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Village in phone lines mix-up





As a result, some householders in Brimpton are connected to one another’s phone numbers, meaning neighbours can accidentally access one another’s private messages.
To add insult to injury, they say, engineers cut through fibre optic cables, causing damage worth tens of thousands of pounds while trying to fix a phone and internet blackout which has lasted more than a month.
One of those affected, Brenda Harding of Hyde End Lane, said: “After suffering four weeks of no internet and no telephone connections, engineers finally came out to fix the problem.
“But then people began to realise they had connected the lines up incorrectly, with the result that the phone numbers had all changed.”
She added: “It was bad enough before - people rely so much on the internet now, not just for leisure but for work, too.
“But now people are receiving voicemail message intended for others and all the phone numbers are jumbled up.”
Mrs Harding, who works from home, said that even though her domestic line had been reconnected, her business line was still useless after weeks of complaining.
Villager Liz Masters said: “It began on December 23 when high winds brought down some of the cables. The phones still worked but next day engineers came and cut the cables. One local family had spent tens of thousands installing fibre optics and they just cut through that.
“Then weeks went by before they eventually came out - but then they reconnected everyone up wrongly. “People were getting one another’s calls, voicemails and messages.”
The make matters worse, said Mrs Masters, villagers were never given the same answer twice when dealing with BT Open Reach.
Irene Neill (Con, Aldermaston) negotiated for an emergency road closure - but Mrs Masters said BT Open Reach continued to use lack of council permission as an excuse.
Another reason given was a shortage of telegraph poles, even though they had already been delivered, villagers claimed.
Mrs Masters said: “There’s very poor mobile phone reception here and we had no phones over Christmas. “People have been told they will only be compensated from when they lodged a complaint. But many were unable to because they had no phones.”
A spokesman for BT, Ian Read, said today (Monday, February 3) that he was investigating and would issue a statement later.




















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