Stijn Klaassen from Breda has been called flat in recent weeks by people who had received a wheel clamp in The Hague. Outside office hours they called the 070 number on a sticker near the wheel clamp, but then they answered the phone to the Breda resident. “Oh yes, we diverted him incorrectly,” was the response from the parking service. But correcting the mistake proves difficult.
Unsuspecting, Stijn Klaassen from Breda was sleeping in his camper at a campsite in the south of France when his phone rang. And again. And again. “I had a great sleep, but before half past nine I had already taken four,” he says on Tuesday.
On the other side of the line were people who thought they were calling parking management in The Hague. But they got Stijn on the phone. Due to an error at the parking service of the municipality of The Hague, the number was forwarded to his mobile.
“You then discover that you are in a strange movie,” says Stijn. The first callers were Macedonians. “They were a bit panicky. And it was difficult to explain that I am not from the parking management, because they hardly spoke English.”
Parking lot error
The calls started on April 29. Since then, Stijn has been called about three to four times a week. Sometimes late at night, sometimes early in the morning. Even before seven o’clock his phone rang.
When he called back the number he was called from, it became clear what was happening. He got the parking service on the phone. “Oh yes sir, sorry, mistake. He was diverted to the wrong number. We will fix that!”, he was told. But that did not solve the problem. “It was really nice and quiet for a while, but after a few days it started again,” he said earlier against Omroep West.
Conversation turned to football
Not all calls were annoying. “The conversation with an older couple was very nice,” says Stijn. “They came from The Hague. In Dutch, people quickly realize that something is wrong.” The conversation soon turned to football. “I congratulated them on the promotion of ADO and said that I am still disappointed that NAC has to be relegated.”
Stijn also received texts from people who thought they were in contact with the parking service. He shows photos of cars with a wheel clamp. There are also photos of the sticker showing the 070 number.
Prejudices about civil servants
Stijn’s mobile number is probably very similar to that of the parking service. “In itself it is not so bad that such a mistake is made,” he says. “But the fact that it has already taken three weeks to solve it. Well, that confirms the prejudice we have about the civil service.”
In the beginning, Stijn found the phone calls irritating. “But if I don’t get a wake-up call and the calls are short, then I can live with it.” Still, he would rather it stop. Because calling the municipality did not help, he wrote a message about it on LinkedIn, in which he kindly asked the municipality to correct the error.
Calm again?
Since Omroep West spoke to a spokesperson for the municipality of The Hague about the phone terror, Stijn’s mobile phone has remained silent. But he doesn’t dare say whether the problem will really be over after Tuesday: “It will be solved if I don’t get a call for a week.”
