BEMUSED firefighters are urging people to call them if they come across a blaze - and not to ring the police instead.
The North Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service says there has been a recent spate of 999 calls when people have called the police to report fires.
Spokesman Carl Boasman said: "This is causing unnecessary delays in call-handling and mobilising of fire appliances. In one instance, it took crews more than 18 minutes to locate and deal with a fire, because it was reported to the police."
Although police control rooms are equipped to deal with 999 calls relating to police matters, they are not able to mobilise fire appliances to incidents.
This means the information has to be passed to fire control, wasting valuable time.
Mr Boasman said: "We are urging members of the public to report all fire-related incidents to the fire service by dialling 999.
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