr6s

— Peel Regional Police (@PeelPolice) September 25, 2023

Peel police remind residents 911 is to be used for life-threatening emergencies or crimes in progress, like assault, gunshots or medical emergencies.

Residents can call the non-emergency line for noise complaints, ongoing crime issues, reporting a crime that has no suspect or a crime that occurred from the night before.

The reminder comes a few weeks after Peel police said non-emergency calls are overwhelming their 911 service. According to police, last year their emergency call centre received nearly 645,000 calls. However, about 40 per cent were either accidental or non-emergency calls.

With files from The Canadian Press