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PostPosted: Sat Jun 25, 2022 9:42 am 
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Plymouth taxi firm loses hundreds of fares after phone line stops working

https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/p ... ds-7249558

Anytime Taxis sees volume of calls plummet after bizarre glitch devastated business and may mean a complete rebrand

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Image: Plymouth Herald

A Plymouth taxi company has been hit with a devastating loss of business after a bizarre phone glitch meant hundreds of calls could not get through to it. Union Street-based Anytime Taxis has seen journeys shrink dramatically after its phone line stopped accepting calls from anyone not on the BT/EE network.

The highly-unusual problem appears to be because the company’s landline number - 247365 - was given to it by mistake, and may be being claimed by a business elsewhere in the UK. Phone provider BT has launched an investigation and the tech giant said it is doing everything it can to resolve the problem.

But it has left Anytime Taxis, a growing business that only launched in December 2021, without full phone access for a week now and with no idea of when the nightmare scenario will be rectified. It has already cost it hundreds of lost fares and a potentially huge future issue as all its vehicles and premises are branded with the phone number and, indeed, it had chosen the 247365 number because it represented it being open for business 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

“The company started with that number,” said Anytime Taxis’ owner Ben Burgess. “It’s on all our cars and the office in Union Street - it is the heart of the company.”

The crisis started for the taxi company, a BT customer, at 5.30pm on Friday, June 17, when calls from any provider other than BT or EE, which merged with BT in 2016, stopped being connected to its office landline. At first the company didn’t realise why the usual volume of Friday night bookings were plummeting and Mr Burgess said: “From then until midnight we received 31 calls - normally it would be in excess of 200.”

It was only when the company started getting messages from customers asking if it had gone out of business that it realised something was wrong. Mr Burgess said: “Our calls are down drastically, 90% of our work comes from telephone calls. I keep getting emails and Facebook messages from our customers asking if we have closed or gone bust, but we are still fully functioning and taking bookings 24 hours a day.”

However, he explained that the company’s drivers, all self-employed, are losing earnings as a result, and said: “They are down money. One has already left because he’s not earning enough.”

If the company ends up needing to change its branding it will be very expensive, and Mr Burgess said a claim for compensation could take months to resolve. Anytime Taxis has eight private hire vehicles, two Hackney black cabs and an eight-seater minibus.

If anyone wants to hire them they can contact the company via its Facebook page or there is an app that can be downloaded. There is also a back office number - 01752 422046 - which is being used as a temporary solution and people can ring that to book rides.

“But we are called Anytime Taxis,” Mr Burgess said. “Our whole brand is that, the business is based around that number.”

BT said it is trying to sort out the situation but admitted it is complicated and unusual. The problem appears to stem from the allocation of the number, done via a method of porting (transferring) that is regulated by Ofcom.

Under this system, people and businesses who change their provider can keep their old number and it is simply moved across. But if they choose to have a new number, the old one can be given to someone else.

It is possible the problem has arisen because another phone provider may have incorrectly transferred the 247365 number from its list of allocated numbers, and it was then given to Anytime Taxis by Ofcom. A BT spokesperson said: “It’s not 100% clear how this has happened and we are trying to get to the bottom of it and offer options and solutions to the customer.

“This error has unfortunately resulted in the customer having only limited service on their line over the last week. This situation is out of BT’s control, but we are doing everything we can to work with the other parties involved to fix the problem. We've apologised to the customer for this and we're keeping them updated today as we try to find a solution as soon as possible.”


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PostPosted: Sat Jun 25, 2022 10:46 am 
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hmmmm...

I can see the claims companies queuing up to take this one on :lol:

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PostPosted: Sat Jul 30, 2022 7:21 pm 
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Boss of Plymouth's stricken Anytime Taxis bounces back by restarting Chequer Cabs

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Ben Burgess now in partnership with directors of mothballed brand and has nine cars on the road just a week after phone glitch drove Anytime Taxis under

The boss of a Plymouth taxi company driven out of business by a bizarre phone glitch has bounced back by restarting Chequer Cabs. Ben Burgess has linked up with directors of the mothballed cab company and it is now back in action with nine vehicles on the road, just a week after he had to pull the plug on Anytime Taxis.

Mr Burgess has reopened the Chequer Cabs office in North Hill and has a Facebook page. The 01752 665544 number is reactivated too and he said the brand is now very much back, with private hire drivers and a black Hackney cab, after it had been in limbo recently.

“I’m back in force,” said Mr Burgess. “In the past four days we have acquired up to 200 followers on Facebook, we have now got 3,250 on Facebook.”

Mr Burgess says he is still pursuing legal action against telecoms giant BT after a phone glitch drove Anytime Taxis out of business only a little over six month after it was launched. He has also lodged a complaint with the Communications Ombudsman.

The Union Street-based company says it ceased trading after losing nearly all its drivers when custom fell away because people couldn’t ring its office number. Mr Burgess, who owned the company, said he is considering a £200,000 claim against BT to make up for lost trade and to cover £35,000 of contracts and loans he is personally responsible for.

Following the company’s closure, Mr Burgess weighed up options and spoke to directors at Chequer Cabs, which had been out of action. He said: “It started with a conversation. I got in touch with the original directors. They wanted to do something. We are now a partnership.

“We have taken the phone number back and they still have the lease on the (North Hill) unit and the (IT) systems. I’m a lot happier now and have a future again. The passion is back, there is a buzz around the office. We have nine drivers active at the moment.”

Mr Burgess had told PlymouthLive how he was “devastated” at losing Anytime Taxis when it was stricken by a telecoms nightmare in mid June. The company said it saw journeys shrink dramatically after its phone line stopped accepting calls from anyone not on the BT/EE network. On one Friday night alone only 31 calls came in, when normally there would be more than 200.

The highly-unusual problem appears to be because the company’s landline number - 247365 - had been given to it by mistake, and was possibly being claimed by a business elsewhere in the UK. Phone provider BT apologised to Mr Burgess and launched an investigation. It said it did everything it could to resolve the problem, but the glitch persisted and it reached the stage where only four of Anytime Taxis’ 12 self-employed drivers were still working for the firm because trade had dropped so much.

Not only did the company lose phone access for weeks, costing it thousands of fares, Mr Burgess said it also damaged the firm in other ways. It had chosen the 247365 number because it represented it being open for business 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year and all its branding and logos were based around that number. Anytime Taxis had eight private hire vehicles, two Hackney black cabs and an eight-seater minibus.

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PostPosted: Sun Jul 31, 2022 1:43 pm 
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where's our local correspondent because a lot about this doesn't quite add up is there another business in the area on the 247365 number ?

How did a new business with only 8 vehicles reach 200 phone calls on a Friday night ?

How come he is able to "resurrect" another PH company that apparently has an office and phone numbers but was not trading ?

something doesn't seem quite right here come on Chris put that rod and line down 5 minutes and give us the local gen or have you managed to bag a nice bluefin tuna recently and sold it to a Japanese sushi restaurant for a million quid ?

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PostPosted: Sun Jul 31, 2022 5:56 pm 
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How did a new business with only 8 vehicles reach 200 phone calls on a Friday night ?

Maybe 100 of those were chasing up as to where their cars were.

Or maybe the operator was telling porkies.

Who would have thought? :roll: :roll:

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PostPosted: Sun Jul 31, 2022 9:30 pm 
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There is a shortage of Taxis and PH. If the big boys won't take a booking in this age of the smartphone, punters look on Google for an alternate. I am sure they got 200 or more calls.

Needacab buy up or lease any building/Offices with historic Planning Permission for PH Office. This means if you want to set up, you have to go through the hoops.

One Tuna a year goes for a silly price in Japan, the first Commercially caught. It is illegal to "Target" Tuna if you're British - the rights were sold to France years ago. So Anglers "Target" Sharks, if a Tuna is accidentally hooked you can't land it, but you can measure it in the water whilst you get water over its Gills and help it recover. There has been a huge number of really big Shark Reels bought in the South West, coincidentally this sales started about the same time as Tuna started showing up. A friend of mine has accidentally caught 6 Tuna..... A bit more practice and he will eventually catch his first Shark.

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PostPosted: Mon Aug 01, 2022 8:16 am 
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It is illegal to "Target" Tuna if you're British - the rights were sold to France years ago.


what stupid idiot did that ?

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PostPosted: Mon Aug 01, 2022 11:55 am 
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Don't know, it wasn't part of joining or leaving the EU.

Some Charter boats have a special licence to fish for Tuna, but they can't land them either.

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