Woman banned from making 999 calls

A woman who called 999 almost 100 times on Christmas Day has been told to pay £2,000.

The woman, who had no medical need to contact the ambulance service, appeared at court earlier this month and has been banned from calling the emergency services for five years, with the exception of a genuine emergency.

The caller rang EMAS 97 times on Christmas Day and used three different phones.

At one stage she put two phones together so call handlers were talking to each other.

The court was told she made a total of 740 inappropriate emergency calls took place in just three-and-a-half months from November 29, 2017 to February 11 this year.

Her actions cost the NHS a total of £13,276, the court heard. She admitted a charge of persistently making use of a public communications network to cause annoyance, inconvenience and anxiety and was also sentenced to a 12-month community order and 15 days of rehabilitation activity.