Council thanks people for their patience as telephones still down (From Bromsgrove Advertiser)

Council thanks people for their patience as telephones still down

1:40pm Wednesday 24th October 2012 in Local

BROMSGROVE residents are being thanked for their patience as the district council is still experiencing faults with their telephone lines.

Calls to Bromsgrove’s Customer Service Centre are being diverted to the switchboard at Redditch Borough Council.

Calls to direct dial numbers, that are not working, are also being directed to the Redditch authority.

Council leader Roger Hollingworth said the council had been suffering problems since Friday, (October 26).

Officers are working with network providers and partners to try and fix the problem which is on the external lines themselves and nothing to do with the council’s internal telephone system.

It is understood the problems may be linked to the incident of vandalism, in which two underground cables on the Church Lane and Church Road junction, near to St John’s Church, were deliberately cut last week.

While call waiting times have increased staff are pulling out all the stops to ensure all queries are dealt with.

On Monday, (October 22), the switchboard dealt with 1078 calls compared to a daily average of 408 last month.

Head of customer services Amanda de Warr said: “Staff are working tirelessly to minimize the disruption to customers who are our priority.

“But of course there will be some disruption as we seek to resolve this issue as soon as possible and I thank customers for their patience.”

The council is directing customers to its website where they can make payments, and report issues. The website is bromsgrove.gov.uk.