BT attracts most complaints over 25 years

BRITISH TELECOM has been named the worst offender in an analysis of 25 years of consumer TV series Watchdog. The company has featured on the BBC programme 45 times for a string of customer complaints and alleged overcharging.

It has appeared almost twice as often as British Gas, which is in second place and has been singled out 27 times.

In one instance, a string of viewers - including comedian and presenter Barry Cryer - complained they were being wrongly charged by BT for calls to premium-rate sex lines. Cryer denied anyone at his home in Hatch End, Middlesex, had made the calls, which doubled his usual £120 quarterly bill.

Watchdog called in a telecoms expert who discovered that a new computer system had allowed hackers to tap into the software, make the calls and charge them to legitimate customers.

When Watchdog confronted BT it said people were sometimes too embarrassed to admit they had made the calls but as a 'goodwill gesture' the firm agreed to remove the charges.

The survey was commissioned to mark the quarter-century of the BBC1 programme. It lists the 10 firms most regularly named and shamed, which include Tesco, Sainsbury's, Boots and British Airways. Watchdog editor Doug Carnegie said: 'BT remains the biggest villain of the piece.'

A BT spokesman said: 'When you have 19m customers, mistakes will be made - all you can do is learn from them and move on.'