Fed-up Robin Hood’s Bay residents say they had suffered disruption since maintenance work began in early June.

Residents of Thorpe Lane, Manor Close and Wesley Road were affected and the disruption left some elderly residents, who live alone, without essential emergency contact.

Avery Nelson, of Thorpe Lane, said last week: “Four weeks ago the phones stopped working and BT came and dug a big hole in the road. Our phones lines went down, there are some very elderly people in their eighties who live round here, and they need their phone lines working.

“We got conflicting stories from BT about what was happening and when they would be working again.

“I went to a payphone to report the fault but got nowhere.

“In the end I had to write a letter to BT and mark it urgent.

“They filled the hole in again days later and after that dug another hole and filled that one in, but still we had no phones.”

Neighbour Sarah Waterson (43) and her two children Zoe and Mark were left with no phone or internet connection.

“I pay for free evening and weekend calls. That is what annoyed me. I pay by direct debit and was getting no service.

“BT were just being so vague. I was passed around the call centres and made seven attempts to resolve this. They just didn’t seem bothered. It was unreal.”

Rita Stubbs (83) said: “My daughter lives in Wakefield and has been unable to get in touch with me. She wrote me a letter in the end.”

“I am utterly disgusted with BT. They just did not seem to want to know about the problems they were causing us.”

Wesley Road resident Kris Britton said: “We got back from holiday and thought it was just our phone then we realised it was affecting everybody.

“With no internet I wasn’t able to do my internet shop at Tesco.

“I don’t drive so I had to get a taxi into Whitby to do my shopping. It cost me £20.

“BT sent text updates to my mobile and the last one said the estimated completion day was Friday but I wasn’t holding my breath.

“I’ve told them I’m going to report them to OFTEL.

“My calls were being diverted to my mobile and they say they will compensate me £1 a day which isn’t enough.”

The Whitby Gazette contacted BT on Thursday morning and they told us that after eleven faults were reported, they were beginning to restore service and expected to have all cutomers with a full working service by the end of Friday.

It said the job had beeen made difficult as access to inspection chambers had, at some point in the past, been tarmaced over.

“This had made locating the fault complicated and resulted in more than one excavation taking place.

They replaced 150 metres of cabling and apologised to customers for the inconvenience.

Service resumed on Thursday afternoon, over 24 hours before the predicted time, after the Gazette stepped in.

Kris Britton said: “It has come back on sooner than we had been advised.