My place of employment's phone number is one digit away from the city health department
Apparently, due to some whimsy of Fate, our phone number here at the office very closely resembles the number of the city's health department; in fact, the last four digits are exactly the same and the first three digits of our number is 621 and the first three digits of the health department is 612. So one can easily see how careless dialing could get you a hold of us instead of the health department (or, "rat department," or "bad sandwich department," or "rat people" - various other monikers it is identified with by the lesser-educated folk).
Sometimes amusing, sometimes annoying, these calls come in numerous times a day: I'll change my company name to something different here
"Coolpages, can I help you?"
"Yeah, ah need t' speak to yo rat department, I got some rats in mah basement."
"I'm sorry, this is Coolpages, we design web sites."
"These rats, they gettin' big, and we need you guys to come down here and--"
"No, sir, this is not the health department, you have dialed 621-XXXX, you need to dial 612."
"I dialed 612!!"
"Uuh, no you didn't. We're not the health department. We design web sites. You need to dial 612. We don't take care of rats."
"Listen here, these rats--"
"Have a good day, sir!" CLICK.
I suppose it was only a matter of time, but a few years ago my boss - an avid fan of crank calling fiends like the Jerky Boys and Touchtone Terrorists - decided he was going to have a little fun with these callers. He invented a "character" he called "Slick Willy" (it not-so-coincidentally resembled the deep, gravely-voiced Touchtone Terrorist character that's always saying "Ah've been workin' all day..."). In fact he started recording them with the help of a former sales rep. Whenever this sales rep would get a health department call, he'd put them on hold and yell to the bossman: "Health department, line two!" And then my boss would generously put the call on speaker phone so we could all share in the joy!
"Hey-lo?"
"Yeah, I gots rats in mah basement..."
"You got rats in yo basement?"
"Yeah, reeeeel big ones, they's--"
"How big ah they?"
"Well, ah dunno, maybe 'bout two, three feet long?"
"Damn, yo, those are some big rats there, ma'am!"
"Yeah, can you send somebody out hur to take care o' these suckas?"
"Lemme acks you a question: have you named yo rats?"
"Name them?! Why the hell would ah name them rats?!"
"Ah like to name 'em sometimes. Like Blinky, or Spot..."
"Listen hur, I want you to come out and take care o' those lil' bastards, OK? I ain't givin' them no names, OK!"
"OK, where do you live?"
"I live at (XXX X)Street..."
"There?! Oh, no, ma'am, I ain't goin' down there!"
"Well, why not?!"
"Ah got cah-jacked down there last week! They even took mah pants!"
"Yo pants?! They even took yo pants?!"
"Yeah, took 'em clean off! So I ain't goin down there!"
"Well now who is gonna come ovah and take care o' mah rats?"
"Well, ma'am, you need to dial our uthu department, 612-XXXX." CLICK.
Not all calls are about rats, though. We got a call once, some guy complaining about a bad sandwich he got at a restaurant. "Slick Willy" asked him what he put on his sandwich and then proceeded to tell the caller what he liked to put on his sandwich and what he liked on them, which of course mystified the man. None of the other calls were quite as humorous as the one above, though (it's not an exact quote, but pieced together from my oft-inaccurate recollections).
Update: May 13, 2004:
Somebody just called asking about a "Food Permit." No, they were not messed with, but boy we were tempted!!