Get all your news in one place.
100’s of premium titles.
One app.
Start reading
Manchester Evening News
Manchester Evening News
National
Sophie Halle-Richards

'People will call me old fashioned but I need it': Pensioner fuming after vital landline phone suddenly 'cut off'

A pensioner claims she has been left without a vital landline phone after her internet provider 'cut it off' after upgrading her to fibre optic broadband.

Jackie Foran, 68, claims she is unable to use her upstairs phone at her home in Northenden - which she relies on to ring her son as she has mobility issues, and has on occasion found herself unable to move.

She also claims she is now unable to use her downstairs landline if she is watching her Sky TV, meaning her family have been left unable to contact her for long periods of time.

READ MORE: Woman forced to take four showers a day to mask her smell due to rare condition

Ms Foran claims her broadband supplier, Talk Talk, have since told her she will need to pay £6 a month if she wants to have the upstairs phone line reinstalled. The pensioner says she has spent countless hours on the phone to the company, but claims the issue still hasn't been resolved.

Speaking to the M.E.N, she said: "They rang me up in March and asked me if I wanted to upgrade to fibre optic broadband. I thought it would just be a case of them coming with a new router as nobody explained anything to me on the phone.

Jackie Foran (Gary Oakley/ Manchester Evening News)

"They came and I didn’t realise they were going to remove the landline to plug it all in. Everything was working afterwards but my Sky Box wasn’t. They told me that if I wanted to have Sky I’d have to unplug my landline.

" When I went upstairs and tried to use the landline there it was completely dead. I didn’t know they were going to cut it off otherwise I never would have agreed. I phoned them the next day and said I didn’t want it anymore."

"They said if I pay £6 a month they can reinstall the landline but I never asked for them to cut it off and I never asked for this upgrade."

Jackie suffers with mobility issues in her legs and says she relies on using the phone upstairs to phone her son for help if she is unable to get downstairs or needs taking to hospital.

"I know a lot of young people have mobiles now but I don't and I need to use my landline," she said. "Talk Talk has said they can't send an engineer out because they can only come if there is a fault.

Jackie says she can't use her downstairs landline unless her Sky box is unplugged (Gary Oakley/ Manchester Evening News)

"For the landline to work at all now I have to unplug Sky. The other night I watched it and forgot to unplug it and my kids thought something really bad had happened as they couldn't get hold of me.

"This has been going on and on since March. I must have rung them hundreds of times since then. I just want to make other people who rely on landlines aware about this.

"People should be told about this before they can agree to new upgrades. I know people will call me old fashioned and that we need to move to fibre optic by 2025 but I could be dead by then."

The Manchester Evening News understands that since we contacted Talk Talk, Ms Foran is due to be sent further equipment and has been booked in with an engineer to solve the issue.

Keep up to date with the most-important Greater Manchester news stories with the free email newsletter from the M.E.N.

Sign up to read this article
Read news from 100’s of titles, curated specifically for you.
Already a member? Sign in here
Related Stories
Top stories on inkl right now
One subscription that gives you access to news from hundreds of sites
Already a member? Sign in here
Our Picks
Fourteen days free
Download the app
One app. One membership.
100+ trusted global sources.