Police Called Because Customer Was Served Wrong Tea Bag

A little bit of power can go to a person's head, and the results can be truly ridiculous. That's why this week a man wound up calling the police to settle a dispute that arose because he was served the wrong flavor of tea by mistake.

According to The Telegraph, 33-year-old Robert Lattarulo is a "senior TripAdvisor contributor," and takes that duty very seriously. This week a server at a London cafe called Birdie Num Nums must not have known how important he was, because Lattarulo was accidentally served a bag of lemon ginger tea instead of the lemongrass and ginger tea he'd ordered.

Faced with the wrong tea bag, Lattarulo had a lot of options. He could have drunk the lemon tea. He could have asked for the tea to be switched and gone on with his life. But apparently he decided to start publicly writing a bad TripAdvisor review right in front of owner Sevjan Melissa, even though she said she had apologized for the mix-up and offered him a refund and a free slice of cake as a peace offering.

Lattarulo would not accept the cake and refund, though, and declared he was leaving a bad online review immediately.

"I'm a senior TripAdvisor contributor and I am true to my word," said Lattarulo, who has reportedly written 35 reviews for the site.

At that point, Melissa told him to get out of her cafe.

That's when senior TripAdvisor contributor Lattarulo called 999–the emergency services number in London–to tell police he was being kicked out of a cafe. The police didn't care.

At that point, some actual police showed up at Birdie Num Nums, but they were not responding to the call. They were just popping by their regular cafe for some tea of their own. When Melissa told them what was happening, they thought it was hilarious.

"I told them about what had gone on and they were in stitches," she said.

Melissa said she's been in the foodservice industry for 10 years and this is easily the most ridiculous thing that's ever happened to her, but it appears to be going well now. Lattarulo wrote his bad review, but the restaurant's TripAdvisor page has been filled with good reviews, many praising the tea in particular.