Do I have a moral obligation to wrong numbers?

[Nikia]

For my job, I have a work cell phone. I have had it for a few months now. I have a voice mail message that says who I am.
I still continue to receive various wrong number calls with a lot of them going to voice mail. By the messages and numbers, I know that they are for several different people. A couple of these have involved somewhat serious situations where I hope that they got a hold of the right person.
Should I be calling these people and telling them they have the wrong number?

[hobbit709]

1. I get calls all the time from people trying to get what I call the dyslexic insurance co.

My number ends in 7900-theirs is 9700.

I had one person call 5 times in a row and get increasingly more pissed when I told him I was not the insurance company and he should dial the right number-which I gave him. the last time he started cussing me and I told him his insurance was cancelled. He hung up and didn't call back.

[pipi_k]

2. Hahahaha!!!

I had a boyfriend whose phone number was similar to a local car repair shop.

People would call all the time asking about their cars.

As in your case, sometimes repeatedly.

So after a while he just started telling them, yeah, the car is ready, come on in and pick it up. I often wished I could have been a fly on the wall to see the hijinks that ensued.

[mockmonkey]

3. I had a call from Florida once

I live in Wisconsin and they left a message that had something to do with preregistering for a hospital stay. They mentioned the persons name and even though I listened to the message about 10 times I couldn't make out what name they were saying.

Even if I did call that number back I wouldn't know who to tell them the message was for.

Another time someone called needing an answer about some paint or something.

And like you wrote my phone message also says my full name at the beginning so wouldn't that be a tip off that they had the wrong number?

I heard this comedian Jay Larson on Conan's show talking about a wrong number and him acting like the it wasn't a wrong number. Here is the youtube version.

[Tom_Foolery]

4. That was some good stuff. n/t

[Phentex]

5. I called one back last week...

only because it escalated and sounded pretty serious. I got a voice mail but the calls stopped.

The most frustrating one was from a local hospital telling me I needed to call the doctor for the test results. The first one I ignored, but they kept calling and even the doctor called. So I called to tell them they had the wrong number and they kept asking me to give them the right number. I had to explain that THEY called me and I had NO idea who they were really trying to reach. Idiots. Got one more call after that but then they stopped.

[nolabear]

6. I call back. I'd want them to do it for me.

Repeated ones are a different matter, but even then if it sounds serious I'd try to help. I got a voicemail once letting me know that Dad's heart attack wasn't fatal and here was the hospital information so he could be reached. I figured someone would want to know.

What chaps ME is people like debt collectors who don't believe you when you say it's a wrong number. Years ago I thought I was going to have to stalk and kill one who would not believe that Mr. Bear hadn't run out on a hospital bill in Salt Lake City.

[frogmarch]

7. If the message sounded urgent

I’d call back.

Several years ago when I lived in Wyoming, at around 3 a.m. the phone rang. I’d fallen asleep on the couch watching tv, so I had to do some scrambling to get to the phone. An angry man’s voice on the other end shouted, “Whoever you are, stop calling me! I’m trying to sleep, for chrissakes!” I told him I was the only one in the house and that I hadn’t called him, but he argued with me and even threatened me. I finally said, “Look, asshole, I don’t know how you got this number, but maybe you need to check the area code.” There was a pause, and then he said, “oops,” and hung up. I was tempted to wait about 15 minutes and then call him back, but I didn’t.