A CITY takeaway has lost nearly all its business after its phone line was cut off by bungling telecom engineers.

Sau Chiu has run the popular Wing Sing Chinese takeaway in Rainbow Hill, Worcester, for 10 years.

However, he was left scratching his head when the phones failed to ring on Tuesday, January 18.

After making enquiries with the help of friend Bob Soley, they discovered the takeaway’s next door neighbour had a new phoneline installed by Sky engineers the day calls stopped.

When he asked neighbour Andrzej Kwietniewski to test what was to be his newly installed number, the takeaway’s telephone started ringing instead.

Sky says the mistake was down to an administration error and has apologised to Mr Chiu and Mr Kwietniewski.

But the error has cost Mr Chiu about £5,000 in lost trade.

BT has stepped in to take over the line by Wednesday, February 9, while Mr Chiu must work off a mobile phone as calls cannot be diverted from his old phone number.

Mr Chiu – who is not a Sky customer – is furious because despite calling to point out the mistake, Sky initially refused to speak to him as he was not one of their customers, until your Worcester News took up the issue.

Mr Chiu said: “From 5pm until 9pm we didn’t have any calls. We were quiet and that just isn’t normal.

“Then I had regulars coming in saying, ‘Are you closed?’ and we knew there was a problem.

“I phoned Sky and they said they couldn’t do anything as we weren’t the account holder.”

Mr Soley said: “It’s a complete mess but Sky didn’t want to know initially.

“They’ve changed their tune but Mr Chiu will be applying for compensation and loss of business.”

BT has shed some light on the confusion because of an error on the “master list of telephone addresses” showing the takeaway’s address to be the same as that of their neighbour – no 8 Laslett Street (the takeaway address is 8/9 Laslett Street).

An Ofcom spokesman said the error was an “erroneous transfer” and was a wider industry problem.

A Sky spokesman said: “The issue was caused by an administration error made at the time of processing Mr Kwietniewski’s order.

“We appreciate the frustration this situation has caused to both parties and are doing everything we can to resolve this issue as swiftly as possible.”

She said Sky would “look into” compensating Mr Chiu.

Meanwhile Mr Chiu is open for orders on 07596 776926.