21 November 2007
A BT home phone user has won an apology from the telecoms firm after his number was changed three times without prior consent.
Steve May, from Sedgemoor, attempted to switch a telephone account to his name in August - triggering a series of engineer visits and unasked-for number changes, the Bridgwater Mercury reports.
The 43-year-old also continued to be billed by the firm, despite not receiving or making calls for weeks at a stretch - and at one point apparently being accidentally allocated the same number as one of his neighbours.
Mr May - still currently without a functioning phone service - said that his experience had been a "nightmare".
A BT spokesperson apologised for the problems - and said that they would soon be fixed.
"We've been trying to contact the customer over the last few days," he added.
In further bad news for the UK's biggest landline provider, an attention-grabbing online protest has been launched by another customer infuriated by its poor customer service.
Warwick resident Patrick Askins has been locked in a dispute over late billing - and told the Kenilworth Weekly News that he had been trying, and failing, to resolve the problem ever since through the firm's website and call centres.
As a result, he has uploaded a personal plea on website YouTube, asking BT chairman Sir Christopher Bland to fix the problem - and terming the firm's electronic customer service system an "automatic maze".
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