Fear phone hitch is hitting taxi business

A taxi firm claims it could be losing business after it was discovered people in a village just outside Shrewsbury have to use the full area code to contact the company.

Select Taxis, based at Shrewsbury Business Park, delivered leaflets to people in Bayston Hill with its number 540000 written on it. But when they did not get any business from the village, bosses were left bemused.

They then found out that if people in Bayston Hill did not dial the full number, using the 01743 area code, they would not get through, but both BT and Cambridge Tele.com, which the firm uses, say the problem is not with them.

Claire Ashton, of Select Taxis, said: We did our promotion and nothing happened. Then a wheelchair-user needed a taxi. By chance, he got hold of one of our drivers, who gave him an admin number and he got through, without the dialling code.

"We then found out just dialling 540000 did not work in Bayston Hill. We have lost business because of it. It's embarrassing because everyone who has had our adverts in Bayston Hill gets a dead line."Ms Ashton said the line is run by Cambridge Tele.com, but she believed there was a problem with the BT exchange in Bayston Hill.

She has now complained to communications watchdog Ofcom.

But Amy Walker, BT media relations manager, said as the phone line was not with BT, the company could only do so many checks and it was a problem at the other end.

She said: "There is no problem with the exchange. It is dialling all local numbers phoned from our exchange in Bayston Hill."

Phil Collins, a director of Cambridge Tele.com, which runs the taxi call system, said: "It is not a problem with us. I understand some people in her area when they phone her number as a local number, the call does not go through but if they dial the area code, it does."