A man has freaked out after realizing his "dad" in a family WhatsApp group chat was actually a stranger.
Making matters even worse, this went on for six months, with the imposter never so much as mentioning the faux pas.
Taking to Twitter, Jonno Hopkins recounted the bizarre tale, writing: "For 6 months there's been someone in my family whatsapp group who I thought was my dad but was in fact a random called Peter (my dad's name).
"This person has sat and read every message and never thought to chime in to inform us that we've added the wrong Peter."
The tweet was posted on February 24 and has since racked up over 5,000 retweets, nearly 2,000 quote tweets, and 78,000 likes.
It went on to spawn an entire thread in which Jonno added more and more details to the hilarious story and answered questions from fellow Twitter users.
Jonno explained: "My family don't communicate (messy divorce), so I was excited to have a group.
He continued: "On calls my dad would ask what's going with stuff, to which I'd say 'Dad, you're in the WhatsApp group, YOU'RE READING THE MESSAGES!' and he'd say 'Am I?' and I just put it down to him being old.
"I'm not sure why, when setting up the group, I didn't add 'Dad' and not 'Peter'. But now I feel bad for fake dad Peter and hope he enjoyed reading my mum's messages about how she'd thought Coldplay's album was called 'A Cold Hard Blow To The Head'. [sic]"
According to Jonno, the group chat could have carried on for years if it hadn't been for his sister – who asked him to add their real dad to the WhatsApp group.
He explained: "It dawned on me that the number of the Peter in the group was not my dad's number."
It turns out that the man who he thought was his dad was actually a plumber who came to repair the washing machine in their home all the way back in December 2013.
Jonno then speculated: "I guess after a while the moment for fake dad Peter to pipe up to let us know we'd got the wrong Peter had passed so he just accepted his role as our new dad."
In any case, the fake dad has now been removed from the group chat and replaced by Jonno's real dad.
People loved the awkward story and flooded the thread with their own similar experiences.
One person shared: "I called my Dad at work once to arrange a lift to Student Uni night. Supervisor put me through, phone was picked up and I arranged a lift, no problem.
"Only problem was I thought my Dad sounded slightly strange - turned out this was because I was actually speaking to his boss."
Another said: "I set up a family chat when eldest left for uni. We started a conversation and son no 2 asked who we were. Turns out I had added a French footballer by mistake."
A third recalled: "I got added to a group chat from some complete strangers discussing a house they were trying to buy. I couldn’t help myself - suggesting a ‘cheeky’ offer way below the asking price; I was briefly a hero in the group as the offer was accepted. Then I got kicked out."
