Sam Pinkett and Phil Bourne, office workers for Berkshire County Council, have their menial existence turned upside-down by a chance phone-call and a case of mistaken identity. After being sole witness to a car crash on a desolate country road, Sam answers an abandoned mobile telephone and hears a message that was clearly not meant for him: "If you are not here by 5 o'clock, we will kill your wife". Encouraged by office mail-room delivery boy Phil that they can be the heroes of the hour, the duo soon find themselves plunged into a deadly kidnap situation.