Santa Rosa man inundated with calls after Siri gives out his number as Amazon's

ByRandall Yip KGO logo
Friday, November 20, 2020
Santa Rosa man's phone accidentally listed as Amazon's
Wilbert Johnson purchased a mattress on Amazon -- and then the calls began.

SANTA ROSA, Calif. (KGO) -- A Santa Rosa man still mourning the recent death of his wife has been forced to deal with another issue: constant interruptions from people calling him, thinking they've reached Amazon.

Wilbert Johnson hummed as he enjoyed one of his favorite hobbies: baking. Judging just from his demeanor, it's tough to tell that he's gone through so much the last few months.

His wife died of Alzheimer's in October. He's also had a hernia operation and is about to go under for knee surgery.

None of that seems to dampen his spirits.

On this day, all he seems to care about is baking his pineapple upside-down cake.

"People looove that," Johnson confidently declared about his cake. "Goodness gracious."

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The only thing that could possibly interfere with Johnson's baking was the constant ringing of his phone.

Some calls come from Amazon customers. Others come from job applicants, and he says even some Amazon employees.

It's been constant. Johnson has been documenting every call and has pages and pages of phone numbers from people who have left him messages for "Amazon."

"Listen, you don't understand. This is a lot of history. I mean I've been call -- I've been calling every day, calling Amazon every day. I get on the phone every day. That's the first thing I do in the morning, is call Amazon trying to fix this," he says.

Johnson says this all started after he ordered this mattress from Amazon.

"After I got that mattress, I started getting phone calls," he said.

One of those errant phone calls came from Sean McCarthy of Oakley. He said he got the number by Googling it.

"That was just the first number that popped up. So I can see why that's confusing to people," McCarthy said.

Others have told us they got the number from Siri.

7 On Your Side reached out to Apple, Google and Amazon.

Amazon says it has no idea how Johnson's information got out there.

But it did find this on Apple Maps: Johnson's number listed as the Amazon Fulfillment Center in Tracy.

Amazon has contacted Apple and the number has been removed.

Now, can you hear that?

That's the sound of silence -- of the phone not ringing.

"You've been the best help to me than anybody," Wilbert declared to 7 On Your Side.

So far we haven't substantiated that Google also made the same mistake. Apple did not comment on the cause of the mistake, but sent us a link that explains how to correct one.

Take a look at more stories and videos by Michael Finney and 7 On Your Side.