A woman came home from her summer holiday to find her landline number, which she had owned for 35 years, had changed without her knowing after a broadband bungle.
Rosa Quinoy, who lives in Pimlico, returned from Spain to discover she was making calls from a number she did not know.
The 59-year-old grandmother realised the bizarre situation when she contacted her daughter the evening she returned.
She said: “My daughter saw a new number on her phone and when she picked it up it was me. She said I couldn’t be calling from home, but I insisted I was. We rang the old line and it was disconnected.
"We were completely confused. I had no idea what was going on.” Mrs Quinoy later discovered a Sky Broadband account had been set up for her flat instead of a neighbour’s after the wrong details were taken when the new customer signed up.
This meant that when the phone line was activated, Mrs Quinoy’s line was erroneously taken over. But the ordeal did not end there.
She said: “When we realised what had happened, Sky transferred the new number to my neighbour’s house and I was left with nothing.
“I can’t believe they have done this to me. They still haven’t given me my number back. I have had the same number since I arrived in England 35 years ago and my husband needs it to receive orders for his business.”
TalkTalk, her landline provider, said it had been told to cancel the account and sent Mrs Quinoy a letter to confirm the closure. She is still waiting to get her number back, having returned from Spain on 14 August, and may have to wait another two weeks.
A TalkTalk spokesman said: “Another telecoms company made a mistake and told us to cancel Mrs Quinoy’s account, when she did not want to switch.
“Unfortunately, because she was on holiday, she did not see the letter we sent to confirm her account was being closed. We have given her a temporary number and will reconnect her old number within 10 working days. We have apologised and waived all charges.”
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A Sky spokesman said: “We were very sorry to learn of the inconvenience experienced by Mrs Quinoy. Our customer service team are working with TalkTalk to help reinstate her phone line as soon as possible and we’ll be offering a gesture of goodwill.”
