Brookes student gets 144 calls about ‘free kittens’ after a Gumtree prank

Ollie Brewer was pranked big time when an ad with his name and number for a handful of kittens was listed on Gumtree, without him having any idea what was going on.

There was the promise of free kittens to be given away to users of the app and all they had to do was call Ollie to decide what colour, gender and when to pick them up. And they called.

Ollie, Built Environment Foundation student, told The Tab: “I was just lying in bed in the afternoon when I got a text saying ‘Hi I am interested in having two brothers, black or white, I can provide them with a good home’. I was going to reply telling them they must have got the wrong number, but then all of a sudden five more texts came through.

“I just kept getting loads of texts and loads of calls, even around 25 voicemails and few WhatsApp messages, there were tonnes”.

The worst part is that Ollie still had no idea why these people were calling or why there were so many texts.

Excitable women were calling about the promise of free cats to pick up and collect in Ollies mum’s hometown when in fact, there were no kittens at all.

We’re all used to having a few prank calls from your mate pretending to be a pizza delivery guy, text confirmations from the “doctor” with STI results or emails with a new Pornhub account, but this practical joke is more unique in nature.

There wasn’t just one joker calling about owning a new pet. There were cat ladies, cheapskates and even floods of callers worrying about the well-being of the animals.

Ollie said: “The RSPCA called at one point and the woman from there told me I had to careful who I was giving cats to because they were listed on Gumtree for free.

“She told me that people have done this before to get cats to use for dog fights. She then started going on about vaccinations and that if I was doing this, I needed to do it properly. I told her I didn’t have a clue what she was on about and just put the phone down on her.”

With a total of 144 calls, 119 texts and over 20 voicemails in just a couple of days, Ollie reported the false advertisement to Gumtree and it has since been taken down, admittedly, he said “It was a good joke and very unique prank”.