BT fined more than £17m over ‘catastrophic’ 999 call failure

Ofcom said the potential degree of harm to the public as a result of the incident was ‘extremely significant’. Photograph: Jeffrey Blackler/Alamy

BT has been fined more than £17m for missing 14,000 emergency calls after technical faults caused the emergency call handling service to be disrupted for nearly 11 hours last summer.

The telecoms regulator launched an investigation shortly after the incident on 25 June 2023. Publishing its findings on Monday, Ofcom said the handling of the network fault was a “catastrophic failure”.